Sara: I'm your host, Sara Baldwin, Senior Director of Electrification with Energy Innovation.
Hello and welcome to another season of Electrify This, a podcast focused on electrification as a pathway to cut climate pollution and invigorate our economy. Each episode, I connect with experts to explore the policy and market issues underpinning the shift to electrified transportation, buildings, and industry, all powered by a clean energy grid.
Today's episode, Electrification Loves Grid Reliability. Welcome to the show, everyone. We took a few months off at the end of 2024, but I am really happy to be back with you and looking forward to hosting the fifth season of this podcast. And in honor of St. Valentine's Day, this first episode is a love note to the electric grid.
We're digging in on the important topic of grid reliability. Something front of mind for more people, utilities, and policy makers as demand for electricity continues to grow. And as extreme weather and wildfires place unprecedented strains on all infrastructure, including the grid. The grid's portfolio is diversifying as more utilities and states integrate more renewable energy, energy storage and other clean energy technologies in the race to reduce emissions and stabilize the climate. And while this transition has been underway for some time now, converging factors are impacting the grid and uncertainty looms on the horizon.
In this episode, we'll explore the myriad issues facing the grid and what policies and practices are needed to build a resilient, reliable, affordable, clean grid to power the future.
But before we meet the guests today, it's time for our electrifying news segment, with a few headlines to keep you informed on what's happening with electrification, clean energy, and climate progress.
According to a 2025 Renewable Energy Outlook and Utility Dive, load growth and strong policies are still driving the renewable energy industry forward despite the threat of federal policy reversals. The article goes on to report that U. S. electricity demand could rise 128 gigawatts over the next five years. And at the same time, the number of new transmission interconnection requests is at an all-time high, with 2.5 terawatts of clean energy and storage capacity currently waiting in the interconnection queue. While macro trends are positive, the industry faces challenges in the form of interconnection backlogs, citing permitting, financial, and political uncertainty.
According to AP News, uncertainty over Trump's electric vehicle policies is now clouding 2025 forecasts for carmakers. Although EV demand is expected to keep rising this year, policy changes and tariffs could impact the market. The article reports that S& P Global Mobility expects global sales of 15. 1 million EVs in 2025, marking a 30 percent jump from last year, and battery electric vehicles are expected to make up for that. Up 16. 7 percent of the market share for light duty vehicles globally.
And finally, in a December report from Wood Mackenzie and the Solar Energy Industries Association, the U. S. added a record breaking 9. 3 gigawatts of new solar module manufacturing capacity in quarter three of 2024. At full capacity, U. S. solar module factories can produce enough to meet nearly all demand for solar in the United States. And five new or expanded factories in Alabama, Florida, Ohio, and Texas will bring the total U. S. solar module manufacturing capacity to nearly 40 gigawatts. With solar cell manufacturing on the rise, this marks a pivotal moment for America's surging solar industry.
And now, back to our topic, electrification loves grid reliability. Hey listeners, I'm your host, Sara Baldwin.
Today I'm speaking with Ric O'Connell with GridLab on the topic of grid reliability. And you're plugged in. to electrify this. Ric is the founding executive director of GridLab, where he leads a team of experts to provide comprehensive technical grid expertise to policymakers and advocates.
He's a recognized leader in renewable energy technology and policy, and he's provided engineering support for more than 8 gigawatts of utility scale solar projects worldwide. Prior to GridLab, he served as a consultant with Black Veatch for 12 years and helped build their global renewable energy consulting practice.
Ric is also a longtime friend and colleague, and I've had the honor to serve on GridLab's advisory board for several years. So welcome to the show, Ric.
Ric: Thanks, Sara. So glad to be here.
Sara: It's so great to have you here, and I'm super excited for this discussion today. So for those listeners who maybe aren't familiar with GridLab and what you all do, maybe tell us a little bit more about your mission and some of the examples of your recent work.
Ric: Yeah, happy to. We're a unique, not for profit. We started in 2017, and it was really about addressing this gap of non-utility stakeholders really lacked the technical expertise to understand what were real technical barriers to the grid transition and what were just sort of hand waving in fear and so we really tried to sort of figure that out.
We really focus on providing that technical capacity to stakeholders around the country, in both regulatory proceedings at the state level, and then at our RTO, ISOs, and FERC and NERC. In that work where we're providing that kind of regulatory technical expertise.
We can sort of take a higher- level view and sort of see what's happening across the country and different places and identify those broad technical barriers. We're really focused right now on about like how we can get clean energy on the grid more quickly. And so we've done a lot of thought leadership around how we do these rapid solutions.
So things like high performance conductors, flexible interconnection, and better tools and processes for energy planning. I think we're a little bit of like two organizations. Really thought leadership work to address these technical concerns and then a technical assistance organization.
Sara: Great. Well, I can attest your work is really important and you guys serve such an important need across the country. The grid has become ever more important as we continue on our path to reduce carbon as well as electrify more end uses. And I'm excited to chat with you today and learn a little bit more about some of the most important issues facing the grid right now.
But before we get there, you know, we're standing in 2025 and already so much has changed, especially on the surface for the U. S. context. But we know that the electric grid is pretty slow moving, and that's not an altogether bad thing in, in some cases. What are the issues that are most front of mind for you as you look at the year ahead as it relates specifically to the U.S. electric grid? And I know that's a big question, so feel free to pick your top two, three, or four that really surface for you.
Ric: Well, maybe I'll pick my top two, Sara. The two that I would say is really how we respond to load growth and then, and then how, and really, and then affordability. And the two are intertwined.
So load growth is coming. We've known this for a while, that as we transition transportation and buildings off of fossil fuels and onto the electric grid. The electrification that, that you think about all the time, you know, that we're going to see that low growth from that. But I think what's caught a lot of people by surprise is the growth in data centers and manufacturing that is causing some regions of the country to see very high growth in the near term.
