Climate Changed
The Quest for a 100% Green Grid: Five Takeaways on Getting There
- Utilities say best they can do is cut emissions by 90 percent
- Being fully carbon free will take technological breakthrough
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New Mexico. California. Hawaii. They’re all among the states that have passed laws requiring that all of their power from clean sources in the coming decades. Puerto Rico joined the bunch on Monday with a 100 percent renewable energy goal by 2050.
But how? While reductions in wind and solar costs have helped close scores of coal plants and dramatically lowered greenhouse-gas emissions, natural gas remains indispensable. And without some scientific breakthrough, utility chiefs at the BNEF Summit in New York Monday said that pushing emissions cuts past 80 or 90 percent is a pipe dream.