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Clean Energy Experts Optimistic About Strategies for New York to Reach Energy Goals

Chris Bolt/WAER News

People at all levels of the green power field are expressing confidence in the future of alternative energy.  But they also see a tremendous challenge if New York is going to reach its goal to have 50% of electricity from renewable sources by the year 2030.  David Mooney is Director at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory in Colorado.  He says most of the new generation of electricity is green.

 “In 4 of the last 5 years, new capacity additions, the majority have been wind and solar. 63% is the wind and solar, 66% here, and going back to 2012 where there’s 53%.”

Mooney says that means market forces will continue the growth of renewable electricity generation regardless of policies in Washington.  Anne Reynolds of the Alliance for Clean Energy says that goal has to be attacked on four fronts. There has to be new solar, wind, geo-thermal and other projects – both at the small home or business level and at the larger utility level.  But also support for existing renewable projects, such as hydro-electric dams along with investments in efficiency to use less energy.  Reynolds says the pace of growth has to pick up.

Credit Chris Bolt/WAER News
Anne Reynolds is the Executive Director of ACE NY.

 “Over the last 10 years, we went essentially from 19% renewables to 25% renewables at least in 2014. And so we don’t need to just double the amount of renewables we have in New York from 25% to 50% we need to more than triple the pace that we’re developing it in terms of renewable share of the total electricity sector.”

One bright spot for growth is the viability of having wind turbines build off-shore, which State Energy Research Vice President Janet Joseph says is rapidly changing.

“Offshore wind is our 21st century Niagara Falls. It is a tremendous resource.  It has high capacity factors. The challenge with offshore wind, for many years, has been its cost, but the costs of offshore wind are coming down significantly.”

Credit nyserda.ny.gov
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nyserda.ny.gov
A map of offshore wind sites. The orange region has already been approved while the green region is still pending. These two areas would be the largest in the nation.

New York is 13th in the US in the amount of Wind Power and 10th in the country in Solar Power.  The speakers were to today’s Energy in the 21st Century Symposium. More information about the symposium can is available at energy21symposium.org

Find out more information about Colorado's National Renewable Energy Laboratory at nrel.gov.  Alliance f0r Clean Energy New York can be found at aceny.org. Finally, the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority can be found at nyserda.ny.gov

Chris Bolt, Ed.D. has proudly been covering the Central New York community and mentoring students for more than 30 years. His career in public media started as a student volunteer, then as a reporter/producer. He has been the news director for WAER since 1995. Dedicated to keeping local news coverage alive, Chris also has a passion for education, having trained, mentored and provided a platform for growth to more than a thousand students. Career highlights include having work appear on NPR, CBS, ABC and other news networks, winning numerous local and state journalism awards.