Energy Minute: Peninsula Clean Energy's Ambitious Pursuit of 24/7 Carbon-Free Energy

In 2016, Peninsula Clean Energy made an ambitious move to supply its customers with 100% renewable energy. As of 2021, it met its goal with a mix of renewable and carbon-free energy, including large hydropower and nuclear power at a lower price than customers were paying for power through Pacific Gas & Electric.

In this Energy Minute, Dana and Steven jump into how Peninsula Clean Energy then decided to reach for a more ambitious strategy - to provide 100% renewable energy matched every hour, the first U.S. energy supplier to do so - how that strategy is progressing towards its 2025 goal, and how it plans to continue to advance the strategy further in years to come.

Listen in for:

1. PCE has already procured enough solar, wind, geothermal and hydropower resources to cover 75% of its 24/7 strategy by 2025, and will procure additional capacity to reach 99% by the end of 2025. This is providing a blueprint for other utilities to decarbonize, evaluate their modeling, and dispatch storage.
2. California has been increasing targets to add energy storage to their mix, which are typically arriving in the form of battery-based storage systems designed to run for as much as four hours at a time, helping fill in some energy gaps.
3. PCE is envisioning eventually adding a broader range of technologies to its strategy, including offshore wind and seasonal energy storage.

Resources

Peninsula Clean Energy's Strategic Plan: https://www.peninsulacleanenergy.com/strategy/

PCE's original white paper sharing its approach to 100% carbon-free energy: http://peninsulacleanenergy.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/Whitepaper-OUR-PATH-TO-247-RENEWABLE-ENERGY-BY-2025.pdf 

PCE's 2023 white paper sharing how its approach was updated to a 24/7 model: https://www.peninsulacleanenergy.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/24-7-white-paper-2023.pdf