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Wind and solar generated more power than gas globally in April 2026

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Re: Wind and solar generated more power than gas globally in April 2026

#391

Post by nonethewiser »

epistasis wrote: post #272
verdverm wrote: post #224

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why is there such a disconnect?

Transmission and distribution costs: i.e. the grid. California is a massive state, has very rugged terrain, and there's a ton of deferred maintenance on transmission lines that are more than 50 years old, that are at huge risk of causing massive wildfires that destroy entire towns. This has been terribly mismanaged, because like most places with regulated monopoly utilities, the regulatory body is opaque and not very…

Solar is a contributing factor in the grid costs though. You cant say solar generation makes wholesale prices cheaper then completely exclude how an oversupply of solar and tons of curtailment drives grid costs up.

Re: Wind and solar generated more power than gas globally in April 2026

#392

Post by bryanlarsen »

nonethewiser wrote: post #390
bryanlarsen wrote: post #218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not. California has the cheapest wholesale electricity prices in the country. It's the only place in the country with a wholesale rate below $100 / MWh, and California is way below $100. https://cleantechnica.com/2026/05/30/california-lowest-whole... Retail prices are of course super high in California, but that has nothing to do with generation.

Actually, solar is a reason for both of these: 1. California wholesale prices are the lowest in the country 2. California consumer prices are the highest in the country That's no coincidence. Solar credits in 1 and debits in 2, so to speak. One reason wholesale electricity prices are so low is because there is an excess in solar. Rates go negative midday when demand is lower. That really brings down the average. But…

The load weighted price would be lower. If they averaged across 24 hours, but load is higher in the daytime when the prices are lower.

> The high transmission and delivery costs, which you identified as the reason for the disconnect, is partially the function of so much solar generation

That correlation is very low. All new supply requires new grid connections, but that's the same whether it is natgas or solar. And generation interconnect is a fraction of grid costs -- last mile is the bulk.

P.S. your graph is also highly misleading since it doesn't include 2025. Battery supply increased substantially in 2025, and curtailment dropped in 2025.

Re: Wind and solar generated more power than gas globally in April 2026

#393

Post by smartbit »

belorn wrote: post #374
smartbit wrote: post #366

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Both users and companies could be incentivized to lower their consumption of electricity by increasing the price astronomical during periods of scarcity. A minimum of 1 Ampere per household without surcharge and beyond that enough to pay off the infrastructure. Taking a sauna or charging your car during peak times would costs, let’s say, €500. Assuming that in the north of Sweden there is ample Hydro energy, in the n…

Market prices in the electricity grid do not work to incentivized lower consumption, and the latest few energy crisis in EU has demonstrated that clearly. You can't expect workers to go to work based on when the weather is optimal, and to stay at home (unpaid) when it is not. Rent do not go down according to weather, nor do food prices. Workers do not like to go to work at 3am in the night if that happens to be the t…

I respectfully disagree. The main argument that is completely ignored and not reacted to “humans can adapt, they behave different in different circumstances, eg. wear thicker coats in northern Sweden than in the southern areas”. Our huge brains allow for creative solutions to changing circumstances, also bakers and other workers can adapt. If they don’t for political reasons, then societies die or diminish.

> Market prices in the electricity grid do not work to incentivized lower consumption, and the latest few energy crisis in EU has demonstrated that clearly.

The prices haven’t changed much, less than factor 2. Far too little to see any change in consumption indeed. If bread is too expensive to produce during some periods switch to Knäckebröd or Müsli products that, now I think of it, are Swedish probably for the reason that they can be stored for prolonged periods and replace bread when that is unavailable in harsh wintertimes.

> right now Hydro energy is being primarily sold off by private actors

It happens all over the world, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commons is an alternative that historically has been successful.

Re: Wind and solar generated more power than gas globally in April 2026

#394

Post by belorn »

smartbit wrote: post #393
belorn wrote: post #374

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Market prices in the electricity grid do not work to incentivized lower consumption, and the latest few energy crisis in EU has demonstrated that clearly. You can't expect workers to go to work based on when the weather is optimal, and to stay at home (unpaid) when it is not. Rent do not go down according to weather, nor do food prices. Workers do not like to go to work at 3am in the night if that happens to be the t…

I respectfully disagree. The main argument that is completely ignored and not reacted to “humans can adapt, they behave different in different circumstances, eg. wear thicker coats in northern Sweden than in the southern areas”. Our huge brains allow for creative solutions to changing circumstances, also bakers and other workers can adapt. If they don’t for political reasons, then societies die or diminish. > Market…

Humans can definitively adapt. Historical when there has been a bad harvest, invading a nearby country which has it better has always been an available option. An alternative solution that humans been up to to handle change is to produce a social rules (like a price roof) so that other people carry the load when the weather provide a bad turn. There is no question that humans can adapt, only a question if that adaption is good for society with some definition of good.

