The risky nature of Big Solar projects has been driven home with California regulators’ move to kill a controversial $1.3 billion transmission line that would have connected massive solar power stations in the desert to coastal cities.
“These projects are unlikely to proceed,” wrote Jean Vieth, an administrative law judge with the California Public Utilities Commission, in a ruling rejecting San Diego Gas & Electric’s Sunrise Powerlink transmission line.
Phoenix-based Stirling Energy Systems in 2005 scored a contract to provide SDG&E (SRE) with up to 900 megawatts of electricity to be generated by as many as 36,000 solar dishes. A few months later, the utility filed an application to build the Sunrise Powerlink, a new transmission line to connect the Stirling power plants and other renewable energy projects to the coast.
But the utility’s proposal to build 150-foot-high transmission towers right through wilderness areas of Anza-Borrego State Park, home to a host of protected species, triggered a long-running fight with green groups that generated an 11,000-page environmental impact report. On Halloween, Vieth issued a ruling that found that despite state mandates to cut greenhouse gas emissions, the environmental impact of the transmission project was frightening.
“The potentially high economic costs to ratepayers and the potential implications for our [greenhouse gas] policy objectives do not justify the severe environmental damage that any of the transmission proposals would cause,” concluded Vieth in a 265-page decision.
The battle isn’t over — the public utilities commission will vote in December whether to accept the judge’s ruling. They will also consider an alternative decision issued by a commissioner assigned to review the case. That decision would let SDG&E build a transmission line along a different route under certain conditions.
But the case highlights the conflicting environmental values that will dog solar power projects. In other words, just what trade-offs are we willing to make to secure a planet-friendly source of energy? In this case, the judge ruled that to avoid the environmental damage of a massive new transmission line, the preferred alternative is to build more fossil-fuel plants close to San Diego along with a smaller-scale solar power station and a huge increase in rooftop solar arrays. The judge acknowledged that such an alternative “would cause substantially more GHG emissions than the proposed project and other transmission proposals.”
The judge’s second preferred alternative was to build only renewable-energy projects near San Diego that would not require big new transmission lines. Some Sunrise Powerlink opponents argue that San Diego has enough roof space to generative massive amounts of electricity from photovoltaic solar panels. (The cost of such an undertaking was left unsaid.)
Public Utilities Commissioner Dian Grueneich’s alternative decision would allow San Diego Gas & Electric to build Sunrise Powerlink along a more environmentally-benign route if the utility could prove that most of the transmission line would carry renewable energy so as to offset the 100,000 tons of greenhouse gases emitted during its construction. “Reliance on a single 900-megawatt contract (the Stirling Energy Systems contract) is too risky,” she wrote.
So where does this leave Stirling? COO Bruce Osborn didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment. But earlier this year, he told Green Wombat that even if Sunrise Powerlink was killed, there’s enough existing transmission capacity to carry electricity from the power plant’s first 300-megawatt phase. Stirling also has a 20-year contract to supply up to 850 megawatts of electricity to utility Southern California Edison (EIX), a deal not contingent on Sunrise Powerlink.
Green Wombat 
The disregard for economic damages to California residents is totally astonishing.Without reading the entire decision it is not impossible to conclude that this is a loony toons type of judicial interference in lawful commercial enterprise.
…the green are now eating each others’ young. California’s judicial branch is as dysfunctional as the rest of the state’s administration.
sad news but c’mon. proabably not the best idea to to build 150-foot-high transmission towers right through wilderness areas of Anza-Borrego State Park.
still the holy grail of solar — low-cost, lightweight, and extremely effcient soalr cells — is in sight, and the investments in solar in the next 5-10 years will be massive. if you want to learn more and follow the action you can go to sites such as
Greentech Media
It’s a bright bright future for solar energy. Currently 3 GW worldwide, is expected to double in the next 2-3 years.
