Dan Schroeder
LightNews LightNews
banner
dvschroeder.bsky.social
Dan Schroeder
@dvschroeder.bsky.social
770 followers 200 following 2K posts
Physicist, educator, number-cruncher. Cartoon by the great Cal Grondahl. physics.weber.edu/schroeder
Posts Replies Media Videos
dvschroeder.bsky.social
Let's compare the @iea.org WEO2025 electricity mix projections for 2035 to 2024.

Solar soars in all scenarios!

But even the new Stated Policies scenario projects smaller increases in wind+solar, a smaller decrease in coal, and increased gas, compared to what IEA projected last year. 🔌💡
Four side-by-side column charts, each showing world electricity generation by source. At left is a chart for 2024, when coal generated the most electricity, followed by gas, hydro, nuclear, wind, solar, bioenergy, oil, and geothermal, in that order. The other three charts are projections for the year 2035; all three show a projected decline in oil generation and modest increases in nuclear, hydro, bioenergy, and geothermal. The second and third charts show the Current Policies and Stated Policies scenarios from the International Energy Agency's World Energy Outlook 2025. In the Current Policies scenario, coal generation has declined only slightly in 2035, while gas, wind, and solar rise significantly. In the Stated Policies scenario, coal declines somewhat more while gas rises somewhat less and wind and solar rise somewhat more. At the far right is the Stated Policies scenario from last year's World Energy Outlook 2024, projecting a greater decline in coal, essentially no change in gas, and even greater increases in wind and solar.
November 13, 2025 at 8:10 PM
dvschroeder.bsky.social
Thank you!

@solarchase.bsky.social do you know why BNEF's numbers for the last four years are higher than IEA's? The 60 GW discrepancy for 2024 seems kinda significant.
Column graph from https://www.iea.org/data-and-statistics/data-tools/renewable-energy-progress-tracker showing global solar net capacity additions by year from 2000 through 2024, with projections through 2030. Each column is divided into two pieces, for distributed and utility-scale systems. The totals for 2020 through 2024, in gigawatts (DC), are 150, 166, 222, 424, and 538. Earlier values were much lower, as solar technology was still being developed. The projection shows only small changes for 2025 through 2030, all of these being pretty close to 600 GW.
November 12, 2025 at 11:51 PM
dvschroeder.bsky.social
I can't say how much of this article is accurate, but I do know the Sierra Club never had a "singular focus on climate change".

The Club's historical mission was to "explore, enjoy, and protect" public lands. Later it took on public health issues and eventually climate—rather awkwardly.
Screen capture of headline and sub-head from https://www.nytimes.com/2025/11/07/us/politics/sierra-club-social-justice.html. "The Sierra Club Embraced Social Justice. Then It Tore Itself Apart. The environmental group gave up its singular focus on climate change for a broader agenda. The ensuing internal strife left it weakened as it takes on the Trump administration."
November 7, 2025 at 6:14 PM
dvschroeder.bsky.social
Looks like both of the incumbents have lost to their challengers in the Ogden city-wide council races—despite endorsements from the mayor and what's left of the local paper. Hard to say exactly why, but I'm glad we'll have some younger voices adding fresh perspectives.
Screen capture from election results page for two nonpartisan Ogden City Council races. As of election night, the results show that Alicia Washington leads Marcia White by more than 10 percentage points in the Seat A race, while Kevin Lundell leads Bart Blair by more than 18 percentage points in the Seat B race.
November 5, 2025 at 12:09 PM
dvschroeder.bsky.social
They paved paradise and put up a parking lot.
A mid-day autumn scene in the foothills of the Wasatch Mountains just east of Ogden, Utah. In the distance, a steep grassy slope, dotted with brown-leaved clumps of trees and shrubs, rises to steeper talus slopes and then tan-colored cliffs, below a clear blue sky. In the foreground is a newly paved and striped asphalt parking lot, big enough to hold 60 parked cars, edged with concrete curb and gutter work. The lot is empty except for two small treaded earth-moving machines.
November 3, 2025 at 4:55 AM
dvschroeder.bsky.social
Interesting patterns in this map of under-construction solar farms. 🔌💡 seia.org/research-res...
Map of the contiguous 48 US states with a red dot for every utility-scale solar farm currently under construction. Dots are sized by solar farm capacity. There is a major concentration of dots in Texas. A notable band of dots runs from Michigan southward into Indiana, western Ohio, southern Illinois, and down the Mississippi river into northeastern Arkansas.There are also significant numbers across the southwest, from southern California through southern Arizona and New Mexico, and in Florida and the mid-Atlantic region. A few dots are scattered across other western states and Minnesota. Notable gaps. There are gaps with relatively few solar farms under construction in the northeastern states, the southern Appalachian area, the northern Great Plains, and much of the Northwest.
October 31, 2025 at 11:36 PM
dvschroeder.bsky.social
The three-way convergence approaches!

