What Caused California’s Blackouts?
Energy Gang
Wood Mackenzie
4.6 • 1.3K Ratings
🗓️ 21 August 2020
⏱️ 63 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Last week, short-term blackouts rolled across an overheated California after the grid operator said there was not enough power to meet demand.
This wasn’t supposed to happen again. Not after the Enron scandal. Not after 19 years of reforms. We have a very different grid now.
Renewables skeptics, including President Trump, are seizing on the incident. What really happened? Where do we place blame? We explain the confluence of grid-management factors.
Then, coal power generation in the United States plunged 30% in just the first half of this year. But what Asia, where 80% of coal gets burned now? What hope is there for a coal decline there? We’ll look at China, Japan and India.
Finally, stunning public health research. What happens when you combine this up-to-date science with the new, low-cost renewable energy? You get a blockbuster picture, that’s what. We’ll examine new research that shows the health benefits alone pay for our energy transition.
Recommended reading:
- New York Times: Rolling Blackouts in California Have Power Experts Stumped
- GTM: Western Heat Wave Tests California’s Clean Grid Transition
- Twitter: Ed Burgess Tesla Powerwall Thread
- Reuters: China's New Coal Projects Account for 90% of Global Total
- The Guardian: India Plans to Fell Ancient Forest to Create 40 New Coalfields
- New York times: Japan Races to Build New Coal-Burning Power Plants, Despite the Climate Risks
- Vox: Roberts: Air Pollution Is Much Worse Than We Thought
- Printed version of Dr. Shindell’s testimony
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | The Energy Gang is brought to you by Fluence, a global leader in battery-based energy storage technology and services. |
| 0:06.0 | Fluence commercialized the first grid-connected battery systems in 2008, |
| 0:10.0 | and they're now building multi-gigawatt fleets for customers globally today. |
| 0:13.7 | And the Fluence team has championed energy storage for years as a cornerstone of our zero carbon |
| 0:18.1 | electric future. |
| 0:19.4 | Learn more at fluence energy.com and join them on their mission to transform the way we power our world. |
| 0:25.0 | We're also brought to you by Norcal Controls. Norcal Controls is a total controls and monitoring |
| 0:30.3 | solution provider for solar power plants. |
| 0:32.7 | Norcal supports every phase of your project from turnkey design solutions to post-OEM |
| 0:36.8 | enhancements, troubleshooting, and training. |
| 0:39.2 | Norcal goes beyond the vendor mentality to partner with you in building solutions that are flexible, scalable, |
| 0:44.2 | and completely customized to your current and future needs. |
| 0:47.2 | Maintain, expand, and scale your solar system anytime, anywhere with confidence. |
| 0:51.5 | Visit Norcal controls. net to learn more. From Green Tech Media, this is the Energy Gang, weekly debates and discussions about the fast-changing world of energy. |
| 1:12.0 | I am Stephen Lacy. Welcome to the show. Thanks for being here. |
| 1:15.3 | In this episode, what caused California's outages? Last week, short-term blackouts rolled across |
| 1:21.2 | and overheated California, as the grid operator said there was not enough |
| 1:24.5 | power to meet demand. |
| 1:26.3 | This wasn't supposed to happen again, not after the Enron scandal, not after 19 years of |
| 1:31.1 | reforms. |
| 1:32.1 | We have a very different grid now and renewable |
| 1:34.8 | skeptics including President Trump are seizing on the incident. What really |
... |
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