Solar Power Saving Communities In Money And Lives

Solar power is OLD. The first solar electric generator was made in 1904. The National Center for Photovoltaics was established in 1996. And solar power is saving Texan backsides right now. German ones, too. And perhaps, one day, it will do so around the world.

The heat waves searing the United States and Europe have generated huge demand for energy, as air conditioners work overtime. Texas, for instance, has broken records for energy demand at least 11 times this summer. This has turned out to be a lifesaving investment. The additional power provided by newly installed solar has probably prevented rolling blackouts this summer. Blackouts that could have proven deadly in this years heat.

“If you took the weather conditions from this year, and plopped them onto [the power infrastructure] from last year, it’s extremely likely that we would have had outages,” Doug Lewin, a Texas-based energy consultant told the Washington Post. But they didn’t happen.

That’s because there has been an enormous ramp-up in solar investment in recent years. This has been driven by multiple factors, including government incentives, customer demand and especially technological advancements that have made solar astonishingly cheap. Sun-drenched Texas has nearly tripled the  amount of solar this summer compared to last summer.

Europe is simultaneously attempting to wean itself off Russian-produced natural gas, increasing demand for other fuel sources. Combine that with the extreme heat they have been seeing and once again millions could have found themselves without power as traditional supplies came up short. But again, Solar power filled in the gap.

The “Canberra bubble” is something of a derisive term in Australia, referring to the niche interests of politicians, lobbyists and media insiders in the country’s capital — the equivalent of being entrenched “inside the Beltway” of Washington D.C.

But as energy bills nationally surge due to high prices for coal and gas triggered by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and aging coal-fired power plants increase strain on the system due to a large number of maintenance outages, it turns out that the Canberra bubble offers not a distraction from cost-of-living pressures, but protection from them. Canberra’s commitment to renewables has made it the only community in the country where energy costs stayed low while fossil fuel prices soar.

Canada could do very well to learn from these lessons.

Sources: https://wapo.st/3S6H4yP and https://bit.ly/3PY7cKj