The project would send power - like wind or solar - across three electricity networks. (Photo courtesy of the National Renewable Energy Laboratory)
Wind and solar power farms are sprouting
up, but they have reliability problems.
Wind doesn’t always blow, and sun doesn’t
always shine. To keep the lights on,
utilities want to grab power from any
solar and wind farm that is working.
Shawn Allee reports one transmission
project could help out:
Transcript
Wind and solar power farms are sprouting
up, but they have reliability problems.
Wind doesn’t always blow, and sun doesn’t
always shine. To keep the lights on,
utilities want to grab power from any
solar and wind farm that is working.
Shawn Allee reports one transmission
project could help out:
It’s not easy to send California’s solar power eastward. Same goes for sending Texan wind power westward.
A proposed transmission project called Tres Amigas hopes to change that.
It would let utilities send power across three electricity networks.
Michael Giberson researches utility economics at Texas Tech University. He says the Tres Amigas project could go in just the right spot.
“The area where it’s locating in Eastern New Mexico close to the Texas borderr, is an area where there’s great renewable energy potential and this is gonna make it much easier for the grid to accomodate that.”
The Tres Amigas power project would need federal approval. It would also require Texas to link its grid with its neighbors’.
That’s something the Lone Star state might not do.
For The Environment Report, I’m Shawn Allee.