If we imagine a society where production become based on the availability of energy through optimal weather, we would have to ask what the cost of that adaptation is and if alternative solutions, say nuclear energy, would be cheaper. The best adaption can simply be to use the correct tool for the job, a tool which may be more optimal in some climates but less so in others. If there is something humans excel at it is to adapt to nature and produce local solutions to local weather conditions.

Re: Wind and solar generated more power than gas globally in April 2026

#395

Post by dnautics »

some-guy wrote: post #38
dnautics wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the U.S. administration has chosen to actively fight against it the biggest producer of renewables is Texas, by a longshot. and the state of california just created insane NEM laws that favor the pockets of pg&e (and are shit for the environment) and as a result solar home installations have cratered.

Both NEM 2.0 and 3.0 have serious issues, but for different reasons. NEM 2.0 was basically a early adopter's rich person's subsidy that heavily distorted the market, and NEM 3.0 does not have nearly enough subsidies to justify the cost unless you pay cash up front for a large system. (For the record, I am on NEM 3.0 and got such a system). At the end of the day, the best case scenario is large scale renewable / batte…

i thought the new NEM screws the homeowner because the city sells electricity at market price and buys electricity back strictly at the worst possible price, even if you're producing at peak demand.

Re: Wind and solar generated more power than gas globally in April 2026

#396

Post by dzhiurgis »

DanielHB wrote: post #367
scope2093 wrote: post #264

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree. The momentum seems to be building up though, at least in (east) Europe, so there is a glimpse of hope. Fun fact: we still don't have AC in our house (it's a new-ish building, built 4 years ago) because it's decently insulated (and we live near the mountains). As in your case, our solar produces way over 100% of what we need, so I'm considering just getting AC to use the sun to cool the house if needed :)

I live in Sweden and there is very heavy insulation, however it makes it unbearable at the end of the summer days (sunset around midnight). I am lucky my current place the bedrooms get the morning sun, not the afternoon sun like my old place. In my old place I would often sleep in the living room sofa because of the heat.

Does your windows have IR film?

Re: Wind and solar generated more power than gas globally in April 2026

#397

Post by dzhiurgis »

scope2093 wrote: post #352
sandos wrote: post #322

Earlier quoted context omitted.

11k euro is INSANELY cheap? Afaik there is absolutely no way to the same thing legally here in Sweden. Unless prices have really fallen off a cliff.

Yes, indeed, once I saw the math/price, it seemed like a no-brainer to just install it. Anedoctal, of course, the rumour is a few (small-ish) companies here offer their complete services abroad in EU (at least to Germany to my knowledge), which makes it very cheap to install, but I did not interact with said companies. I have friends in Germany and their solar (similar to ours, no batteries) installation cost more th…

Missing gst.

Re: Wind and solar generated more power than gas globally in April 2026

#398

Post by epistasis »

nonethewiser wrote: post #391
epistasis wrote: post #272

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Transmission and distribution costs: i.e. the grid. California is a massive state, has very rugged terrain, and there's a ton of deferred maintenance on transmission lines that are more than 50 years old, that are at huge risk of causing massive wildfires that destroy entire towns. This has been terribly mismanaged, because like most places with regulated monopoly utilities, the regulatory body is opaque and not very…

Solar is a contributing factor in the grid costs though. You cant say solar generation makes wholesale prices cheaper then completely exclude how an oversupply of solar and tons of curtailment drives grid costs up.

No it really isn't much of a contributor to the current grid costs, which are nearly all maintenance and mismanagent.

Especially residential solar, which greatly lessens the need for distribution and transmission max capacity, therefore T&D costs, yet this is an area where the utility has been able to present very biased analyses that snow the regulators, because anything that lessens T&D need means that the utility makes less money and must be stopped.

There is not tons of curtailment of solar, it's a solved problem. Storage is now super super cheap. Grid maintenant is super expensive.

We have all the accounting right in front of us, and the answers are clear.

Re: Wind and solar generated more power than gas globally in April 2026

#399

Post by citrin_ru »

throwaway473825 wrote: post #327
citrin_ru wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Gas allows to use combined cycle gas turbines (CCGT) which is more efficient and it makes gas cheaper for electricity generation.

That's still not enough to bridge the gap between coal and gas. See for example this article: https://www.ffe.de/en/publications/merit-order-shifts-and-th... The US is an anomaly due to shale gas: https://energyathaas.wordpress.com/2026/05/11/how-much-has-s...

Gas prices vary across the world, mostly depending on if it's only LNG imports (high prices) or local sources (much cheaper, e. g. the US) or a mix (e. g. Europe but since 2022 it's heavy reliant on LNG which pushes prices up). Coal prices also vary. Guess we cannot compare gas and coal prices globally, only withing a specific region.

Re: Wind and solar generated more power than gas globally in April 2026

#400

Post by philipallstar »

pstuart wrote: post #239
philipallstar wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

Could you explain cultural marxism to me in your own words? More so, could you hazard a guess why those friends would be categorically against renewables?

> could you hazard a guess why those friends would be categorically against renewables?

The simplest way to understand people's motivations is to ask them, and not to guess what they're thinking and gripe about those guesses on online forums.

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