Instead of building a high voltage transmission line, they should instead use the solar arrays to run air compressors. That compressed air could be pipelined underground to the coast to turn power generators in San Diego. And if leaks occur, it is only air. No EMI, no unsightly towers and no fossil fuels. No environmental damage once the pipes are in the ground.
And the compressed air can be stored during the day to run the generators in the evening to make power when we really need it.
Why not run the lines underground instead?
This is an administrative law judge employed by the PUC to review this decision, not a courtroom judge. There is no judicial interference here. Read more here: http://tinyurl.com/powerlinkUT
To the person that asked why they don’t run them under ground, high voltage power lines are less efficient underground than they are in the air. Also, the damage is done when they have to haul the bulldozers in to clear out and setup the transmission line towers. Pretty similar to hauling them in to clear out and run lines underground.
As to the person that suggested compressing air… …seriously people. I realize a complete lack of appreciation for basic physics, let alone the realities of power generation and transmission, is what has allowed everyone in the union to believe that the only thing holding us back from relying on pure, clean energy is a lack of cooperation from the big, bad industries. However, reality has to step in once in a while here. It saddens me to hear so many people, talk so passionately, about things they understand so incompletely.
Why don’t you guys just ask the good forest fairies to fly the packets of sunshine over to you? It would be about as realistic as compressing air and pumping it.
Imagine that, a whole bunch of people decide to overpopulate a remote, hot, arid stretch of land, isolate themselves by multiple stretches of protected national forest/park, then complain about someone else not being able to provide them with everything they want to keep them living the life they prefer. Gotta love California.
WHO CARE’S! I HOPE THEY BUILD THIS THING IN YOUR BACK YARD!
GIVE ME ENGERY STUPID!
Run lines underground? They did that with a 5 mile long power line here in Virginia. It won’t carry as much power as an overhead, and reputedly added 10 cents to that power company’s customer’s bills _every_ month. That’s 5 miles, 10 cents, every month. Multiply that by the greater distances and larger power carrying capacity required, and you’ll be paying $200 per month just for your infrastructure, before you buy the first kilowatt.
Environmentalists act like there’s a bottomless pit of money to pay for their desire to save every insect on the planet. California and other states inflicted with these greens are going to implode in a great pile of unaffordability. I’ll watch from the Midwest, after I retire. Should be entertaining. Maybe I’ll rent a room to a California refugee who will be amazed that I will have electrical service 24 hours a day…
Onell Soto writes that this isn’t judicial interference. No it’s worse, it is an unelected, unappointed, unaccountable administrative law judge making a decision for millions without regard. What a system.
High voltage DC lines are no less efficient if run underground, unlike AC lines. I hope we get serious about building out such an infrastructure since it would reap dividends for years to come.
StephenB
Regarding underground vs. overground, its cost that is the main factor. Areas of “outstanding natural beauty” tend to have their power lines hidden under ground (common in parts of europe)
Quote Wikipedia:
Electric power can also be transmitted by underground power cables instead of overhead power lines. This is a more expensive option, as the life-cycle cost of an underground power cable is two to four times the cost of an overhead power line.[2] However, they can assist the transmission of power across:
Densely populated urban areas
Areas where land is unavailable or planning consent is difficult
Rivers and other natural obstacles
Land with outstanding natural or environmental heritage
Areas of significant or prestigious infrastructural development
Land whose value must be maintained for future urban expansion and rural development
Compared to overhead lines, underground cables emit much less powerful magnetic fields. (All conductors carrying current which varies with respect to time generate magnetic fields.) Underground cables need a narrower strip of about 1- 10 metres to install, whereas the lack of cable insulation requires an overhead line to be installed on a strip of about 20- 200 metres wide to be kept permanently clear for safety, maintenance and repair. Those advantages can in some cases justify the higher investment cost.
