“The transition that is underway to get to a decarbonized end state is posing material, adverse challenges to electric reliability. A key risk is that many existing “dispatchable” resources that can be turned on and off and adjusted as needed are being replaced with weather-dependent resources such as wind and solar that have materially different characteristics and capabilities. While wind and solar produce needed clean energy, they lack certain key reliability attributes that are needed to keep the grid reliable every hour of the year. Although several emerging technologies may someday change that calculus, they are not yet proven at grid scale. Meanwhile, efforts to build new dispatchable resources face headwinds from government regulations and policies, as well as prevailing investment criteria for financing new energy projects. Until new technologies become viable, we will continue to need dispatchable resources for reliability purposes.”
Above is our regional grid operator’s warning to all willing to listen to it. An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. Once plants like the Campbell are demolished, then this becomes a very difficult issue to tackle.