And on the affordability front, while low growth is often seen as good for rates, I think we're concerned that utilities are making significant investment based on uncertain forecasts that could really drive up rates, especially if they double down on more gas investments. And on the gas front, right, you know, I think we have like incredibly low gas prices in the U.S., but if we expand LNG exports, gas could become a global commodity like oil and our very low national pricing could become a much higher national price and really exposing customers to that higher price. So I think affordability and low growth are the two things that I think about the most and the two things that I worry about and keep me up at night for sure.
Sara: Both of those make a lot of sense. And I think those who are in the energy space would relate very much to those being the key themes and trends at the forefront. And I really appreciate the additional context you give for the interrelated dynamics of affordability and gas markets, both domestic and global and how interrelated those are. Can you say a little bit more about that? Because I'm not sure everyone fully understands those dynamics.
Ric: Well, yeah. So right now we produce a lot of natural gas and the U. S. actually produces the most natural gas in the world. And we export some of that natural gas. We've exported a lot to Europe, especially post Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. We export to Asia. You know, gas is really constrained. Most of the gas that we produce is consumed here in the US. and so the price is really set just here in the U.S., you know, whereas oil is a really a global commodity so it doesn't really matter how much oil we produce here in the U.S.
The price is set by the global market. Whereas gas is still, there's still a national market and the price is set nationally. And so we pay about a third for gas or a quarter for gas, what the global price is. But if we start exporting enough gas and if our export capability goes up, just like the current administration is pushing for, there becomes some tipping point, at which it'll stop being a national price and start becoming an international price, a global price.
And that could really drive prices up for, for consumers. I mean, this is what happened to oil in the U. S. during the 1970s crisis, where we stopped becoming self-sufficient and we had an oil shock. So the same thing could potentially happen with natural gas. And I think that's a risk that I don't think a lot of people are thinking enough about.
Sara: Yeah, I agree with you, and thanks for that helpful explanation. There's kind of this rush to gas without a lot of discussion around what implications that might have, more broadly, so appreciate that additional context.
So it sounds like there are a lot of pressures and many converging factors that are impacting our electric grid. Simultaneously, you mentioned load growth. You mentioned electrification, not just from buildings and transportation, but hopefully in a not too distant future, we're also going to see more industrial processes electrify yet another large source of potential growth.
But we also have climate disasters, and we have more extreme weather, and we have polar vortexes and wildfires, and we have supply chain issues and inflation. So we're really just kind of getting hit from all sides. How do we build and operate a grid that is reliable and resilient?
And how are you guys evaluating in your work, all of these factors and thinking about cohesive solutions that can tackle many fronts in one shot?
Ric: Yeah, that's a great question. And it goes to really the heart of what GridLab does and what we think about. So we spend a lot of time in the planning world, thinking about the future electric power system and what it looks like and all those risks that you just talked about need to be taken into account when you're planning the future power system. So thinking about weather risks, thinking about fuel supply risks, costs, etc. So what you're talking about is: how do we plan for all those contingencies?
And how do we plan and build a grid that can handle extreme weather? We're sort of choosing the right resources based on the costs and performance and different trade offs. And so we spend a lot of time with sophisticated software tools to plan the electric grid.
And just like any tool, you've got to use it correctly. You've got to give it the right data. You've got to be making sure that you're actually modeling the extreme weather, that you're modeling multiple weather years that you're capturing those risks, that you're building multiple scenarios to capture sort of inflation or other kinds of other kinds of concerns.
So, we just launched this Innovate Series where we're really thinking pretty differently about the ways to use these tools. I think the sort of standard way was people would build a couple of scenarios and then do some sensitivities inside those scenarios.
They'd have like a scenario with a carbon constrained world and then have a scenario with low load growth, and a scenario with high load growth or, and. Now I think we're thinking that there's just so many different permutations and complications that we just model like thousands of scenarios at once and be able to sort of sort them rapidly and like figure out like what are the, what are the least regret paths.
I think the other thing that's really important about this is thinking more holistically about the distribution system generation and the transmission system. Traditionally, those three systems were planned in silos separately that and that approach just really isn't fit for purpose for today's grid.
And I think a lot of utilities and others have been thinking about a more integrated planning approach. But I think the tools and the ambition are kind of not there. We're doing a lot of work on how we can bring these silos together, both sort of organizationally and then from a tool perspective and think more holistically about how we plan and operate the grid.
Sara: Love it. That all makes a lot of sense. And I'm, again, just so grateful you guys are doing this deep thinking and bring a level of sophistication to the conversation that's really needed because it isn't as simple as, you know, saying “We can do it. Let's just do it!” You've actually got to prove through modeling and through trial and error these things out in the real world.
So super important work. You know, the reliability of the grid has been a topic for as long as I've been working in the space. I'm sure you would find the same. But I don't hear the conversation evolving as much as maybe I would like, or maybe it should. You kind of alluded to this, that, you know, there used to be just such silos between the generation transmission and distribution system planning, as well as the regulatory construct that operates outside of all of the technical aspects of the grid, not necessarily evolving as fast as it needs to support these changes.
There's also a lot of hand waving and fear mongering that happens when you talk about reliability. In your perspective, what do we need to be most focused on right now to really double down on the construction of a strong, reliable, and resilient grid?
Ric: Yeah, Sara, I'm, I'm really frustrated by that discourse as well.
I think there's this consensus that we're in a reliability crisis, but our reliability, our electric system reliability is actually quite good, and the few issues we've had in the last couple of years, like winter storm Uri, winter storm Elliot, Those are really have been due to our grid switching from being from coal to natural gas and not having firm gas supply.
So in the winter, our electric system is competing with residential and commercial heat for gas. And there's not always the gas isn't always available. You know, we moved really quickly. We talked about how slow things move in the grid world, but just in the last decade, we've really gone from 40 percent coal to 15 percent coal.
With natural gas kind of doing the opposite going from 20 percent to 40 percent. And the gas system really hasn't been able to keep up with that in many ways. And I think it's sad that the narrative, the sort of conventional wisdom is sort of blaming new resources like wind and solar for, you know, these reliability challenges, but that's, that's just not the case.
