2019 Sustainable Energy in America Factbook

Hosted in coordination with: House and Senate Renewable Energy & Energy Efficiency Caucuses

Sponsored by: Business Council for Sustainable Energy and Environmental and Energy Study Institute

In its seventh year, the BloombergNEF (BNEF) and Business Council for Sustainable Energy (BCSE) 2019 Sustainable Energy in America Factbook provides new industry information and trends for the U.S. energy economy, with an in-depth look at the energy efficiency, natural gas, and renewable energy sectors, as well as emerging areas such as energy storage and sustainable transportation.

Ethan Zindler, Head of Americas, Bloomberg New Energy Finance

• Due to mass retirements of coal power plants (11 completed closures in 2018) and a rise in natural gas and renewable energy usage, the U.S. energy economy is decarbonizing.
  • Renewable energy resources represent 18 percent of U.S. electricity generation (up from 11 percent in 2009). Coal has fallen from 44 percent to 27 percent.
  • The overall amount of electricity generated has remained relatively flat since 2009.
  • Solar is a driving force in the growth of renewable energy (11.7 GW of new capacity in 2018), with wind not far behind (7.5 GW of new capacity), but hydropower represents the lion's share of renewable energy generation in the United States, providing about half the total.
• Renewable energy resources are increasingly becoming the cheapest option for electricity generation in the United States.
  • In 2018, the levelized cost of electricity without subsidies was cheapest for onshore wind ($27-61 per megawatt hour), followed by tracking photovoltaics ($42-65), non-tracking photovoltaics ($46-70), and large hydropower ($38-75). Adding battery storage to wind and solar installations raises the cost to $36-118 and $57-169 respectively.
  • Costs for Combined Cycle Gas Turbines (natural gas power plants) were at $56-108/MWh and coal was at $63-156.
• The amount of jobs in clean energy grew in 2018.
  • Energy efficiency and solar employ the majority of these workers, at 2.2 million and 350,000 respectively.
  • In comparison, there are 379,000 natural gas jobs and 167,000 coal jobs.
  • Taken together, there are more than 3 million jobs in sustainable energy, compared to 702,000 in fossil fuels (coal, natural gas, and oil), if one takes into account fuel extraction and processing jobs.
• Energy remained inexpensive in 2018 by historical standards. As a share of total consumption, energy goods and services are now hovering around 4 percent, compared to more than 7 percent in the 1960s.
• Business enthusiasm for renewable energy is high, with corporate procurement of clean energy climbing fast!
  • Facebook, AT&T, Wal-Mart and other large corporations procured record amounts of solar and wind capacity in 2018 (2,468 megawatts for Facebook alone). Even ExxonMobil purchased 325 MW in solar capacity, and 250 MW in wind capacity.
  • A large number of corporations support energy efficiency and the adoption of electric vehicles company-wide.
• Investments in energy efficiency continued to rise, reaching a record $15 billion in 2017 (up from about $1 billion in 1990). Utility spending and Energy Savings Performance Contracts (ESPCs) were the main sources of investment, though Property Assessed Clean Energy (PACE) programs are a fast-rising source of growth.
• Unfortunately, not all the energy news in 2018 was positive.
  • Overall energy consumption rose.
  • Greenhouse gas emissions also rose, after considerable reductions in previous years.
  • Energy productivity (the quantity of GDP produced for a given amount of energy) stalled. In previous years, energy consumption had been very stable, despite solid GDP growth.
  • According to the Energy Information Administration (EIA), the number of days we need to turn on cooling in our homes reached its highest rate ever in 2018 (1,592 cooling degree-days). This is an additional indication that the climate is changing, and that we are using more power to offset those changes.

Carrie Annand, Vice President of External Affairs, Biomass Power Association

• Carrie Annand was representing Covanta, a member of the Biomass Power Association (BPA). Covanta turns waste into energy (recyclables are removed from garbage, and the remaining litter is used to generate heat).
• Several BPA members use forestry residue (from lumber operations, for example) to generate power (and reduce forest fire risk).
• Biomass is a source of baseload power that runs 24-7, using materials that need to be dealt with in some way.
• Unfortunately, there has been very low growth in biomass, biogas, and waste-to-energy since 2013. At the time, strong government policies were in place to help the industry. Since then, bioenergy's tax credits have expired and have not been renewed (unlike the credits of solar and wind). Policy directly affects the growth of renewable energy.
• BPA's main policy proposal is to include electricity in the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS), a federal program that requires transportation fuels to contain a minimum level of renewable energy. Electricity was made part of the RFS, but EPA has yet to implement the policy. This is particularly troublesome since more and more electric vehicles are on the road.

Emily Duncan, Director of Federal Government Affairs, National Grid

• In the United States, National Grid is a utility with 6 million customers in 3 states (New York, Massachusetts, and Rhode Island). It invested $3.3 billion in the United States last year and is planning to invest another $10 billion over the next 5 years.
• The power sector has made considerable efforts to reduce its greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. In 2017, power sector carbon emissions were 20 percent below their 2005 level.
• National Grid's goal is to reduce its GHG emissions by 80 percent by 2050 (compared to a 1990 baseline). To do so, it is investing in renewable energy and storage (it wants to generate 67 percent of its electricity from renewable sources by 2030). It is helping its customers convert from oil heating to natural gas. And it is investing in recharging infrastructure for electric vehicles (transportation is now the top GHG emitting sector).

Charles Hernick, Director of Policy and Advocacy, Citizens for Responsible Energy Solutions (CRES)

• Citizens for Responsible Energy Solutions is a conservative organization promoting market-based solutions for all forms of clean energy. It is focused on federal policy.
• The biggest news is that the four cheapest forms of energy in the United States (in terms of levelized cost) are now renewable energy sources. They've made it! Of course, renewables are not immune to price changes (tariffs and siting challenges are of particular concern) and market uncertainty needs to be addressed.
• From a demand perspective, the news is also good: demand for renewable energy is surging, as demonstrated by record corporate procurement. Companies are not just investing in renewables for the environmental benefits, but also for long-term cost certainty (prices can be locked in at very attractive rates). Investing in renewable energy is also great PR.

Anna Pavlova, Vice President, Government Relations, Schneider Electric

• Schneider Electric is a global energy management company and manufacturer with 20 facilities in the United States. Seventy percent of the world's buildings have a Schneider Electric product in them.
• Schneider Electric has committed to procure 100 percent of its energy from renewable sources by 2030.
• To address rising energy consumption, active energy management is often overlooked. On average, 60 percent of an office building's space is unused. And yet, that space is still being heated and cooled, and lights and appliances are often left on in unoccupied rooms. It is fairly easy to optimize energy usage in buildings and to extract maximum performance from old equipment. Widespread implementation of energy management controls would greatly improve energy efficiency nationwide.