This past April marked the first month in U.S. history that renewable energy sources supplied more electricity than coal. Clean energy sources—including wind turbines, solar panels and hydroelectric dams—generated nearly 68.5 million megawatt-hours of power in April. Meanwhile, coal produced roughly 60 million megawatt-hours of power in the same time period, according to the Energy Information Administration (you can view the data here ).
The fact that April saw the most clean power America has ever produced seems to bode quite well for renewable energy sources in the future. In fact, BloombergNEF predicts that the world will get half its power from wind and solar by 2050.
According to BloombergNEF, renewable energy sources—including wind, solar and battery storage—are being targeted by the power sector to fulfill its share of emission cuts required under the Paris climate agreement, at least until 2030. Electricity demand is also expected to increase by 62% over the next three decades.
As the Union of Concerned Scientists points out : “Because some renewable energy technologies—such as wind and solar—have variable outputs, storage technologies have great potential for smoothing out the electricity supply from these sources and ensuring that the supply of generation matches the demand.”
At Dynapower, we’re huge supporters of renewable energy—which is why we’ve worked hard over the last decade to become a leader in the field of energy storage systems. Our energy storage solutions scale to the power and energy requirements of any site—including small businesses, renewable installation and local/regional utilities.
The Future of Energy Storage
According to BNEF, the cost of wind power has sunk 49% since 2010 while solar has dropped by 85%. However, it’s worth noting that while the overall trend towards renewable energy sources is extremely strong, coal-fired power plants produced less in April due to many facilities being down for spring maintenance. Nevertheless, renewable energy will continue to grow exponentially in the coming months and years as more and more wind and solar farms are deployed.
As industry and government support grows, the future of energy storage and renewables appears brighter and brighter. According to the Union of Concerned Scientists, this growing support will allow energy storage technology to “continue to develop and expand, aid in the increasing deployment of variable renewable energy sources, and help store an ever-growing amount of clean, renewable energy in the future.”
