How Cheap and Abundant Can Clean Power Get?

A decarbonized power sector will unlock massive opportunities across nearly every other sector, either via direct electrification or via indirect electrification via the production of low-carbon fuels, like green hydrogen.

But here’s the rub. Many of the companies that are working on these solutions rely on pretty heroic assumptions around the cost, availability and cleanliness of electricity in order for the economics to work.

To put it bluntly, many decarbonization business models hinge on a cell deep in their spreadsheets that has 1- to 3-cent per kilowatt-hour electricity. Is it a realistic assumption?

To tackle that question, Shayle turns to his colleague at Energy Impact Partners, Andy Lubershane, the Senior Vice President of Research & Strategy.

They survey the technologies that depend on this super cheap, super abundant power, such as EVs, space heating, carbon removal, green hydrogen and industrial heat.

Then, they examine the talk of cheap renewables, covering the difference between cheap wholesale and more expensive delivered prices. They break down the variables that make up the difference between wholesale and delivered prices, namely transmission, distribution and capacity factors.

So what are the solutions that could shrink that gap?

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