Most high-voltage underground cables for power transmission that are currently sold on the market are insulated by a sheath of cross linked polyethylene (XLPE). Some cable may have a lead jacket in conjunction with XLPE insulation to allow for fiber optics to be seamlessly integrated within the cable. Before 1960, underground power cables used to be insulated with oil and paper and ran in a rigid steel pipe, or a semi-rigid aluminium or lead jacket or sheath. The oil was kept under pressure to prevent formation of voids that would allow partial discharges within the cable insulation. There are still many of those oil-and-paper insulated cables in use worldwide. Between 1960 and 1990, polymers became more widely used at distribution voltages, mostly EPDM; however, their relative unreliability – particularly early XLPE – resulted in a slow uptake at transmission voltages. While cables of, say, 330kV are commonly constructed using XLPE, this has only occurred in recent years.
Just pay the extra and put them underground I say.
There are FAR too many eco-Nazis and environmental nut-bags for their own good.
Basically mankind needs to die to keep those folks happy.
Just build the darned thing.
why can they do things simple? Like the opponents have suggested use individual houses as power source then you don’t need to build new lines. Using already existing infrastructure will cut cost, save precious resources like copper, environment, etc. Also, benefit of house not losing power during a black out. With current config. each house could do about 9kw which cost about $20k, that would be enough for 65,000 house to generate about 585 mega watt for cost of building that transmission line. SDGE can set up and least that to customer like a electric bill, any surplus of electricity flows back to grid, any unused electricity from SDGE power generation can go to businesses and natinal grid. SDGE can also, bill maintenance to consumers and also write off the investment with Fed tax credit. SDGE saves money and create power source without much regulation or overhead, consumer gets clean energy with back up capacity in case of powerline cut or outage, cut down on environmental damage, no activists in the way. also, this work will create job near town not in no where in desert, where slew of people heading out there can damage the place. By the way, I am not a green person, this is simply a better business case.
It is actually more expensive to build on someone’s roof (if it is a strong enough roof, besides who owns it) and to put in that many separate inverters then to do one large greenfield solar project.
two choices – personal responsibility. make every one their own mini-power generator. Second choice is major capital projects with infrastructure. Big business always like to keep control and keep customers paying, if we all become self generators, big business loses, and so does all the big money for the lobbyists.
I love this! I left Kalifornia in 1990 and never looked back. I work in nuclear power at a location that generates almost 4000 MegaWatts of electricity at a reasonable rate. I can’t wait for the rolling blackouts to hit Kalifornia and the NIMBY crowds. Wait, that won’t happen because Saint Obama will generate free, clean, green energy for all.
Simon of Ridgefield CT wants everyone to own their own Solar power infrastuctur at their house but he will never be able to make it work. I live here in Connecticut and with all of our cloudy days we average less than 3 hours of sun light a day.
Wind we can do out to sea south of Block island, geothermal we haven’t got at all. Reality needs to intrude in the lives of environmentalists.
Don’t expect big investments in green enery in California when people like this judge attempt to shoot down real projects like this in favor of fantasies that are 10-20 years down the road. Who let the judge out of Disneyland?
If the government wants to bail out Ford or GM, let’s get double our money by requiring the company to produce only hybrid and electric vehicles going forward. That way our taxpayer investment at least goes towards developing technologies to move us towards energy independence.
–jmanley
Solar PV, biofuels, hydrogen, improved vehicle efficiency, and compressed natural gas are not going to solve either the impending oil crisis or the climate crisis. Bear with me here for a sound perspective that has not often been heard from the green advocates. We will be able to recycle CO2 into standard liquid fuels using wind energy, as I’ll explain shortly, but first some background on a problem with solar, nuclear, and biofuels – cost.
The renewables advocates almost never mentioning capacity factor (CF, the ratio of annual mean power to peak name-plate power). The best available data indicates the following mean capacity factors for recently installed power plants: fixed PV, under 14%; CSP, 20%; wind, 28%; conventional power, 80%.
The only recent CSP plant with well-documented costs is the 65 MW Nevada Solar One (2007), which cost $3.5/W. Conventional natural gas power plants cost about one-third as much per peak electrical watt and produce four times as much energy annually for the same published power rating – because they produce all around the clock, not just in the middle of the day. Hence, the Nevada Solar One plant cost per energy output was 12 times that for a gas power plant. The available data indicate other CSP options (including Stirling) are more expensive.
