Energy from the wind and sun

THE problem with renewable energy, from the wind and the sun, has always been that it was more expensive than energy from fossil fuels such as coal and gas. But now that pattern is changing. The cost of providing electricity from the solar and wind industries in the United States has plunged over the past five years, so much so that in some markets, renewable energy is actually cheaper than from fossil fuels, a boon to environmentalists, who have long waged a war against the coal’s destructive emissions. The drop in costs for renewable energy has been especially pronounced in the Southwest of the US and in the Great Plains area, where wind and sunlight are plentiful.

In Texas, Austin Energy recently signed a deal for 20 years of output from a solar farm at less than five cents a kilowatt- hour. In Oklahoma, the Grand River Dam Authority approved a new agreement to buy power from a wind farm which will be completed next year, that will save its customers 50 million dollars. And American Electric Power, which is also based in Oklahoma, is tripling the amount of wind power it uses.

The deadline in cost of solar and wind power does not mean that they can replace conventional power sources, but the drop in price makes them competitive. According to the Solar Energy Industries Association, the price of electricity sold to utilities under long- term contracts from solar projects has fallen more than 70 percent since 2008 in the Southwest. And in the wind industry, prices have dropped more than half in recent years to historically low prices, especially in North Dakota and Texas. Both solar and wind have managed to bring down costs through a combination of new technologies and new approaches to financing.