Renewable energy has been slow to take hold for a number of reasons, a big one being storage. The infrastructure to house and distribute it is large, complex, and constantly evolving. The National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) found a way to lower the renewable energy storage requirements: emphasize energy efficiency.
Communities want to eventually rely 100% on renewable energy, but how to handle long-duration storage is often a hurdle that they cannot clear. The industry needs long-duration storage systems that meet electricity demands for more than 48-hour periods and focused on creating new renewable energy storage systems.
The problem is the technology for most long-duration storage technologies is either immature or not available everywhere. As a result, the NREL researchers calculated that reaching the last 75% to 100% of renewable energy would result in significant cost increases.
A New Path to Renewable Energy?
So, NREL’s Sammy Houssainy, and William Livingood offered a different path to embracing renewables in their research paper. “Optimately Strategies for a Cost Effective and Reliable 100% Renewable Electrical Grid”. Using the Department of Energy’s EnergyPlus and OpenStudio building energy modeling tools, they simulated future energy demand.
They then examined energy requirements considering such factors as buildings’ size, age, and occupancy type. They determined that making homes and offices more energy efficient reduces the amounts of renewable resources needed, decreases the amount of storage required, and cuts transmission costs.
Consequently, the best path to 100% renewable energy is following a multi-pronged approach. The first step is oversizing renewable capacities by a factor of 1.4 to 3.2. The second aims for a 52% to 68% increase in energy savings through building energy-efficiency measures.
Energy Needs Vary by Area
To understand what was needed, the researchers divided the US into five climate zones, ranging from the hot and humid (Tampa, Florida) to the very cold (International Falls, Minnesota). The other zones encompassed the cities of New York, El Paso, and Denver.
The team even broke down which renewables should be used in the different areas in order to minimize their reliance on the storage system. Tampa would generate all of its electricity from solar panels while International Falls would receive 100% from wind turbines, the researchers calculated.
The road to renewables is taking shape. Storage has been a major hurdle. Increasing energy efficiency reduces the amount of electricity needed, resulting in significant lowering in requirements for energy usage and the size of energy storage systems, making the path easier to travel.