A lot more utility-scale solar has been mounted this year than all other forms of power

• Utility-scale solar and also wind each added a lot more creating capacity than natural gas during the initial nine months of 2022, according to a SUN DAY Campaign evaluation of FERC information. FERC's newest three-year forecast suggests that installed natural gas capacity will certainly begin to decline by 2025 while solar as well as wind continue to rapidly increase.

Solar (6,751 MW) and wind (6,328 MW) each supplied much more new producing capacity throughout the first three-quarters of this year than did natural gas (6,086 MW). Combined with capacity additions by geothermal (90 MW), biomass (22 MW) as well as hydropower (14 MW), renewable energy resources made up 13,205 MW or 68.4% of the 19,316 MW of new generation put into solution this year.

Besides natural gas, the balance originated from nuclear power (17 MW) and also oil (8 MW). No new capacity was reported for 2022 from coal.

In addition, solar offered 82.7% (487 MW) of the new capacity reported in September alone. This includes the 275.0-MW Noble Solar & Storage Project in Denton County, Texas, and the 150.0-MW Wood County Solar Project in Wood County, Wisconsin, among others. Also included September was 99 MW of new natural gas capacity and 3 MW of new hydropower.

These current additions bring renewable resource's share of overall united state offered set up generating capacity as much as 26.96%:.

• wind-- 11.23%.
• hydropower-- 8.05%.
• solar-- 6.14%.
• biomass-- 1.22%.
• geothermal-- 0.32%.

For comparison, 5 years earlier, renewables' share was 19.84%. Ten years back, it was 14.79%.

FERC reports that there may be as high as 206,184 MW of new solar capacity in the pipeline with 71,617 MW classified as "high probability" additions as well as no offsetting "retired lives." The "high probability" additions alone would virtually double utility-scale solar's present installed capacity of 77,210 MW, while effective completion of all projects in the pipe would almost quadruple it.

Arguably much more surprising is FERC's projection for natural gas capacity over the following three years. FERC anticipates 107 units of "high probability" enhancements by natural gas by September 2025 amounting to 17,062 MW of capacity. However, there will certainly also be "retired lives" of 130 units totaling 17,489 MW. If that emerges, installed natural gas capacity would actually decline, very possibly indicating that natural gas generating capacity has now actually peaked.

FERC expects new nuclear additions to total 2,200 MW (2 new activators being constructed at the Vogtle nuclear plant site near Waynesboro, Georgia). Nevertheless, FERC likewise projects that nuclear retired lives over the following 3 years will complete 2,323 MW. Additionally, FERC reports no new coal producing capacity in the three-year pipe but 19,106 MW of expected retirements. Oil generating capacity is projected to fall by 1,710 MW as well

" FERC's newest information might be the most remarkable released thus far this year," noted the SUN DAY Campaign's executive director Ken Bossong. "A sharp boost in FERC's three-year projection for wind and also solar within just the last month combined with an evident peaking of natural gas appear to validate that the nation has ultimately transformed an edge on its shift to lasting energy sources.".