Enabling Renewable Energy with Data-Driven Power Systems and Battery Energy Storage. RMI and NREL unveil new tools to simplify complex energy analysis and improve energy storage  February 19, 2024 – Basalt, CO Rocky Mountain Institute, and the US Department of Energy’s National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) announced today the launch of innovative, publicly available tools aimed at advancing renewable energy development. These tools were launched as part of RMI’s Energy Transition Academy (ETA), a global leadership and workforce development platform that is designed to empower and equip energy leaders with essential skills including modeling power systems using NREL’s System Advisor Model (SAM). Additionally, the organizations unveiled a comprehensive “how-to” guide on operating and maintaining battery energy storage systems (BESS). The ETA works to ensure leaders are well-informed and ready to act by providing access to curated information, tools, peer-to-peer problem-solving, skills training, and mentorship networks to advance energy transition priorities in their companies, countries, and communities. The ETA collaborates with regional partners such as the Caribbean Electric Utility Services Corporation (CARILEC) and the Lagos Energy Academy, as well as international partners such as NREL to design training opportunities and resources for energy professionals that respond to local training needs. Through courses like SAM and the BESS “how-to” guide, the ETA empowers clean energy professionals to strategically plan and execute initiatives that align with their clean power goals. The System Advisor Model (SAM) is a user-friendly techno-economic computer model designed to calculate the performance and financial metrics of renewable energy projects. This free tool aids decision makers in analyzing the cost, performance, and financing aspects of grid-connected solar, wind, or geothermal power projects of any scale. SAM’s versatility extends to manufacturers, engineering and consulting firms, research and development entities, utilities, developers, venture capital firms, and international organizations, enabling end-to-end analysis for informed decision-making.            https://rmi.org/press-release/enabling-renewable-energy-with-data-driven-power-systems-and-battery-energy-storage/

So Big It’s Boring: The Rise of Utility-Scale Solar. Hundreds of gigawatts of utility-scale solar will define the shape of the rest of America’s carbon-free economy COLIN SMITH MARCH 12, 2021In the second quarter of 2020, the U.S. hit 50 gigawatts of cumulative operating utility solar, without much pause to consider how momentous a milestone it was. In 2011, utility solar reached 1 gigawatt. It took roughly nine years for the country to hit 50 gigawatts, but now it’s on track to reach 100 gigawatts by the end of 2023. Under Wood Mackenzie’s current forecast, U.S. utility solar will surpass 250 gigawatts by 2029 and reach more than 1 terawatt of utility PV somewhere between 2042 and 2045. 

Onshore wind currently is the top technology for annual capacity additions in the U.S. It will hold the No. 1 spot until 2022 when the combination of the stepdown of the federal Production Tax Credit and the growth in solar causes wind to drop to second place. But the growth doesn’t stop there. Annual additions of solar will keep increasing. By 2029, utility solar will see more annual capacity additions than onshore wind, offshore wind, natural gas, battery storage, and all other capacity generation sources combined. In short, utility solar is the first wave in the revolution that will lead to a carbon-free economy. We will need other carbon-free technologies, of course. Onshore and offshore wind will continue to be built, distributed generation will flourish, and new infrastructure such as microgrids will allow the grid to be more resilient and reliable. Through this energy grid evolution, large-scale PV will be the vanguard. That much new solar will also spur its own set of problems. Transmission build-out might be the limiting factor for growth of solar or energy storage and dictating the pace of change. Permitting or NIMBY issues will continue to arise across the country for large-scale and small-scale developers alike. Financing the vast build-out will prove challenging and finding funding could prove to be challenging to some developers. Finally, there’s the looming question of energy-market redesign to handle high levels of solar and renewables penetration, and what that new design might look like. But these challenges to how fast utility solar grows take it for granted that it will, in fact, see such enormous growth. Despite these potential hurdles, more states, utilities and corporations are passing carbon-free energy or 100% renewables plans. This helps increase our certainty that utility-scale solar, as the country’s dominant energy technology, will play a defining role in how the U.S. energy infrastructure changes over the coming decades.....that's the full article, checkout....Solar Will Be Cheapest Form of Electricity Across US by 2030, Plus Other PV Trends. A look at the resource’s next decade, in charts.......https://www.greentechmedia.com/squared/the-lead/solar-to-be-cheapest-form-of-electricity-across-u.s-by-2030-and-other-trends

