A Comparative Look at Utility-Scale Wind and Solar Across the US

Presentation Description: Utility-scale wind and solar are the fastest-growing sources of generation in the U.S., having accounted for more than half of all new capacity added to U.S. grids over the past five years. As utility-scale solar becomes more competitive with wind, many companies (spanning the full length of the value chain) that formerly focused exclusively on wind have now branched out into solar (and storage) as well. These companies are hungry for insights that are not confined to single technologies or markets, but that instead span the full breadth of the technologies and markets in which they operate, providing a more holistic view.

As lead authors of the U.S. Department of Energy’s annual “Wind Technologies Market Report” and “Utility-Scale Solar” report series, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory is in the rather unique position of being a keen observer of both of these thriving—and converging—markets. These two “state-of-the-market” reports—now in their 14th and 8th years, respectively—draw upon an unparalleled wealth of empirical project-level data to uncover key trends and developments in utility-scale wind and solar deployment, technology, cost, performance, PPA pricing, wholesale market value, and policy, before concluding with a look ahead. Although, historically, we have tended to present each of these reports separately, to wind- or solar-specific audiences, WINDPOWER’s rebranding to CLEANPOWER presents a perfect opportunity to bring together the most important trends and insights from each report in a comparative fashion. To maximize this opportunity and facilitate our messaging, we present both wind and solar data in a side-by-side format on each slide—i.e., in parallel rather than in series.