Thank you Maureen Horn for sharing the following news article with me. This complexity will challenge the utility sector significantly. Conservation and a regional development of energy resources are criticle.
“In an Aug. 13 presentation …, company officials cautioned that “the region is increasingly at risk for rolling blackouts and brownouts,” which it blames in part to “aging transmission infrastructure that cannot meet current or projected demand.”
However, the presentation also noted that “data centers in the PNW, which are notorious for high energy use, are expected to more than double their electricity use in the coming years.”
Another contributor is the state’s transportation electrification efforts, with a ban on new fossil fuel vehicles taking effect in 2030. Currently, there are roughly 90,200 battery electric vehicles registered in Washington. Last year, light-duty electric vehicles consumed about 309,000 megawatt hours of electricity.
The dilemma facing Washington is twofold. The first is that its energy grid will require an additional 5,300-gigawatt hours by 2030 and 13,500 GWh by 2045 to meet demand, according to Tenaska’s presentation; one gigawatt is enough electricity to power 750,000 homes.
By 2050, electrical load growth is anticipated to increase by 92% compared to 2020 demand.
The second dilemma is that the new electricity must be from sources that conform to the state’s Clean Energy Transformation Act, which stipulates that utilities cannot use coal-based electricity starting next year, and by 2030 they can only use carbon neutral sources. By 2045, the energy will need to be from 100% renewable or “non-emitting” sources.
According to Inslee’s letter to the council, the original project would have generated 1,150 megawatts of electricity, 5% of the total needed to meet 2035 demand. Inslee wrote that 20 projects of similar energy generation will need to be built by 2035 if the state is to meet demand.” (NewsBreak, TJ Martinell 8.14.24)
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