In a first, renewables beat coal in the US power sector in 2022

For the first time ever, renewable power generation – that’s wind, solar, hydro, biomass, and geothermal – exceeded coal-fired generation in the US electric power sector in 2022, according to the US Energy Information Administration (EIA).

Overall, the US electric power sector produced 4,090 million megawatt-hours (MWh) of power in 2022.

Wind and solar’s combined total generation increased from 12% in 2021 to 14% in 2022. Hydropower stayed the same last year at 6%, and biomass and geothermal also remained unchanged, at less than 1%. So that’s a total of 21%.

Utility-scale solar capacity in the US electric power sector – the EIA doesn’t include rooftop solar – increased from 61 gigawatts (GW) in 2021 to 71 GW in 2022, according to EIA data. Wind capacity grew from 133 GW in 2021 to 141 GW in 2022.

Coal-fired generation, on the other hand, dropped from 23% in 2021 to 20% in 2022 because a number of coal-fired power plants retired, and the plants still online were used less.

Renewables surpassed nuclear generation for the first time in 2021, and that trend continued last year. Nuclear dropped from 20% in 2021 to 19% in 2022 because Michigan’s Palisades nuclear power plant was retired in May 2022. However, Palisades’ new owner, Holtec, wants to restart it, and this idea is not proving particularly popular, with one environmental group saying that would risk a “Chernobyl-scale catastrophe.”

The Biden administration pledged $6 billion on March 2 to help extend the operating life of aging nuclear power plants in order to help the US combat climate change.

However, natural gas is still the largest source of US electricity generation, and it grew from 37% in 2021 to 39% in 2022.

This month, the EIA forecast that both wind and solar will each grow by 1% in 2023. Natural gas is forecast to remain unchanged, and coal is forecast to decline by 3% to 17% next year.

Read more: Here’s the good and bad news about coal in 2022

Photo by Kelly on Pexels.com

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