I think it's great maybe to just think about it. Texas is an example. I know Texas is unique, but, you know, has a unique regulatory structure, but Texas has been growing its load dramatically. So its load has growth 35 percent over the past four years. Texas grid in terms of peak capacity is now larger than New York and California combined, and it's been doing that while it's increasing its share of carbon free energy.
So it's been adding primarily wind, solar, and batteries over the last couple years. And it's growing its grid and it's also increasing its clean energy percentage. I think Texas is a great example of how you can grow to meet load, but then doing that really with clean energy.
Sara: Yeah, absolutely. And to your other point about the gas supply being one of the challenges, we also saw in both of those events that the plants themselves and a lot of the infrastructure was not weatherized. It was not prepared for extreme cold because it's Texas, and it was built under a paradigm of a certain temperature range of operation.
And so when this climate driven extreme weather hits, it knocks all of those preconceived notions right out the door and challenges what we think we know about power plant operations in different seasons. In addition, a lot of the homes also similarly not weatherized and so folks were, you know, huddling around, ovens and trying to stay warm and yeah, bad, bad situation all around.
So good lessons to be learned and I'm really glad to hear. Texas, I'm glad to see that Texas and ERCOT have moved so swiftly to respond and make changes in response to those very devastating events. What are some of the biggest fallacies that you hear repeated in the various venues that you're in, working on grid reliability and planning and the energy transition?
Ric: Yeah, great question. I mean, I really think the largest fallacy is the myth that the grid needs to have enough dispatchable generation to meet its peak load. So essentially assigning wind and solar zero reliability benefit. So it's absolutely true that we do need dispatchable generation, but we don't need 100 percent.
And batteries definitely count as dispatchable. So I think the lessons from California and Texas are clear that we can have a portfolio of clean resources. You know, wind, solar batteries to support us with some dispatchable generation, you know, to meet growing load and provide reliable power.
I wish we had better messaging around that. I think it's not intuitive to a lot of people. I think there's also the cousin of this fallacy is the notion that if we're adding new, you know, 24/7 loads to the grid, like manufacturing your data centers, then we have to add new 24/7 generation to match that load.
It's just wrong. I mean, the grid is a dynamic system. There's, there's transmission that allows you to share. Even though the new load may be 24/7, there's still lots of headroom in the existing system. You know, we build to meet peaks, which are, you know, a lot of times twice what the sort of average generation is.
So, we can still build this portfolio to produce it. And then I think if that load, you know, we're talking about these new loads, like data centers or manufacturing, if that load can flex. You know, can be flexible for just a handful of hours a year that we definitely don't need 24/7 to support it.
I think a paper is just coming out this week that from Duke University that says we can add 100 gigawatts of new data center load to the U.S. power system without adding any new generation if that load could just be a little bit flexible. So I think this is just something that's maybe not intuitive to people, like they don't understand the dynamics of this pretty complex system, and so this is just one of the fallacies that I spend a lot of time thinking about how we can, you know, get people to think differently about dispatchable generation and the need for dispatchable generation.
Sara: Yeah, really, really important point there, just for the listeners who may not be fully up to speed on the term dispatchable. Can you just give us a quick, concise definition of that?
Ric: Oh, sure. And I think you're going to see this term used more often. I know the new administration has been using this quite a bit. A dispatchable generator just really means someone that can be turned on or off, you know, it can be controlled to ramp up and down. So this is in contrast with something like a wind or a solar plant that is really being turned, you know, turned up and down by the weather that really a dispatchable generator is as some, it's either battery or it has some kind of fuel source like water or gas or coal or nuclear, although nuclear actually doesn't really dispatch.
It kind of runs flat, but a dispatchable generator is one that's not subject to, you know, we talk about wind and solar as being variable generators or weather dependent generators. So that's, yeah, I hope that's helpful.
Sara: Yeah, that's really helpful, and I guess one of the things that jumps out to me with, with that emphasis on dispatchability, as you mentioned, is it really puts so much onus on the supply and the generation to respond to fluctuations in the load. But as you said, if the load can step up a little bit more through demand side, uh, management programs, demand response, flexible load programs, then we have a little bit more of a two-way street of operation that actually is more responsive in general and probably more affordable.
Ric: Exactly.
Sara: So, pivoting to the solution set. What can policy makers and regulators and non-technical people who are trying to understand this and may be faced with some of these issues in their work or daily lives, what should they know about grid reliability to ensure that they can make the most informed decisions or where can they go to find good information?
Ric: Yeah, good question. I think it's hard to it's been hard to sort of find this information like condensed. And I think part of that is that I think we need to have good examples. Places like I talked about Texas, I think also California, you know, examples of grids where you could have a grid that's running with a lot of renewable energy, low wholesale prices.
I think it's hard for a lot of non-technical people to find it just hard to grasp that we can have this reliable grid, you know, if we're just, if we're relying on things like wind and solar that only generate when it's windy, only generate when it's sunny. So I think we need good stories and examples to demonstrate that it works.
I mean, one of my frustrations is that places in the country that are most worried about the variability of renewable energy of the places that have the least of it. They should be the least worried about this. I think there are limits to how much what percentage of a variable resource you can have on a grid like we debate that and it sort of depends on the, on a lot of factors, but, you know, there's a lot of places in the country that have sort of single digit percentage of wind and solar and are very concerned about a lack of dispatchable generation, but they have tons of dispatchable generation.
So I think really just, you know, getting experience, one of the things I think a lot about is that we just need to get better about this narrative and explaining to people how grids can be reliable running on clean energy.
Sara: Hey listeners, I'm your host Sara Baldwin. Today I'm speaking with Ric O'Connell with GridLab on the topic of grid reliability. And you're plugged in to Electrify This!
So you're involved with a group called ESIG, the Energy Systems Integration Group, and they do a ton of great research, and they unite folks from all walks of the energy grid, so utilities and operators and researchers and national labs, et cetera, and they try to, as I understand it, really do a lot of testing of theories and coming to consensus where they can on some of these issues.
