Between 2000 and 2016, only 23% of projects seeking grid connection have been built.
John: We’ve got some good and bad news. The good news is that there are enough wind, solar, and battery storage projects planned to meet our climate goals. The bad news is that a bottleneck in our electrical grid system is stalling most of these projects. In fact, between 2000 and 2016, only 23% of projects seeking grid connection have been built.
Many factors are at play in causing this green energy backlog. A lack of suitable transmission and grid interconnects is a key issue. Additionally, getting these projects started also necessitates a review process that examines the economic and environmental effects the project will have, how extra energy will affect the grid, and energy reliability during peak hours, outages, and bad weather conditions. This approval process alone takes two years on average to complete, especially since many of these energy regulators are understaffed and dealing with a massive influx of project proposals to sift through.
The Lawrence Berkley National Laboratory report found that 1,300 gigawatts of renewable energy projects have been proposed since last year, but less than a quarter of these projects will ever get started. That’s even with permit approvals and financing in place.
Fortunately, there’s a lot of hope that this hold-up on renewable energy can be resolved. SEEC’s Power Sector Task Force is committed to investigating opportunities that can address this problem and therefore achieve President Biden’s clean energy goals. For instance, the Task Force is currently hard at work making sure the $5.5 billion from the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law to revamp our energy transmission system gets implemented correctly and the money starts flowing to projects across the country.
Thanks to your help in 2020, SEEC PAC was able to re-elect over 95% of our pro-environment members to the U.S. House of Representatives — defying the odds on a night where Democrats lost seats. Now we are counting on you to help our SEEC members pass climate, clean energy and environmental justice policies in the 117th Congress while we undo the damage of the Trump Administration. But if you'd like to receive fewer emails, we understand. You can click here to only get our most important messages, or you can unsubscribe.
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