[frafra]

> Renewables are now cheaper than fossils

price of energy production != cost of energy

Lazard 2023 estimates that solar and wind in the California grid costs 2/3 times more than when just considering the LCOE. Solar and wind production can be cheaper, but the final price is way higher.

[oezi]

I must be reading Lazard 2023 wrong because the LCOE for wind and utility scale solar seems almost half of the other sources. What am I missing?

[frafra]

When taking into account the "Cost of Firming Intermittency" the total cost can go up by 2/3 times in the "CAISO" case at page 8 of Lazard 2023, which is higher than LCOE for existing nuclear and to some LCOE estimates for new nuclear.

In addition to that, there are additional costs (integration costs) that are not considered in LCOE; for example, you can build PV power plants in sunny places, but that might not be where the electricity need is, so the network should be upgraded as well. All these costs are highly dependent on the penetration of intermittent sources and on the grid, and this is why the price of the electricity can be very different from the cost of electricity. I can produce electricity very cheaply, but maybe no one needs that. This is why Germany sometimes have negative prices, so it actually pays with subsidies the consumption of energy in neighbourhood countries, and then the price can skyrocket, which is why Sweden recently blocked a new connection towards Germany, "where the electricity market today does not function efficiently" (Energy Minister Ebba Busch).