Climate Changed
Batteries and Gas: Frenemies of the Power World Face Off
- Some solar farms with batteries can compete with gas plants
- ‘Natural gas is still king but it’s starting to get displaced’
Photographer: Tomohiro Ohsumi/Bloomberg
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It was only three years ago that natural gas overtook coal to become king of America’s power mix, and its throne is already being challenged -- by batteries.
As battery costs fall, solar farms are increasingly installing storage systems, allowing them to sock away cheap electricity by day and pump it onto grids at night. Solar-storage projects are already cheaper than gas plants to build in the U.S. Southwest. And that’s bound to spread, some analysts and executives said Tuesday at the BNEF summit in New York.