And it's a great forum for elevating some of the technical solutions and some of these great examples out there. So I'll put that link to their website as well as your website in the show notes for folks who want to dig in and get more information, and of course our national labs are a wealth of information and they are amazing and what they produce and the tools that they create and how many smart, dedicated people they have on staff devoting their lives every day to figuring out these hard problems. So hopefully those labs will continue to get the support they deserve.
So looking back on the past few years of progress and looking ahead to a little bit more uncertain future, what do you hope will carry forward and not be scrapped when it comes to this conversation around reliability and affordability?
Ric: Yeah, great, great question. And I think, you know, for me, the first thing that comes to mind are the tax credits for clean energy, the investment tax credit and production tax credit. So those tax credits really drive down the cost of new clean energy resources. And it solves for affordability and reducing rates. And I think it really also solves for reliability. It gets us new clean resources on the grid that can help add to reliability. I think it's an incredibly important federal incentive. And so I hope that those provisions that were in the Inflation Reduction Act are going to stick around.
You know, we've made a lot of progress. When I started in clean energy 20 years ago, you know, wind and solar were kind of a very small percentage of national generation. I mean, solar was not even a percentage point, right? And now with the solar in the teens, it's really incredible. So I think a lot of it has to do with the tax credits, which have really helped. I think that would be my, that would be my one bid.
Sara: And a good and timely bid it is. Yeah, totally agree there. I think if I were to layer on, I would say (kind of building on what you were saying earlier) looking to the examples and really looking hard at how things are operating and how things are working in places that do have high renewables penetration and increasing amounts of storage and are managing these problems with an eye to the future.
I think we have so many great examples and more to come, not just domestically, but internationally. The numbers speak for themselves and the facts tend to lead to a more positive conclusion that we are able to do this.
So great. Well, thank you. As always, these conversations go way too fast, so I have just a couple more questions, and then I'll let you go.
You mentioned earlier that AI data center load growth is becoming more and more of a behemoth in our energy space simply because of the amount of energy required. I saw a chart the other day that showed the volume of electricity needed to produce just one AI image was like astronomically larger than what it is to just like ask Siri to do something simple.
So it's not just a matter of what the data center companies are trying to do, but also what consumers are asking of these data apps. There's also electrification growth, which is a slower and has a steadier rate of change. So, how do you see them playing out in the work that you do? And what do we really need to be focused on to ensure that this is not a race to the bottom, but an opportunity to really build, again, more of a clean and reliable grid for all the loads, uh, coming on the grid.
Ric: Yeah, well you, you said it. I think electrification load is a lot more predictable and slow and steady. And it's much easier to model, you know, you can do adoption curves and it's just easier to respond to from a planning perspective. Whereas AI, you know, it's very chunky, it shows up in just certain places. And we think a lot of it is speculative, so it's hard to figure out what's real and what's not, so it's, it's just much more difficult to respond to.
We have over two terawatts of wind and solar and, and storage in the interconnection queues around the country, you know, it's an enormous amount. So, you know, more generating capacity waiting in interconnection queues than we have installed by like a factor of two. And so all those projects are waiting to get online and provide the energy and capacity that all these new loads need, whether it's charging an EV or building a new AI data center and that's what we should be focused on. How can we get those projects out of the interconnection queues and actually constructed and built and plugged into the grid so they can provide new clean electricity for these new loads?
And I think the concern I have is we're seeing now is a lot of focus on how do we get gas generation to jump these cues and jump in front because what we really need is, you know I think this goes back to the fallacy that you were asking me about of, oh, well, gas generation is really the only kind of generation that can meet these new loads.
And I think that's just wrong. And I think it's going to be slower and more expensive. So rely on gas and so I think we need to, you know, hopefully the new administration and states across the country understand that, like, the best way to power our economy in an affordable way is to let these clean energy projects that are sitting in queues actually get built and, and provide value to society and to the grid.
Sara: Yeah. Absolutely. And I'll just take the opportunity to give your surplus interconnection research a plug here because there are some very innovative ideas you all have had on the topic of how you expedite those queues, but also how you take advantage of existing interconnections on the grid and swapping in clean where older and retired fossil plants once were. So great, great research there to take a look at for our listeners interested in learning more about the ever-exciting world of interconnection. My listeners know I'm a total interconnection nerd and very proud. I have the wonderful folks at IREC and Sky Stanfield to thank for that.
Well, this has been great, Ric. I really appreciate all the thoughts and all the thought leadership, uh, that you bring to the country and the world. So, and it's great to be your longtime colleague and friend. We'll round it out to see if you have any final thoughts or words of wisdom for our listeners.
Ric: I really want to come back to what I was talking about earlier and just say, I think it's important to come up with these compelling narratives and stories to help people understand that clean energy is reliable, affordable, and it can meet low growth. You know, it's what's waiting in the queues to connect to the grid and provide reliable and affordable energy. And so I guess we all need help in coming up with these stories and coming up with this message and really to push back against these fallacies that gas is really the only answer to new load growth and the only resource that can provide that can provide new energy and capacity. I'd love help coming up with those stories and narratives, and I appreciate the work that you're doing to help us think through that.
Sara: Awesome. Well, the good news is I think we both have our work cut out for us here. Job security is a good thing.
Ric: That's right.
Sara: Always new problems to be solved. Well thank you so much Ric. It's really a pleasure to chat with you and thanks so much for coming on the show today.
Ric: Absolutely. My pleasure.
Sara: The pleasure is all mine. Super fun.
Electrify This! is an Energy Innovation original podcast. Energy Innovation is a nonpartisan energy policy firm delivering high quality research and analysis to help policy makers and regulators pursue a decarbonized energy future.
You can find out more about energy innovation and the podcast@energyinnovation.org/electrifythis, and feel free to send us an email at electrifythis@energyinnovation.org. And we always appreciate any shout outs on social media and both energy innovation and myself are now on Blue sky. So you can find us there @sarabaldwin.bsky.social and @energyinnovation.org.
And we're also on Substack, so check us out online. As always, a big thanks to our sound engineer Rowan sticker and SLC recording based here in the City of Salt of Utah.
Thanks for tuning in. I'm your host, Sara Baldwin, and you're plugged in to Electrify This.
