Yet Another Misleading Report on “Low-Cost” Wind and Solar
11 hours ago Guest Blogger
By Jonathan Lesser
In a just-released report, the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) claims that renewable energy is the most cost-competitive source of new electricity generation worldwide, The report further claims that “91% of new renewable power projects commissioned last year were more cost-effective than any new fossil fuel alternative” based on levelized costs, which can be thought of as the energy equivalent of a fixed mortgage.
If those claims sound too good to be true, it’s because they are. IRENA’s boasts ignore a fundamental reality: the intermittent electricity generated from wind and solar is fundamentally different than electricity generated by traditional generating resources that are not subject to the whims of the weather.
In the U.S., the Energy Information Administration (EIA) makes the same mistake. The EIA claims that wind and solar will account for the lion’s share of new generating capacity for the next decade and will provide electricity at a lower levelized cost than any traditional resource, including new natural gas generators.
But the episodic nature of wind and solar power has critical impacts on both supply adequacy and cost, which, while recognized by some, are nonetheless not incorporated into how bottom-line data. Traditional coal, natural gas, nuclear, and hydroelectric generating plants can be scheduled to run when needed. Some of them, especially nuclear and most coal plants, are designed to operate continuously and are referred to as “baseload” facilities. Others, especially natural gas plants, can quickly be turned on or off (“dispatched”) to match changes in demand. Collectively, traditional generation can be both scheduled and dynamically managed, enabling the operators of electric grids to reliably meet demand at the lowest cost.
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2025/08/05/yet-another-misleading-report-on-low-cost-wind-and-solar/