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New Advancement Could Make Solar Panels 2 to 4 Times Cheaper. The findings may enable engineers to systematically identify the most effective molecules for extending the lifespan of perovskite solar cells, moving away from a reliance on time-consuming trial-and-error methods. A discovery at the University of Michigan provides key insights into preventing rapid degradation of perovskite semiconductors. This advancement has the potential to lead to solar cells that are two to four times less expensive than current thin-film solar panels. Perovskites may also be combined with the silicon-based semiconductors that are prevalent in today’s solar panels to create “tandem” solar cells that could surpass the maximum theoretical efficiency of silicon solar cells. "Silicon solar cells are great because they are very efficient and can last for a very long time, but the high efficiency comes with a high cost,” said Xiwen Gong, U-M assistant professor of chemical engineering. “To make high-purity silicon, temperatures over 1,000 degrees Celsius are needed. Otherwise, the efficiency won’t be as good.” Challenges with Perovskite Solar Cells.......The high temperature comes with higher economic and environmental costs. But while perovskites can be produced at lower temperatures, they degrade when exposed to heat, moisture and air. As a result, the lifespan of perovskite today is too short to be commercially competitive in solar panels. Gong’s research aims to make hardier perovskite solar cells, and her latest study published in the journal Matter suggests that bulky “defect pacifying” molecules are best at increasing the perovskites’ stability and overall lifespan.  Understanding Perovskite Defects........Perovskite crystals contain lead atoms that aren’t fully bound to the other components within the perovskite. Such “undercoordinated sites” are defects often found on the crystal surfaces and at grain boundaries where there’s a break in the crystal lattice. These defects hinder the movement of electrons and speed up the decay of the perovskite material. We wanted to figure out what features on the molecules specifically improve the perovskite’s stability,” said Hongki Kim, a former postdoctoral researcher in chemical engineering and one of the study’s first authors. Research on Perovskite Additives.....read on              https://scitechdaily.com/new-advancement-could-make-solar-panels-2-to-4-times-cheaper/

What the Future of Renewable Energy Looks Like......Renewable energy capacity is set to expand 50% between 2019 and 2024, led by solar energy. This is according to The International Energy Agency (IEA)’s ‘Renewable 2020’ report, which found that solar, wind and hydropower projects are rolling out at their fastest rate in four years, making for the argument that the future lies in using renewable energy. The Future of Renewable Energy: Growth Projections......Renewable energy resources make up 26% of the world’s electricity today, but according to the IEA its share is expected to reach 30% by 2024. The resurgence follows a global slowdown in 2019, due to falling technology costs and rising environmental concerns. Renewable energy in the future is predicted that by 2024, solar capacity in the world will grow by 600 gigawatts (GW), almost double the installed total electricity capacity of Japan. Overall, renewable electricity is predicted to grow by 1 200 GW by 2024, the equivalent of the total electricity capacity of the US. The IEA is an autonomous inter-governmental organisation that was initially created after the wake of the 1973 oil crisis. It now acts as an energy policy advisor to 29 member countries and the European Commission to shape energy policies for a secure and sustainable future. 1. Solar Will Become 35% Cheaper By 2024 When the sun shines onto a solar panel, energy from the sunlight is absorbed by the PV cells in the panel. This energy creates electrical charges that move in response to an internal electrical field in the cell, causing electricity to flow. Industry experts predict that the US will double its solar installations to four million by 2023. In 2018, the UK had over one million solar panel installations, up by 2% from the previous year and Australia reached two million solar installations in the same year. A big reason for this increased uptake is the fall in prices to install the panels. The cost of solar PV-based power declined by 13% in 2018, while Carbon Tracker predicts that 72% of coal-based power will become globally unprofitable by 2040. The IEA report found that solar energy will account for 60% of the predicted renewable growth, primarily due to its accessibility. Compared with the previous six-year period, expansion of solar energy has more than doubled. The cost of solar power is expected to decline by 15% to 35% by 2024, spurring further growth over the second half of the decade. Future Capacity of Solar Energy......Wind and hydropower often require users to live in specific locations, but solar offers more freedom; the sun rises and sets on a predictable schedule, and it’s not as variable as running water or wind. Residential solar power is expected to expand.....read on      https://earth.org/the-growth-of-renewable-energy-what-does-the-future-hold/