Renewable Energy

Electricity Markets & Policy's (EMP) work in the area of renewable power generation synthesizes foundational data, conducts original research, and provides technical support to public agencies and others. 

EMP’s work in this area has broad topical coverage, including:

EMP’s work seeks to inform decision-making among regulators, policymakers, grid operators, utilities, the renewable energy industry, and communities impacted by renewable energy development. 

See the Projects tab for more information on the areas in which we work. 

The EMP Group’s renewable energy research falls within four broad and overlapping areas:

Program Analysis and Assistance

The development and deployment of renewable power technologies are affected by regulations, programs, and policies at the local, state and federal levels. The EMP Department works to inform program and policy design through objective research and technical assistance. Among other areas, this includes a long-standing assessment and tracking of state Renewables Portfolio Standards.

Community Impacts and Public Acceptance

Renewable energy development impacts individuals and local communities in myriad ways. The EMP Department produces empirical research on individual and community responses to wind and solar deployment. This includes, among other related research, investigations of the relationships between wind and solar developments and real estate, and a national survey of community attitudes towards wind projects. 

Grid Operations, Infrastructure, and Valuation

Renewable energy technologies present distinct challenges to power system operations and planning, complicating assessments of grid-system value. The EMP Department works to increase understanding of strategies to reliably integrate renewable energy into the power system, while also advancing methods for grid-system valuation. 

Cost, Benefit and Market Analysis

Renewable power generation is growing rapidly, but each technology exhibits unique cost and performance profiles, and provides different benefits. The EMP Department synthesizes foundational data and conducts innovative analysis on the costs, benefits, performance, and markets for renewable energy technologies. As a component of this work-stream, EMP produces the annual flagship Land-Based Wind Market Report, Utility-Scale Solar report, and Tracking the Sun report series, and collaborates to produce the U.S. Wind Turbine Database. 

2020

Bolinger, Mark, Will Gorman, Dev Millstein, and Dirk C Jordan. "System-level performance and degradation of 21 GW-DC of utility-scale PV plants in the United States." Journal of Renewable and Sustainable Energy 12.4 (2020).

Related Files

   September 2020 Update PDF (1.39 MB)
Wiser, Ryan H, Dev Millstein, Mark Bolinger, Seongeun Jeong, and Andrew D Mills. "The hidden value of large-rotor, tall-tower wind turbines in the United States." Wind Engineering (2020).

Related Files

   Summary PDF (4.27 MB)
Wiser, Ryan H, Mark Bolinger, and Joachim Seel. "Benchmarking Utility-Scale PV Operational Expenses and Project Lifetimes: Results from a Survey of U.S. Solar Industry Professionals." 2020.

Related Files

   Technical Brief PDF (437.73 KB)
Seel, Joachim, Andrew D Mills, Cody Warner, Ben Paulos, and Ryan H Wiser. Impacts of High Variable Renewable Energy Futures on Electric-Sector Decision Making: Demand-Side Effects. 2020.

Related Files

   Report PDF (4.06 MB)   Briefing PDF (3.89 MB)
Hamilton, Sofia D, Dev Millstein, Mark Bolinger, Ryan H Wiser, and Seongeun Jeong. "How Does Wind Project Performance Change with Age in the United States?." Joule 4 (2020) 1-17.
Wiser, Ryan H, and Dev Millstein. "Evaluating the economic return to public wind energy research and development in the United States." Applied Energy 261 (2020).
Gorman, Will, Andrew D Mills, Mark Bolinger, Ryan H Wiser, Nikita G Singhal, Erik Ela, and Eric O'Shaughnessy. "Motivations and options for deploying hybrid generator-plus-battery projects within the bulk power system." The Electricity Journal 33.5 (2020).

Related Files

   Presentation PDF (2.28 MB)
Darghouth, Naïm R, James McCall, David Keyser, and Alexandra Aznar. Distributed Photovoltaic Economic Impact Analysis in Indonesia. 2020.
Barbose, Galen L, Sydney Forrester, Naïm R Darghouth, and Ben Hoen. Income Trends among U.S. Residential Rooftop Solar Adopters. 2020.

Related Files

   Report PDF (1.17 MB)
Rand, Joseph, Louisa Kramer, Christopher Garrity, Ben Hoen, James Diffendorfer, Hannah Hunt, and Michael Spears. "A continuously updated, geospatially rectified database of utility-scale wind turbines in the United States." Scientific Data 7.15 (2020).

Related Files

   Journal Article PDF (2.04 MB)
Wang, Meina, Paul Ullrich, and Dev Millstein. "Future projections of wind patterns in California with the variable-resolution CESM: a clustering analysis approach." Climate Dynamics 54.3-4 (2020) 2511 - 2531.

Related Files

   Pre-print Journal Article (10.77 MB)
Bolinger, Mark, Eric Lantz, Ryan H Wiser, Ben Hoen, Joseph Rand, and Robert Hammond. "Opportunities for and Challenges to Further Reductions in the “Specific Power” Rating of Wind Turbines Installed in the United States." Wind Engineering (2020).

Related Files

   Pre-print Article PDF (1.2 MB)   Webinar Slides PDF (1.77 MB)

2019

Bolinger, Mark, Joachim Seel, and Dana Robson. Utility-Scale Solar: Empirical Trends in Project Technology, Cost, Performance, and PPA Pricing in the United States –2019 Edition. 2019.

