Renewables rising, but gas is still king

Solar generates 4.3% of state’s electricity, while wind energy overtook coal last year

Renewable power sources are making up an ever-bigger piece of Texas’ energy pie heading into 2022.

That’s especially true for solar energy, which has grown exponentially on the Texas grid over the past half decade.

Through November, solar panels generated 4.3 percent of the state’s electricity — a small slice, but a big increase from five years ago when solar contributed just a quarter of 1 percent of the state’s power, according to new data from the Electric Reliability Council of Texas, the state’s grid operator.

Last year, wind energy overtook coal as a power source in Texas for the first time. And wind turbines’ lead over the fossil fuel grew again this year as wind farms contributed nearly a quarter of the electricity generated in Texas through November.

Five years ago, wind power generated 15 percent of the state’s electricity.

Even so, the amount of power produced by coal-fired power plants bounced back this year after declining each year from 2017 through 2020.

The increase in coal-fired generation is likely a result of more overall power generation compared with last year as economic activity returned in 2021. The state’s generators have produced just over 3 percent more electricity this year than at the same time last year.

Even as solar and wind farms combined production grew to nearly 30 percent of the state’s power, natural gas remains the main source for Texans. Gas-fired plants generated 43 percent of electricity on the ERCOT grid through November.

The same is true in San Antonio, where city-owned CPS Energy generates about 31 percent of its power from natural gas, more than any other source. The most recent yearlong data that’s available for CPS generation covers the

period from July 2020 through July 2021.

In that year, CPS got 14 percent of its power from renewable resources and 29 percent from the South Texas Project nuclear power plant outside Victoria. Statewide, nuclear plants have provided about 10 percent of Texas’ power for the past decade.

CPS is expected to award contracts next year to add 900 megawatts of additional solar power, which would double the utility’s solar capacity. It is also looking to add 500 megawatts of “firm generation” the utility can dispatch whenever it needs power.

That 500 megawatts is likely to come in the form of new natural gas-fired generation, said Frank Almaraz, CPS Energy’s executive in charge of power generation.

“Gas-fired technology is probably the one that best meets cost and performance standards at this moment,” Almaraz said Thursday to the utility’s Rate Advisory Committee.

Natural gas “is going to play a role in our generation mix for some time,” he said.

In the year through July, CPS’ two-unit coal-fired J.K. Spruce Power Plant generated 23 percent of the city’s power. Coal made up 19 percent of the generation fuel mix across Texas.

The Spruce 2 unit was commissioned in 2005, before fracking drastically reduced the cost of natural gas and when renewable energy technology was still in its infancy. It went online in 2010.

Last year, the plant emitted nearly 6 million tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, making it among the highest-emitting power plants in the state, according to the federal Energy Information Administration. Spruce also spews far greater amounts of sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxides — both toxic pollutants — than CPS’ other power plants.

CPS is considering a plan to close or retrofit Spruce. But for now, it’s focused on securing a rate hike from City Council in January.

Beyond that, CPS interim CEO Rudy Garza has said the utility will examine options on Spruce over the next year, potentially closing the plant ahead of time or converting it to run on natural gas.

The utility in January said closing Spruce in the coming years would raise customers’ monthly bills between $6 and $12 on average.

“We’re not kicking anything down the road,” Garza said. “On the really critical decisions like our generation plan, we’ve got to develop a process to get our board and community on the right track.”