Goldman Sachs Renewable Power (GSRP), an affiliate of Goldman Sachs Asset Management, announced that its Slate solar and energy storage project is now in operation and serving five California-based organizations. The 390-MW solar + 561-MWh storage project was originally developed by Recurrent Energy, a wholly owned subsidiary of Canadian Solar.
Credit: Goldman Sachs Renewable Power
The Slate project, located in Kings County, California, is supported by PPAs with five California-based organizations — Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART), Central Coast Community Energy (3CE), the Power and Water Resources Pooling Authority (PWRPA), Silicon Valley Clean Energy (SVCE) and Stanford University. The Slate project’s dispatchable solar + storage power is essential to meeting the renewable energy procurement goals of each organization.
“We are thrilled that Slate is now online and serving California-based organizations. There is significant demand throughout California for solar and energy storage projects at this scale, and we look forward to continuing to invest in projects like Slate that will help facilitate the state’s transition to a carbon-free power grid,” said Jon Yoder, head of GSRP.
To commemorate the start of the Slate project’s operation, GSRP hosted a ribbon cutting event on March 15. Project stakeholders toured the site, which will generate enough low-cost, clean energy to power approximately 126,000 California homes and displace approximately 369,310 metric tons of carbon dioxide emissions each year. The battery storage component will enable the Slate project’s customers to obtain more carbon-free energy in the evening hours and ensure grid reliability during times of peak demand.
Credit: Goldman Sachs Renewable Power
“Congratulations to all the organizations and individuals across both the private sector and public sector that contributed to making this project happen, helping put Kings County at the forefront of California’s clean energy future. Meeting the state’s 100% clean electricity goals requires an unprecedented amount of new solar and storage resources to come online and a tremendous amount of collaboration to build the type of solutions at the scale we need,” said California Energy Commission vice chair Siva Gunda.
Over the past year, the project employed approximately 405 workers at peak construction, with 90% of the construction jobs filled by local skilled tradespeople from the Kings County area through the International Brotherhood of Electric Workers Local 100, Laborers International Union of North America 294, Iron Workers Local 155, Northern California Millwrights Local 102, Operating Engineers Local 3, Carpenters Local 1109 and the Electrical Training Center Joint Apprenticeship and Training Committee. Along with indirect economic benefits that accompany solar project development, such as increased local spending in the service and construction industries, the Slate project will also have a positive economic impact on the local community by providing significant tax revenues for Kings County.
News item from Goldman Sachs Asset Management and Goldman Sachs Renewable Power
Why isn‘t more consideration given to pumped-water storage systems? These use power but when coupled with solar it becomes the best eco-friendly alternative. We‘ll still need carbon-based fuels, though.
Note the article is ENTIRELY TOTALLY without even speculation… let alone reasonable calculation… of the COST of this insanely expensive power. And without consideration of the environmental impact of recycling (or ATTEMPTING to recycle) all those solar panels and lithium batteries when the are no longer adequately fresh, in about 20 to 25 years.
There is no comparison to the cost and environmental impact of “the alternative” (read THE ONLY sane and rational and viable) approach, massive build out of nuclear power.
The crowing about the jobs created is about at the level of praising the wisdom and foresight of building 100 factories making only left shoes.
For the record: France went 50% nuclear in its generation of electric power in ten short years, and 85% nuclear in 20 years. Neighboring Germany elected to spend comparable sums more recently (over the last decade) on solar and wind farms, and on closing down existing nuclear power plants (while building new natural gas electric power plants and expanding the capabilities of their coal plants and planning to cut down virgin forests in order to dig a new strip mine in Germany to mine more coal). In order to “back up” (read: provide 60% or more of the needed power) its uselessly intermitten solar and wind power.
Result: In France, electricity costs half as much as in Germany, and CO2 production per kilowatt hour of electricity is TEN TIMES… let me repeat that… TEN TIMES… lower than it is in Germany. Germany did lower its CO2 output per kilowatt hour of electricity production initially… but insignificantly so, and that lowering has stalled.
As for “battery backup” of solar or wind power generation: Applying high school physics and elementary school arithmetic to the facts and figures for the most recent technology large scale batteries… the one at Hornesdale in Australia and the one at Moss Landing, California… it becomes overwhelmingly obvious these things are by orders of magnitude (many powers of ten) FAR from being able to provide remotely economically the reserve stored power a 100% or mostly solar and wind power generation system of large scale (like for the state of California) needs. Such batteries would cost many trillions… and they MAKE NO ENERGY… just store energy made by some other source Spending that amount of money on the 35 new nuclear power plants California needs would provide
24 /7 365 electricity reliable… from plants that should last 60 to 80 years… highly economically. With near zero CO2 output.
Thus I find this article and its author to be (to given the most generous and gracious possible assessment) very ill informed and misleading.
—marty
Martin H. Goodman MD
life long fighter for social justice
life long environmentalist (and mountaineer, backpacker, river rafter, and long distance cyclist)
And… above all else… one who respects intellectually honestly conducted examination of science and medicine, based on evidence collected by rigorously proper, honest scientific method. By those who strive to reject any and all personal confirmation bias.