Related Files

   Report PDF (2.75 MB)   Presentation PDF (3.02 MB)   Data File XLSX (257.64 KB)
Hoen, Ben, Jeremy Firestone, Joseph Rand, Debi Elliott, Gundula Hübner, Johannes Pohl, Ryan H Wiser, Eric Lantz, Ryan Haac, and Ken Kaliski. "Attitudes of U.S. Wind Turbine Neighbors: Analysis of a Nationwide Survey." Energy Policy 134 (2019).

Related Files

   Journal article PDF (1.31 MB)   Presentation PDF (3.03 MB)
Mills, Andrew D, Dev Millstein, Ryan H Wiser, Joachim Seel, Juan Pablo Carvallo, Seongeun Jeong, and Will Gorman. Impact of Wind, Solar, and Other Factors on Wholesale Power Prices: An Historical Analysis—2008 through 2017. 2019.

Related Files

   Report PDF (22.02 MB)   Briefing PDF (3.2 MB)
Hübner, Gundula, Johannes Pohl, Ben Hoen, Jeremy Firestone, Debi Elliott, Joseph Rand, and Ryan Haac. "Monitoring annoyance and stress effects of wind turbines on nearby residents: A comparison of U.S. and European samples." Environment International 132 (2019).

Related Files

   Journal Article PDF (765.71 KB)   Presentation PDF (1.85 MB)
Barbose, Galen L, and Naïm R Darghouth. Tracking the Sun: Pricing and Design Trends for Distributed Photovoltaic Systems in the United States - 2019 Edition. 2019.

Related Files

   Report PDF (2.13 MB)   Slide Deck Summary PDF (390.62 KB)   Summary Data Tables XLXS (97 KB)
Hoen, Ben, Joseph Rand, and Salma Elmallah. Commercial PV Property Characterization: An Analysis of Solar Deployment Trends in Commercial Real Estate. 2019.

Related Files

   Presentation PDF (2.51 MB)
Mills, Andrew D, and Pía Rodriguez. Drivers of the Resource Adequacy Contribution of Solar and Storage for Florida Municipal Utilities. 2019.

Related Files

   Report PDF (3.46 MB)
Watson, Simon, Alberto Moro, Vera Reis, Charalampos Baniotopoulos, Stephan Barth, Gianni Bartoli, Florian Bauer, Elisa C Boelman, Dennis Bosse, Antonello Cherubini, Alessandro Croce, Lorenzo Fagiano, Marco Fontana, Adrian Gambier, Konstantinos Gkoumas, Christopher Golightly, Mikel Iribas Latour, Peter Jamieson, John Kaldellis, Andrew Macdonald, Jimmy Murphy, Michael Muskulus, Francesco Petrini, Luca Pigolotti, Flemming Rasmussen, Philippe Schild, Roland Schmehl, Nafsika Stavridou, John Tande, Nigel Taylor, Thomas Telsnig, and Ryan H Wiser. "Future emerging technologies in the wind power sector: A European perspective." Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews 113.109270 (2019).
Veers, Paul, Katherine Dykes, Eric Lantz, Stephan Barth, Carlo L Bottasso, Ola Carlson, Andrew Clifton, Johney Green, Peter Green, Hannele Holttinen, Daniel Laird, Ville Lehtomäki, Julie K Lundquist, James Manwell, Melinda Marquis, Charles Meneveau, Patrick Moriarty, Xabier Munduate, Michael Muskulus, Jonathan Naughton, Lucy Pao, Joshua Paquette, Joachim Peinke, Amy Robertson, Javier Sans Rodrigo, Anna Maria Sempreviva, J. Charles Smith, Aidan Tuohy, and Ryan Wiser. "Grand challenges in the science of wind energy." Science (2019).
Gorman, Will, Andrew D Mills, and Ryan H Wiser. "Improving estimates of transmission capital costs for utility-scale wind and solar projects to inform renewable energy policy." Energy Policy (2019).

Related Files

   Pre-print Journal Article PDF (1.66 MB)
Wiser, Ryan H, and Mark Bolinger. Benchmarking Anticipated Wind Project Lifetimes: Results from a Survey of U.S. Wind Industry Professionals. 2019.

Related Files

   Summary Report PDF (428.93 KB)
Wiser, Ryan H, and Mark Bolinger. 2018 Wind Technologies Market Report. 2019.

Related Files

   2018 WTMR Report PDF (3.34 MB)   2018 WTMR Briefing PDF (5.82 MB)   2018 WTMR Data File XLSX (186.93 KB)
Haac, Ryan, Ken Kaliski, Matt Landis, Ben Hoen, Joseph Rand, Jeremy Firestone, Debi Elliott, Gundula Hübner, and Johannes Pohl. "Wind turbine audibility and noise annoyance in a national U.S. survey: Individual perception and influencing factors." The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America 146.1124 (2019).

Related Files

   Presentation PDF (5.74 MB)   Journal Article PDF (1.07 MB)

Pages

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Interactions between hybrid power plant development and local transmission in congested regions
Effects of land-based wind turbine upsizing on community sound levels and power and energy density
Generator Interconnection Cost Analysis in the Southwest Power Pool (SPP) Territory

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