Onshore wind generation in Texas is poised to overtake the state's coal-based energy production by multiple terawatt-hours, according to a report that analytics firm Rystad Energy AS recently released.
Rystad said its forecast is based on the "trend of ever-lower production cost, as well as the healthy pipeline of planned capacity additions."
In the Lone Star State, onshore wind is expected to generate about 87 TWh of electricity annually, while only 84.4 TWh will come from coal-fired resources by 2020, Carlos Torres-Diaz, Rystad's head of gas market research, said in a Sept. 19 news release. Although the state traditionally has been highly reliant on fossil fuel-fired power production, Rystad believes that the cost of wind energy will continue to compare favorably to that of coal, which also is struggling against the renewable resource's greener image.
Many Republican-leaning states historically have not demonstrated the same enthusiasm for the wind industry as Democratic-majority states — renewables supply 13% of red-state demand compared to 27% in blue states — but political preferences may not be enough to prevent a continued wave of new wind-powered projects, Rystad said.
"Texas is just one of many red states that have recently 'gone green' by harnessing their great wind generation potential," Torres-Diaz said. He added that in Rystad's view, "renewable energy technologies are reaching a level where new installations are not driven solely by policies or subsidies, but by economics."
While one federal subsidy — the production tax credit — will phase out at the end of the year and thereby may make increasing market share more difficult for the wind industry in the mid-Atlantic and New England states, Torres-Diaz believes that expansion elsewhere will press on.
"Even without government subsidies, wind will likely remain competitive in the Midwest and south-central U.S. markets," he said. "Further expansion in the Rockies and California is likely, as state governments pursue more carbon-friendly energy solutions."
U.S. wind generation has surged in 2019. According to S&P Global Market Intelligence data, 2,423 MW of wind power projects were completed nationwide in the first six months of the year, marking the strongest two quarters for wind capacity additions between 2014 and 2019, and about 55% of the capacity additions in the second quarter were in Texas. With 25,629 MW of wind-sourced capacity, the state already ranks first in the nation for wind power, according to the American Wind Energy Association.
Meanwhile, coal generation in June comprised the majority of retiring operating capacity throughout the U.S. Of a total of 1,229 MW of capacity that permanently retired that month, 68.6% was from coal-fired generation units.
