[hannob]

As a counterpoint, I recommend this article: https://ketanjoshi.co/2024/08/12/texas-builds-clean-power-bu...

It looks into the numbers for the Texas renewable buildout, and there's a very important caveat: the amount of renewables you build is not the relevant metric. Emission reduction is. And Texas does not succeed there.

[buckle8017]

Articles that try to compare Texas with California almost always miss that California is not it's own grid.

Power in California is from the Western Interconnect, which is regulated by WECC.

Power on the Western Interconnect is only 8.7% solar and 10.4% wind.[0]

Texas in the same year was 7% solar and 24% wind.[1]

[0] https://wecc-spdp-weccgeo.hub.arcgis.com/pages/power-generat...

[1] Annoyingly the data is in an excel spreadsheet in a zip file https://www.ercot.com/files/docs/2021/03/10/FuelMixReport_Pr...

[jandrese]

> Emission reduction is. And Texas does not succeed there.

Are you saying they would have released less CO2 had they installed natural gas power plants instead?

[ZeroGravitas]

Maybe they are saying that if they'd followed California's policies they'd have a higher percentage of their power from renewables and they wouldn't be so wasteful with the energy they do generate.

Because that's the point of this article isn't it? To follow Texas policies, not California's, by pointing to absolute numbers of renewables.

If they looked at absolute numbers on coal and gas they'd look worse.

[epistasis]

California is not plummeting in total emissions either, which is the point of the plots in there.

The only thing that could move this along faster is to shut down fully running and functional fossil fuel facilities, which means that the huge capital assets are stranded and a big loss to the people who paid for them.

There, Texas's approach of private investors bearing the cost of that poor investment will fare much better than California's approach of letting the utility bill customers for their poor decisions. (I say this as a Californian absolutely INFURIATED at our toothless public utility commission allowing six whole rate increases in the past year, making electricity for a heat pumpfar more expensive than burning gas for heating, and making charging an EV about the same cost as fueling gas car, instead of much cheaper.)

[Spivak]

> and making EVs about the same cost as a gas car

At first I was like, isn't that great EVs are the more expensive car but then I realized you meant that the electricity costs as much as the equivalent gas. Oof. Yikes. That's really bad.

[epistasis]

Thanks for pointing out that ambiguity, I hopefully edited for better clarity!

The other problem in California is that most heating is done via natural gas, and though heating needs are fairly low if houses had any sort of insulation, there's basically zero insulation in all homes. Which means that every winter, people experience massive natural gas bills that should be close to zero, making it very problematic to switch some of the utility cost burdens from the electricity side to natural gas side. Meanwhile, PG&E profits are at the very top of the utility stock list for its profit margins...

[toast0]

Insulation in California homes depends a lot on where they were built and when. My parents' home in southern california was built in the 1960s, and was pretty much uninsulated, but none of these homes had a/c and the gas heater would be run a few days in the winter. You've got to have a heater to be an inhabitable home by California law, but if it only runs a few days a year, insulation almost doesn't matter. If there's little climate control, not being air sealed is generally a benefit rather than a negative, as it provides passive ventilation, and much of the old housing stock is in areas where the climate is generally pleasant enough all year that outside air is nice enough.

If you've got an attic, it's not too expensive to from zero insulation to basic insulation, and the ROI is pretty quick. Of course, some areas of California had neighborhoods built in the Eichler-style with no attic space; those are hard to add insulation to. A nice large tree over the home can help with summer heat, but large trees over the home have risks and costs too.

[baggy_trough]

> there's basically zero insulation in all homes.

This is completely false.

[kragen]

A nice thing about EVs is that they already have enough battery to shift their energy consumption from the powerline to whatever hour is most economical. So you can install solar panels on your house and charge your EV during peak daylight hours if you're home then, or get the company to install them over the office parking lot if you're at the office then. This eliminates the cost of storage from the cost of upgrading to solar. Even at the US's grossly inflated costs, that makes it an easy economic win.

[sightbroke]

I don't really know, the details of measuring energy consumption, emissions, and price is a fairly convoluted concept as far as I know.

Asking google AI:

"California emmisions rate" gave:

"California has seen a decline in greenhouse gas emissions, with a 20% reduction since 2000, while its economy has grown significantly. The state aims to reduce emissions to 85% below 1990 levels by 2045 and achieve carbon neutrality by 2045"

Then asking "Texas emissions rate" gave:

"Texas is a major emitter of carbon dioxide in the United States, producing 13.4% of the nation's total in 2022, with transportation being a significant source of emissions"

followed by:

"Emissions Leader: In 2022, Texas produced 663 million metric tons of carbon dioxide, more than double that of California, the second-largest producer"

[epistasis]

Google AI is not really useful, but going to an actual reliable source from that such as California's emissions inventory:

https://ww2.arb.ca.gov/ghg-inventory-graphs

The graphs seem to contradict those in the article, as the article has a huge annual variability not shown in the government data, and also the article does not show the decline in the "Electric Power" sector that's shown so clearly in the CA government data.

I also would not agree with the article's assessment that Texas is a "disaster" based on the same sort of plot. Serving the needs of ever more people, with an ever growing GDP, but keeping emissions constant is a win environmentally.

[sightbroke]

Texas has both less people and lower GDP than California yet emits more. How is that not a bit of a disaster?

[hannob]

They would have released less CO2 if they had regulated CO2 emissions.

[epistasis]

> Emission reduction is. And Texas does not succeed there.

If we're talking about the impact of a particular tech, choosing the proper baseline is important, otherwise it's easy to reach fallacious results in counterfactual reasoning.

Emission reduction versus what? Per-capita emissions reductions? Per-kWh emissions reductions? Compared to whose usage?

Plotting total emission and saying "we've failed!" actually hides a lot of what's going on, it's only one aspect, and increased population can hide that overall emissions are trending in the right way.

[M3L0NM4N]

Emission reduction measured how?