Hello and welcome to another season of Electrify This, a podcast focused on electrification as a pathway to cut climate pollution and invigorate our economy. Each episode, I connect with experts to explore the policy and market issues underpinning the shift to electrified transportation, buildings, and industry, all powered by a clean energy grid.
Today's episode, Electrification Loves Grid Reliability. Welcome to the show, everyone. We took a few months off at the end of 2024, but I am really happy to be back with you and looking forward to hosting the fifth season of this podcast. And in honor of St. Valentine's Day, this first episode is a love note to the electric grid.
We're digging in on the important topic of grid reliability. Something front of mind for more people, utilities, and policy makers as demand for electricity continues to grow. And as extreme weather and wildfires place unprecedented strains on all infrastructure, including the grid. The grid's portfolio is diversifying as more utilities and states integrate more renewable energy, energy storage and other clean energy technologies in the race to reduce emissions and stabilize the climate. And while this transition has been underway for some time now, converging factors are impacting the grid and uncertainty looms on the horizon.
In this episode, we'll explore the myriad issues facing the grid and what policies and practices are needed to build a resilient, reliable, affordable, clean grid to power the future.
But before we meet the guests today, it's time for our electrifying news segment, with a few headlines to keep you informed on what's happening with electrification, clean energy, and climate progress.
According to a 2025 Renewable Energy Outlook and Utility Dive, load growth and strong policies are still driving the renewable energy industry forward despite the threat of federal policy reversals. The article goes on to report that U. S. electricity demand could rise 128 gigawatts over the next five years. And at the same time, the number of new transmission interconnection requests is at an all-time high, with 2.5 terawatts of clean energy and storage capacity currently waiting in the interconnection queue. While macro trends are positive, the industry faces challenges in the form of interconnection backlogs, citing permitting, financial, and political uncertainty.
According to AP News, uncertainty over Trump's electric vehicle policies is now clouding 2025 forecasts for carmakers. Although EV demand is expected to keep rising this year, policy changes and tariffs could impact the market. The article reports that S& P Global Mobility expects global sales of 15. 1 million EVs in 2025, marking a 30 percent jump from last year, and battery electric vehicles are expected to make up for that. Up 16. 7 percent of the market share for light duty vehicles globally.
And finally, in a December report from Wood Mackenzie and the Solar Energy Industries Association, the U. S. added a record breaking 9. 3 gigawatts of new solar module manufacturing capacity in quarter three of 2024. At full capacity, U. S. solar module factories can produce enough to meet nearly all demand for solar in the United States. And five new or expanded factories in Alabama, Florida, Ohio, and Texas will bring the total U. S. solar module manufacturing capacity to nearly 40 gigawatts. With solar cell manufacturing on the rise, this marks a pivotal moment for America's surging solar industry.
And now, back to our topic, electrification loves grid reliability. Hey listeners, I'm your host, Sara Baldwin.
Today I'm speaking with Ric O'Connell with GridLab on the topic of grid reliability. And you're plugged in. to electrify this. Ric is the founding executive director of GridLab, where he leads a team of experts to provide comprehensive technical grid expertise to policymakers and advocates.
He's a recognized leader in renewable energy technology and policy, and he's provided engineering support for more than 8 gigawatts of utility scale solar projects worldwide. Prior to GridLab, he served as a consultant with Black Veatch for 12 years and helped build their global renewable energy consulting practice.
Ric is also a longtime friend and colleague, and I've had the honor to serve on GridLab's advisory board for several years. So welcome to the show, Ric.
Ric: Thanks, Sara. So glad to be here.
Sara: It's so great to have you here, and I'm super excited for this discussion today. So for those listeners who maybe aren't familiar with GridLab and what you all do, maybe tell us a little bit more about your mission and some of the examples of your recent work.
Ric: Yeah, happy to. We're a unique, not for profit. We started in 2017, and it was really about addressing this gap of non-utility stakeholders really lacked the technical expertise to understand what were real technical barriers to the grid transition and what were just sort of hand waving in fear and so we really tried to sort of figure that out.
We really focus on providing that technical capacity to stakeholders around the country, in both regulatory proceedings at the state level, and then at our RTO, ISOs, and FERC and NERC. In that work where we're providing that kind of regulatory technical expertise.
We can sort of take a higher- level view and sort of see what's happening across the country and different places and identify those broad technical barriers. We're really focused right now on about like how we can get clean energy on the grid more quickly. And so we've done a lot of thought leadership around how we do these rapid solutions.
So things like high performance conductors, flexible interconnection, and better tools and processes for energy planning. I think we're a little bit of like two organizations. Really thought leadership work to address these technical concerns and then a technical assistance organization.
Sara: Great. Well, I can attest your work is really important and you guys serve such an important need across the country. The grid has become ever more important as we continue on our path to reduce carbon as well as electrify more end uses. And I'm excited to chat with you today and learn a little bit more about some of the most important issues facing the grid right now.
But before we get there, you know, we're standing in 2025 and already so much has changed, especially on the surface for the U. S. context. But we know that the electric grid is pretty slow moving, and that's not an altogether bad thing in, in some cases. What are the issues that are most front of mind for you as you look at the year ahead as it relates specifically to the U.S. electric grid? And I know that's a big question, so feel free to pick your top two, three, or four that really surface for you.
Ric: Well, maybe I'll pick my top two, Sara. The two that I would say is really how we respond to load growth and then, and then how, and really, and then affordability. And the two are intertwined.
So load growth is coming. We've known this for a while, that as we transition transportation and buildings off of fossil fuels and onto the electric grid. The electrification that, that you think about all the time, you know, that we're going to see that low growth from that. But I think what's caught a lot of people by surprise is the growth in data centers and manufacturing that is causing some regions of the country to see very high growth in the near term.
