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America is discovering the hidden cost of green energy. California faces rolling blackouts by 2015 because its aging electricity grid is ill-equipped to husband the sporadic nature of wind and solar power. The rest of the country is not far behind. Upgrading the nation's infrastructure to avoid this fate won't come cheap.
The problem is that the electricity grid was built to manage energy from fossil fuels, which provide a steady flow of power. Renewable energy is not so reliable. The sun doesn't always shine and the wind blows more vigorously at night when consumption is low, for example.
That's not a big issue as long as such resources only make up a small amount of overall electricity consumption. But they're growing fast. Green energy is on track to provide a third of the Golden State's needs by 2020, up from 14 per cent today. On a good day Texas already gets a quarter of its power from wind.
Getting the most from green energy requires building more storage capacity as well as smarter systems to manage usage – like programming washing machines and other appliances to operate at night to take the edge off peak demand. It also means ensuring there's a backup which can be turned on quickly when demand is high but sits idle much of the time – gas-fired plants being most suitable.
All this costs money. A full revamp of the national grid would cost $1-trillion (U.S.) over the next 22 years, according to the International Energy Agency. That's equivalent to about three years of the country's electricity bills. Even spread over two decades, it equates to some 12 per cent of the $363-billion that individuals and firms paid to utilities in 2012, according to the Energy Information Administration.
That makes an increase in electricity bills inevitable. Of course, the environmental benefits of wind and solar energy are formidable. And once equipment is installed, the price for renewable energy is fixed – unlike the volatile cost of coal and gas. But California's impending crunch suggests that consumers have yet to receive the full tab for going green.