The Juice is Worth the Squeeze

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Good morning and happy Friday,

This week, President Biden gave domestic solar panel manufacturers a boost by bumping the number of silicon solar cells that can enter the country tariff-free, raising the quota from 5 GW to 12.5 GW.

And, the EIA reported that electricity production from US wind and solar were ahead of coal through July and are on track to stay there for the rest of the year. Although renewables including hydro eclipsed coal in 2020, 2022, and 2023, this is the first time wind and solar alone have accomplished this feat.

Meanwhile, after a glitchy start, billionaire Elon Musk had a “conversation” with Donald Trump in which Musk attempted to wheedle some climate concessions out of the Republican presidential candidate, to little avail. The CEO of Tesla might be the only person Trump listens to on climate, a sobering thought given that the non-partisan group Energy Innovation estimates Project 2025 will cost American households $32 billion by 2030, decrease GDP by $320 billion per year, and result in 1.7 million lost jobs.

Read on for more.

The Juice is Worth the Squeeze

August 16 marks the two-year anniversary of the IRA, the most impactful climate law passed in the history of the U.S. An article from Heatmap shares a new report from the Climate Jobs National Resource Center and makes the case that the IRA could also prove to be one of the most important labor laws in recent history. Here’s why:

Dispatch readers are familiar with the eye-popping numbers for investment and job creation driven by the IRA; the CJNRC report finds that 6,285 utility-scale clean energy projects representing nearly 4 million jobs could be eligible for IRA incentives tied to labor standards.
The IRA’s prevailing wage and apprenticeship requirements could have a transformational effect for American workers. “This industrial expansion is going to pay dividends for generations,” according to the president of the Texas AFL-CIO.
Compliance is key, and “the lawyers are scaring everyone” about the costs of messing up. This has spawned “a whole new cottage industry in tax credit compliance,” the price of which by some estimates could “eat into 5% to 20% of the tax benefits” – but “the juice is worth the squeeze.”

⚡️ The Takeaway

Easier said than done. Enticing incentives notwithstanding, “52% of solar installation and project development companies found it ‘very difficult’ to find qualified workers, with electricians and construction workers being among the most difficult positions to fill.” This week E2 also published a two-year review of the IRA, and by their count 334 IRA-related clean energy projects have been announced across 40 states since August 2022, representing almost 110,000 jobs and nearly $126 billion in planned investment – despite “more than 40 attempts to roll back or reduce parts of the IRA by the U.S. House.”

Swing for the Fences

As November 5 draws closer, focus on key swing states is intensifying – and for clean energy advocates, the persistent question is, “Will the economic impacts of the IRA resonate with swing-state voters?” Here are two examples of what those impacts look like on the ground:

In Georgia, the city of Dalton went from Carpet Capital to Solartown, USA in just a few years thanks to investments in manufacturing facilities by Korean solar panel maker Qcells. In total, the Peach State has received $23 billion in investments driven by the IRA, resulting in the creation of nearly 30,000 jobs.
Qcells’ Dalton facility produces 5.1 GW of panels annually and employs 2,000 people; just last week, the DOE announced a $1.45 billion loan to the company to expand its manufacturing facility in Cartersville to employ an additional 2,000 workers and produce 3.3 GW of panels annually.
Across the border in North Carolina, sodium-ion battery startup Natron Energy plans to invest $1.4 billion to build its first big plant in the state. The battery and energy storage sector is booming, despite a recent slowdown in EV sales.

⚡️ The Takeaway

Rolling out the red carpet. As noted in the E2 report referenced above, “red states and Republican congressional districts are benefitting the most” from the IRA; in fact, “19 of the top 20 congressional districts for clean energy investments are held by Republicans,” and “more than half of all projects (are) in Republican districts.” Unsurprisingly, Republican states and districts also lead in terms of job creation. Here’s hoping “swing dancing” catches on.

New Berkeley Labs Report: U.S. State Renewables Portfolio & Clean Electricity Standards: 2024 Status Update
Grain Bust Express: Illinois Court Reverses Building OK for Chunk of $7B Transmission Project
Live Wires: AI game changer hits the grid
Colorado Phoenix: After years of dings, coal-fired powerhouse Tri-State now noted for switch to solar, wind
‘Seriously, This Sucks’: How a small Minnesota town was left with a giant pile of wind turbine blades
Not Easy: Inside Tim Walz’s not-quite-green record in Congress
NOOA, not NOAA: US offshore wind opponents seek to form national group to fight projects
Pure Play: Algonquin Power sells renewable energy business for $2.5B
Surf’s Up: Central Atlantic Offshore Wind Lease Sale Yields Nearly $93 Million To Power 2.2+ Million Homes
Extreme Scenes: Can tornadoes topple wind turbines? Fact-checking ‘Twisters.’
Whack-a-Mole: What the YIMBY Movement Can Teach the Climate Movement
Planning Ahead: Ukraine sets offshore wind target and plans green power auctions
Opinion: The GOP’s efforts to repeal the clean energy plan are anti-worker & will hurt Arizona

The Perks of Perovskites

We know many of you look forward to The Last Byte for fun factoids you can impress your friends with over drinks, and this week we’re continuing this trend by introducing you to perovskites, a type of mineral first discovered in Russia’s Ural Mountains in 1839 and named after Russian mineralogist Lev Perovski.

Perskovites have a lot of perks, particularly when it comes to solar PV. They can be used to create super-thin coatings that can then be “’ink-jetted’ onto your backpack, cell phone or car roof to harness the sun’s energy,” potentially revolutionizing how we generate electricity.

Scientists at Oxford have developed a pioneering technique that “stacks multiple light-absorbing layers into one solar cell. This makes it possible to harness “a wider range of the light spectrum, allowing more power to be generated from the same amount of sunlight.”

Impressively, independent certification has confirmed that the new ultra-thin material can capture about 27% of the energy in sunlight – a big improvement over the 22% capture rate of most solar panels. And researchers believe that in a few years’ time, they may be able to increase this to 45%.

While no one expects the technology to eliminate the need for solar farms, it could potentially generate a lot of energy by virtue of the fact that the materials could be applied anywhere. Sounds like a winning trend to us!