And on the affordability front, while low growth is often seen as good for rates, I think we're concerned that utilities are making significant investment based on uncertain forecasts that could really drive up rates, especially if they double down on more gas investments. And on the gas front, right, you know, I think we have like incredibly low gas prices in the U.S., but if we expand LNG exports, gas could become a global commodity like oil and our very low national pricing could become a much higher national price and really exposing customers to that higher price. So I think affordability and low growth are the two things that I think about the most and the two things that I worry about and keep me up at night for sure.
Sara: Both of those make a lot of sense. And I think those who are in the energy space would relate very much to those being the key themes and trends at the forefront. And I really appreciate the additional context you give for the interrelated dynamics of affordability and gas markets, both domestic and global and how interrelated those are. Can you say a little bit more about that? Because I'm not sure everyone fully understands those dynamics.
Ric: Well, yeah. So right now we produce a lot of natural gas and the U. S. actually produces the most natural gas in the world. And we export some of that natural gas. We've exported a lot to Europe, especially post Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. We export to Asia. You know, gas is really constrained. Most of the gas that we produce is consumed here in the US. and so the price is really set just here in the U.S., you know, whereas oil is a really a global commodity so it doesn't really matter how much oil we produce here in the U.S.
The price is set by the global market. Whereas gas is still, there's still a national market and the price is set nationally. And so we pay about a third for gas or a quarter for gas, what the global price is. But if we start exporting enough gas and if our export capability goes up, just like the current administration is pushing for, there becomes some tipping point, at which it'll stop being a national price and start becoming an international price, a global price.
And that could really drive prices up for, for consumers. I mean, this is what happened to oil in the U. S. during the 1970s crisis, where we stopped becoming self-sufficient and we had an oil shock. So the same thing could potentially happen with natural gas. And I think that's a risk that I don't think a lot of people are thinking enough about.
Sara: Yeah, I agree with you, and thanks for that helpful explanation. There's kind of this rush to gas without a lot of discussion around what implications that might have, more broadly, so appreciate that additional context.
So it sounds like there are a lot of pressures and many converging factors that are impacting our electric grid. Simultaneously, you mentioned load growth. You mentioned electrification, not just from buildings and transportation, but hopefully in a not too distant future, we're also going to see more industrial processes electrify yet another large source of potential growth.
But we also have climate disasters, and we have more extreme weather, and we have polar vortexes and wildfires, and we have supply chain issues and inflation. So we're really just kind of getting hit from all sides. How do we build and operate a grid that is reliable and resilient?
And how are you guys evaluating in your work, all of these factors and thinking about cohesive solutions that can tackle many fronts in one shot?
Ric: Yeah, that's a great question. And it goes to really the heart of what GridLab does and what we think about. So we spend a lot of time in the planning world, thinking about the future electric power system and what it looks like and all those risks that you just talked about need to be taken into account when you're planning the future power system. So thinking about weather risks, thinking about fuel supply risks, costs, etc. So what you're talking about is: how do we plan for all those contingencies?
And how do we plan and build a grid that can handle extreme weather? We're sort of choosing the right resources based on the costs and performance and different trade offs. And so we spend a lot of time with sophisticated software tools to plan the electric grid.
And just like any tool, you've got to use it correctly. You've got to give it the right data. You've got to be making sure that you're actually modeling the extreme weather, that you're modeling multiple weather years that you're capturing those risks, that you're building multiple scenarios to capture sort of inflation or other kinds of other kinds of concerns.
So, we just launched this Innovate Series where we're really thinking pretty differently about the ways to use these tools. I think the sort of standard way was people would build a couple of scenarios and then do some sensitivities inside those scenarios.
They'd have like a scenario with a carbon constrained world and then have a scenario with low load growth, and a scenario with high load growth or, and. Now I think we're thinking that there's just so many different permutations and complications that we just model like thousands of scenarios at once and be able to sort of sort them rapidly and like figure out like what are the, what are the least regret paths.
I think the other thing that's really important about this is thinking more holistically about the distribution system generation and the transmission system. Traditionally, those three systems were planned in silos separately that and that approach just really isn't fit for purpose for today's grid.
And I think a lot of utilities and others have been thinking about a more integrated planning approach. But I think the tools and the ambition are kind of not there. We're doing a lot of work on how we can bring these silos together, both sort of organizationally and then from a tool perspective and think more holistically about how we plan and operate the grid.
Sara: Love it. That all makes a lot of sense. And I'm, again, just so grateful you guys are doing this deep thinking and bring a level of sophistication to the conversation that's really needed because it isn't as simple as, you know, saying “We can do it. Let's just do it!” You've actually got to prove through modeling and through trial and error these things out in the real world.
So super important work. You know, the reliability of the grid has been a topic for as long as I've been working in the space. I'm sure you would find the same. But I don't hear the conversation evolving as much as maybe I would like, or maybe it should. You kind of alluded to this, that, you know, there used to be just such silos between the generation transmission and distribution system planning, as well as the regulatory construct that operates outside of all of the technical aspects of the grid, not necessarily evolving as fast as it needs to support these changes.
There's also a lot of hand waving and fear mongering that happens when you talk about reliability. In your perspective, what do we need to be most focused on right now to really double down on the construction of a strong, reliable, and resilient grid?
Ric: Yeah, Sara, I'm, I'm really frustrated by that discourse as well.
I think there's this consensus that we're in a reliability crisis, but our reliability, our electric system reliability is actually quite good, and the few issues we've had in the last couple of years, like winter storm Uri, winter storm Elliot, Those are really have been due to our grid switching from being from coal to natural gas and not having firm gas supply.
So in the winter, our electric system is competing with residential and commercial heat for gas. And there's not always the gas isn't always available. You know, we moved really quickly. We talked about how slow things move in the grid world, but just in the last decade, we've really gone from 40 percent coal to 15 percent coal.
With natural gas kind of doing the opposite going from 20 percent to 40 percent. And the gas system really hasn't been able to keep up with that in many ways. And I think it's sad that the narrative, the sort of conventional wisdom is sort of blaming new resources like wind and solar for, you know, these reliability challenges, but that's, that's just not the case.