The larger PV installations in North America today (without tracking) achieve up to 15% CF in good areas and cost about $5/W. Hence, the PV plant costs over 20 times as much as a gas power plant of similar annual energy output. The largest PV plant currently under construction in North America (Lennox County, Ontario) has a contract to sell its energy at $0.44/kWhr – four times the U.S. average for electricity. The most recent data (9/2008) show rooftop solar in larger installations (~18 kW) costs $8/W. An “18 kW” PV rooftop system at 12% CF produces 19 MWhrs of energy annually. At the current national average of $120/MWhr for residential electricity, its energy is worth $2300/yr. The interest cost alone, assuming 8%, is $12K/yr.
The upfront costs for nuclear power plants in the US are being quoted by the major companies (Exelon and GE) in the range of $5500-$9000/kW for plants of ~1 GWE. Wind, on the other hand, can be below $900/kW in prime areas, though it may be over $2000/kW in many areas where it is still being built. The capacity factor of nuclear is only 2.2 to 3.0 times that of wind. Hence, the upfront cost for new nuclear energy (not peak power) today is 1.5 to 4 times that for wind energy. A decade ago, that ratio was reversed. New construction of unsubsidized nuclear power is not currently competitive in any advanced country where there are good wind resources.
When the hundreds of thousands of square miles of pine forests that have been killed by the pine beetle are gone (from wild fires) five years from now, the price of wood pellets and all other cellulosic feedstocks will soar. Vast regions of the Rocky Mountains that were previously mature forests, both pines and mixed species, will be bare or in seedlings by 2012. The global wood-pellet market by 2014 will be approaching 100 MMT/yr, and wood pellets will be above $500/ton – ten times what they cost four years ago. Using the world’s limited cellulosic feedstocks for domestic heating is more than twice as efficient as making transportation fuels from them. Ethanol from these cellulosic feedstocks five years from now will be $6.50/gal.
There is a much better solution for transportation fuels. Detailed simulations have recently shown that low-cost off-peak wind energy can be used to recycle CO2 into ethanol, gasoline, and jet fuel at up to 60% efficiency. These wind-generated carbon-neutral fuels, dubbed WindFuels, will compete when oil is above $80/bbl. Recycling CO2 into transportation fuels using renewable energy addresses both the oil and the climate challenges. The energy storage problem with wind is no longer the challenge it has been perceived to be. Detailed scientific, engineering, and economics analyses are available at http://windfuels.com/ .
Wind energy is the most competitive renewable energy resource in many regions. The perceived challenge is getting wind energy from good sites to where and when it is needed. Efficient conversion of off-peak wind energy and waste CO2 into standard liquid fuels solves these problems. Annual WindFuels production per land area in good wind regions will exceed biofuels production density in fertile farming areas by a factor of 4 to 30.
The cost of producing ethanol and gasoline from CO2 and wind energy will depend mostly on the quality of the wind site and on the market for the co-produced electrolysis oxygen. In a Class-4 wind site with expected consideration for climate benefit, the cost of wind ethanol should be about $2.00/gal. Wind-gasoline will compete as long as oil is above $85/bbl.
It is essential for the market to help drive the dramatic cut needed in CO2 emissions to prevent a climate disaster in this century. With the taxes expected on CO2 emissions within a decade, WindFuels (ethanol, gasoline, jet fuel, diesel, etc.) will prove to be the most competitive solution to transportation fuel needs in North America. Tell Obama and the DOE that we need to start developing the industry that will synthesize all future transportation fuels efficiently from low-cost renewable energy and waste CO2.
Todd,
Thanks for reporting this. Without transmission capacity, California won’t be able to use all the solar energy falling on our vast (and cheap) nearby deserts. Alas, the PUC seems to be leaning towards supporting the ALJ.
Joel West
CleantechBiz