California’s Electrified Future Requires More Transmission Lines Which Take Years to Build

KQED's Forum

KQED

Politics, News, News Commentary

4.6 • 656 Ratings

🗓️ 17 April 2023

⏱️ 57 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

California’s energy future is going to require electricity – a lot more of it. With the push to electrify transportation like cars and trucks and a climate characterized by hotter summers and colder winters, experts say California needs to triple the capacity of the grid by 2050. For the next 10 years alone, California will require 40 billion watts of energy, and to power this new future, the state needs to upgrade old transmission lines and construct new ones. But this is no easy task: Building new lines can take years, even decades – time that the state does not have if it wants to meet its clean energy goals. We’ll talk about what California is doing to build out the infrastructure to keep the lights on and get more electric cars on the road. Guests: Michael Wara, policy director for the Sustainability Accelerator at the Doerr School of Sustainability, director of the Climate and Energy Policy Program and senior research scholar at the Woods Institute for the Environment, Stanford University Nadia Lopez, environmental reporter, Cal Matters Neil Millar, vice president of Infrastructure and Operations Planning, Cal ISO Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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0:00.0	Support for Kikiweedy Podcasts comes from Rancho La Puerta, a wellness resort on 4,000 acres located 45 minutes from downtown San Diego.
0:08.7	Established in 1940, Rancho LaPuerta offers adult summer camp-like vacations for individuals and groups.
0:15.0	Rancho LePuerta.com.
0:16.7	Support for Forum comes from Broadway S.F. presenting Parade, the musical revival based on a true story.
0:24.5	From three-time Tony-winning composer Jason Robert Brown comes the story of Leo and Lucille Frank,
0:30.7	a newlywed Jewish couple struggling to make a life in Georgia.
0:34.8	When Leo is accused of an unspeakable crime, it propels them into an unimaginable
0:40.2	test of faith, humanity, justice, and devotion. The riveting and gloriously hopeful parade
0:47.2	plays the Orpheum Theater for three weeks only, May 20th through June 8th. Tickets on sale now
0:54.0	at Broadwaysf.com.
0:57.6	From KQD in San Francisco, I'm Alexis Madrigal.
1:14.6	If we were going to prepare California for climate change, to shut down our fossil fuel power plants
1:19.5	and build gigawatts of solar and wind generation, there was always going to be a moment like this.
1:24.3	A moment where the state authorities had to plunk a huge report on the table that
1:28.1	said, oh my God, we need so much new renewable energy supply, which means, oh my God, we need so
1:35.1	many new transmission lines. We're now in that moment. And on the one hand, it should be terrifying.
1:40.4	We're definitely not on pace to meet the goals, but it's also thrilling. This next decade is really it, and today we're going to consider the practical realities of building the electricity system of the future.
1:52.0	That's all coming up next after this news. Welcome to Forum. I'm Alexis Madrigal.
2:05.9	Here's one reality of adding huge amounts of solar and wind power to California's electric grid.
2:11.8	The best sun and windiest spots are not close to where the people using electricity live.
2:17.1	So that means to use those renewable
2:18.9	resources, we'll have to string massive wires there. Here's another reality. Most energy specialists
	...

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