I think it's great maybe to just think about it. Texas is an example. I know Texas is unique, but, you know, has a unique regulatory structure, but Texas has been growing its load dramatically. So its load has growth 35 percent over the past four years. Texas grid in terms of peak capacity is now larger than New York and California combined, and it's been doing that while it's increasing its share of carbon free energy.
So it's been adding primarily wind, solar, and batteries over the last couple years. And it's growing its grid and it's also increasing its clean energy percentage. I think Texas is a great example of how you can grow to meet load, but then doing that really with clean energy.
Sara: Yeah, absolutely. And to your other point about the gas supply being one of the challenges, we also saw in both of those events that the plants themselves and a lot of the infrastructure was not weatherized. It was not prepared for extreme cold because it's Texas, and it was built under a paradigm of a certain temperature range of operation.
And so when this climate driven extreme weather hits, it knocks all of those preconceived notions right out the door and challenges what we think we know about power plant operations in different seasons. In addition, a lot of the homes also similarly not weatherized and so folks were, you know, huddling around, ovens and trying to stay warm and yeah, bad, bad situation all around.
So good lessons to be learned and I'm really glad to hear. Texas, I'm glad to see that Texas and ERCOT have moved so swiftly to respond and make changes in response to those very devastating events. What are some of the biggest fallacies that you hear repeated in the various venues that you're in, working on grid reliability and planning and the energy transition?
Ric: Yeah, great question. I mean, I really think the largest fallacy is the myth that the grid needs to have enough dispatchable generation to meet its peak load. So essentially assigning wind and solar zero reliability benefit. So it's absolutely true that we do need dispatchable generation, but we don't need 100 percent.
And batteries definitely count as dispatchable. So I think the lessons from California and Texas are clear that we can have a portfolio of clean resources. You know, wind, solar batteries to support us with some dispatchable generation, you know, to meet growing load and provide reliable power.
I wish we had better messaging around that. I think it's not intuitive to a lot of people. I think there's also the cousin of this fallacy is the notion that if we're adding new, you know, 24/7 loads to the grid, like manufacturing your data centers, then we have to add new 24/7 generation to match that load.
It's just wrong. I mean, the grid is a dynamic system. There's, there's transmission that allows you to share. Even though the new load may be 24/7, there's still lots of headroom in the existing system. You know, we build to meet peaks, which are, you know, a lot of times twice what the sort of average generation is.
So, we can still build this portfolio to produce it. And then I think if that load, you know, we're talking about these new loads, like data centers or manufacturing, if that load can flex. You know, can be flexible for just a handful of hours a year that we definitely don't need 24/7 to support it.
I think a paper is just coming out this week that from Duke University that says we can add 100 gigawatts of new data center load to the U.S. power system without adding any new generation if that load could just be a little bit flexible. So I think this is just something that's maybe not intuitive to people, like they don't understand the dynamics of this pretty complex system, and so this is just one of the fallacies that I spend a lot of time thinking about how we can, you know, get people to think differently about dispatchable generation and the need for dispatchable generation.
Sara: Yeah, really, really important point there, just for the listeners who may not be fully up to speed on the term dispatchable. Can you just give us a quick, concise definition of that?
Ric: Oh, sure. And I think you're going to see this term used more often. I know the new administration has been using this quite a bit. A dispatchable generator just really means someone that can be turned on or off, you know, it can be controlled to ramp up and down. So this is in contrast with something like a wind or a solar plant that is really being turned, you know, turned up and down by the weather that really a dispatchable generator is as some, it's either battery or it has some kind of fuel source like water or gas or coal or nuclear, although nuclear actually doesn't really dispatch.
It kind of runs flat, but a dispatchable generator is one that's not subject to, you know, we talk about wind and solar as being variable generators or weather dependent generators. So that's, yeah, I hope that's helpful.
Sara: Yeah, that's really helpful, and I guess one of the things that jumps out to me with, with that emphasis on dispatchability, as you mentioned, is it really puts so much onus on the supply and the generation to respond to fluctuations in the load. But as you said, if the load can step up a little bit more through demand side, uh, management programs, demand response, flexible load programs, then we have a little bit more of a two-way street of operation that actually is more responsive in general and probably more affordable.
Ric: Exactly.
Sara: So, pivoting to the solution set. What can policy makers and regulators and non-technical people who are trying to understand this and may be faced with some of these issues in their work or daily lives, what should they know about grid reliability to ensure that they can make the most informed decisions or where can they go to find good information?
Ric: Yeah, good question. I think it's hard to it's been hard to sort of find this information like condensed. And I think part of that is that I think we need to have good examples. Places like I talked about Texas, I think also California, you know, examples of grids where you could have a grid that's running with a lot of renewable energy, low wholesale prices.
I think it's hard for a lot of non-technical people to find it just hard to grasp that we can have this reliable grid, you know, if we're just, if we're relying on things like wind and solar that only generate when it's windy, only generate when it's sunny. So I think we need good stories and examples to demonstrate that it works.
I mean, one of my frustrations is that places in the country that are most worried about the variability of renewable energy of the places that have the least of it. They should be the least worried about this. I think there are limits to how much what percentage of a variable resource you can have on a grid like we debate that and it sort of depends on the, on a lot of factors, but, you know, there's a lot of places in the country that have sort of single digit percentage of wind and solar and are very concerned about a lack of dispatchable generation, but they have tons of dispatchable generation.
So I think really just, you know, getting experience, one of the things I think a lot about is that we just need to get better about this narrative and explaining to people how grids can be reliable running on clean energy.
Sara: Hey listeners, I'm your host Sara Baldwin. Today I'm speaking with Ric O'Connell with GridLab on the topic of grid reliability. And you're plugged in to Electrify This!
So you're involved with a group called ESIG, the Energy Systems Integration Group, and they do a ton of great research, and they unite folks from all walks of the energy grid, so utilities and operators and researchers and national labs, et cetera, and they try to, as I understand it, really do a lot of testing of theories and coming to consensus where they can on some of these issues.
And it's a great forum for elevating some of the technical solutions and some of these great examples out there. So I'll put that link to their website as well as your website in the show notes for folks who want to dig in and get more information, and of course our national labs are a wealth of information and they are amazing and what they produce and the tools that they create and how many smart, dedicated people they have on staff devoting their lives every day to figuring out these hard problems. So hopefully those labs will continue to get the support they deserve.
So looking back on the past few years of progress and looking ahead to a little bit more uncertain future, what do you hope will carry forward and not be scrapped when it comes to this conversation around reliability and affordability?
Ric: Yeah, great, great question. And I think, you know, for me, the first thing that comes to mind are the tax credits for clean energy, the investment tax credit and production tax credit. So those tax credits really drive down the cost of new clean energy resources. And it solves for affordability and reducing rates. And I think it really also solves for reliability. It gets us new clean resources on the grid that can help add to reliability. I think it's an incredibly important federal incentive. And so I hope that those provisions that were in the Inflation Reduction Act are going to stick around.
You know, we've made a lot of progress. When I started in clean energy 20 years ago, you know, wind and solar were kind of a very small percentage of national generation. I mean, solar was not even a percentage point, right? And now with the solar in the teens, it's really incredible. So I think a lot of it has to do with the tax credits, which have really helped. I think that would be my, that would be my one bid.
Sara: And a good and timely bid it is. Yeah, totally agree there. I think if I were to layer on, I would say (kind of building on what you were saying earlier) looking to the examples and really looking hard at how things are operating and how things are working in places that do have high renewables penetration and increasing amounts of storage and are managing these problems with an eye to the future.
I think we have so many great examples and more to come, not just domestically, but internationally. The numbers speak for themselves and the facts tend to lead to a more positive conclusion that we are able to do this.
So great. Well, thank you. As always, these conversations go way too fast, so I have just a couple more questions, and then I'll let you go.
You mentioned earlier that AI data center load growth is becoming more and more of a behemoth in our energy space simply because of the amount of energy required. I saw a chart the other day that showed the volume of electricity needed to produce just one AI image was like astronomically larger than what it is to just like ask Siri to do something simple.
So it's not just a matter of what the data center companies are trying to do, but also what consumers are asking of these data apps. There's also electrification growth, which is a slower and has a steadier rate of change. So, how do you see them playing out in the work that you do? And what do we really need to be focused on to ensure that this is not a race to the bottom, but an opportunity to really build, again, more of a clean and reliable grid for all the loads, uh, coming on the grid.
Ric: Yeah, well you, you said it. I think electrification load is a lot more predictable and slow and steady. And it's much easier to model, you know, you can do adoption curves and it's just easier to respond to from a planning perspective. Whereas AI, you know, it's very chunky, it shows up in just certain places. And we think a lot of it is speculative, so it's hard to figure out what's real and what's not, so it's, it's just much more difficult to respond to.
We have over two terawatts of wind and solar and, and storage in the interconnection queues around the country, you know, it's an enormous amount. So, you know, more generating capacity waiting in interconnection queues than we have installed by like a factor of two. And so all those projects are waiting to get online and provide the energy and capacity that all these new loads need, whether it's charging an EV or building a new AI data center and that's what we should be focused on. How can we get those projects out of the interconnection queues and actually constructed and built and plugged into the grid so they can provide new clean electricity for these new loads?
And I think the concern I have is we're seeing now is a lot of focus on how do we get gas generation to jump these cues and jump in front because what we really need is, you know I think this goes back to the fallacy that you were asking me about of, oh, well, gas generation is really the only kind of generation that can meet these new loads.
And I think that's just wrong. And I think it's going to be slower and more expensive. So rely on gas and so I think we need to, you know, hopefully the new administration and states across the country understand that, like, the best way to power our economy in an affordable way is to let these clean energy projects that are sitting in queues actually get built and, and provide value to society and to the grid.
Sara: Yeah. Absolutely. And I'll just take the opportunity to give your surplus interconnection research a plug here because there are some very innovative ideas you all have had on the topic of how you expedite those queues, but also how you take advantage of existing interconnections on the grid and swapping in clean where older and retired fossil plants once were. So great, great research there to take a look at for our listeners interested in learning more about the ever-exciting world of interconnection. My listeners know I'm a total interconnection nerd and very proud. I have the wonderful folks at IREC and Sky Stanfield to thank for that.
Well, this has been great, Ric. I really appreciate all the thoughts and all the thought leadership, uh, that you bring to the country and the world. So, and it's great to be your longtime colleague and friend. We'll round it out to see if you have any final thoughts or words of wisdom for our listeners.
Ric: I really want to come back to what I was talking about earlier and just say, I think it's important to come up with these compelling narratives and stories to help people understand that clean energy is reliable, affordable, and it can meet low growth. You know, it's what's waiting in the queues to connect to the grid and provide reliable and affordable energy. And so I guess we all need help in coming up with these stories and coming up with this message and really to push back against these fallacies that gas is really the only answer to new load growth and the only resource that can provide that can provide new energy and capacity. I'd love help coming up with those stories and narratives, and I appreciate the work that you're doing to help us think through that.
Sara: Awesome. Well, the good news is I think we both have our work cut out for us here. Job security is a good thing.
Ric: That's right.
Sara: Always new problems to be solved. Well thank you so much Ric. It's really a pleasure to chat with you and thanks so much for coming on the show today.
Ric: Absolutely. My pleasure.
Sara: The pleasure is all mine. Super fun.
Electrify This! is an Energy Innovation original podcast. Energy Innovation is a nonpartisan energy policy firm delivering high quality research and analysis to help policy makers and regulators pursue a decarbonized energy future.
You can find out more about energy innovation and the podcast@energyinnovation.org/electrifythis, and feel free to send us an email at electrifythis@energyinnovation.org. And we always appreciate any shout outs on social media and both energy innovation and myself are now on Blue sky. So you can find us there @sarabaldwin.bsky.social and @energyinnovation.org.
And we're also on Substack, so check us out online. As always, a big thanks to our sound engineer Rowan sticker and SLC recording based here in the City of Salt of Utah.
Thanks for tuning in. I'm your host, Sara Baldwin, and you're plugged in to Electrify This.