12-month world totals as of August 2025:
Nuclear 9.0%
Wind 8.7%
Solar 8.3%

Thanks to @ember-energy.org for the data update! 🔌💡☢️🌬️🌞
Chart of world electricity generation, 12-month running totals, broken down by source, from January 2020 through August 2025. From top to bottom are curves for coal, gas, hydro, nuclear, wind, solar, other fossil (mostly oil), biomass, and other renewables (mostly geothermal). The data come from ember-energy.org. Most of the curves have been pretty flat for the last year or more, but wind is gradually rising to approach nuclear, while solar is quickly rising to approach both wind and nuclear. It appears that the solar, wind, and nuclear curves will cross within the next few months.
October 25, 2025 at 2:34 PM
dvschroeder.bsky.social
So for now, you can charge the battery but not discharge it? How can this be right—or what am I missing?
Screen capture of a paragraph from the article at https://www.canarymedia.com/articles/batteries/pila-plug-in-backup-power-renters-homes that reads in part, "For now, Pila's software is configured to only allow power to flow from wall sockets into its batteries, not vice versa, Ashman emphasized."
October 21, 2025 at 2:53 PM
dvschroeder.bsky.social
Here's a little more about the buffer and BNEF's methodology, from the 2021 version of this thread. x.com/solar_chase/...
October 21, 2025 at 2:08 PM
dvschroeder.bsky.social
Interesting changes in the BNEF PV installations projection (right), relative to last year's version (left).
Stacked column chart from BloombergNEF of annual solar photovoltaic installations, with historical values since 2016 and forecast values through 2035. This version was released in the third quarter of 2024. Each column is broken down by region: China, North America, Europe, India, and so on, plus a "buffer/unknown" category in the forecast values. Overall, the chart shows exponential-like growth from 75 GW(DC) in 2016 through 444 GW(DC) in 2023. Then the growth begins to slow, with a roughly linear trend from 592 GW in 2024 to 996 GW in 2035. Originally posted by Jenny Chase: https://bsky.app/profile/solarchase.bsky.social/post/3l57mtuwhj62f Stacked column chart from BloombergNEF of annual solar photovoltaic installations, with historical values since 2016 and forecast values through 2035. This version was released in the third quarter of 2025. Each column is broken down by region: China, North America, Europe, India, and so on, plus a "buffer/unknown" category in the forecast values. Overall, the chart shows exponential-like growth from 75 GW(DC) in 2016 through 444 GW(DC) in 2023. Then the growth continues at a slowed pace to 694 GW(DC) in 2025 and plateaus at around 700 GW(DC) per year from 2025 through 2028, with somewhat increased growth thereafter, reaching 931 GW(DC) by 2035. Originally posted by Jenny Chase: https://bsky.app/profile/solarchase.bsky.social/post/3m3mdrfmuv22v
October 20, 2025 at 8:58 PM
dvschroeder.bsky.social
Regarding nuclear and geothermal, it's now nearly 18 months since @jigarshahdc.bsky.social said this. I'm not sure what qualifies as an announcement, but my gut tells me both technologies are overhyped, at least in the US.
Tweet from Jigar Shah dated April 18, 2024: "My sense is that we will see 80% of new generation continue to be #solar, #wind, #storage but you will see 10 GW of new nuclear announcements over the next 18 months in the USA. We will also see 2 GW of new geothermal announced in the same timeframe. Everyone will coexist just fine — along with some new gas."
October 16, 2025 at 6:17 PM
dvschroeder.bsky.social
Looks they're actually at nearly 42% for the most recent 9 months. Must've had a bunch of anomalous weather in May-July 2024.
Chart from https://ember-energy.org/data/electricity-data-explorer/ showing the share of renewables in Australia's annual electricity generation, from 2000 through 2024. From 2000 through 2010 the share is steady at about 8%. It then rises to 16% in 2016 and to 34.8% in 2023, but the increase slows in 2024, when the renewables share was 35.1%. Chart from https://ember-energy.org/data/electricity-data-explorer/ of monthly share of renewables in Australia's electricity generation, with calendar months along the horizontal axis and a separate line drawn for each year from 2000 through 2025 (ending September). Here we see that the apparent slow-down in renewables growth in 2024 was due to a big dip in May, June, and July relative to earlier years, presumably due to anomalous weather. The curve for Jan-Sep 2025 lies well above that of 2024, indicating that the rapid growth in renewable generation has resumed.
October 7, 2025 at 6:03 PM
dvschroeder.bsky.social
Ember estimates that US hydropower generation in September was the lowest of any calendar month since at least 2001. 🔌💡
Chart from the Ember Electricity Data Explorer (https://ember-energy.org/data/electricity-data-explorer/?tab=main&chart=trend&fuel=hydro&metric=absolute&entity=United+States) showing monthly electricity generation from hydro in the United States from January 2001 through September 2025. The chart shows large seasonal variations, with each year's lowest value typically in September or October. The value for September 2005, though, is the lowest in the whole time series, at 13.6 TWh. The previous low was 13.9 TWh in October 2022. It looks like the average for September is probably around 16 or 17 TWh.
October 3, 2025 at 8:01 PM
dvschroeder.bsky.social
I find it so discouraging to look at this map and see how little renewable energy is under construction in the northeastern states. What are y'all waiting for? At least here in Utah we can blame it on the Republicans.
Map from the US Energy Information Administration, https://www.eia.gov/electricity/monthly/images/figure_6_01_c.png, showing utility-scale electric generating units planned to come online in the US during the coming year (Aug 2025 through July 2026). While many parts of the US are quickly building out solar, batteries, and some wind, the northeastern states seem to have few projects in the pipeline.
October 3, 2025 at 1:34 PM
dvschroeder.bsky.social
Thank you!

Interesting that the new gas units are a few months behind schedule.

If I'm interpreting this chart correctly, IPP is still putting out a steady 200MW of coal-fired power.

I'm still puzzled about where the electricity for making hydrogen by Q2 2026 is supposed to come from.
Chart from https://www.eia.gov/electricity/gridmonitor/dashboard/electric_overview/balancing_authority/LDWP showing LADWP hourly electricity generation by source over the last 7 days, with "coal" highlighted. The line for coal over this time period is nearly constant at about 200 MW.
October 2, 2025 at 4:50 PM
dvschroeder.bsky.social
You jumped into this thread in response to my criticism of MZJ, who cranks out paper after paper modeling hypothetical allegedly low-cost 100% WWS energy systems all around the world. To bolster the credibility of this work, he regularly tweets about places like Denmark and South Dakota.
Tweet from Mark Z. Jacobson on March 30, 2024: "Now 47 countries with 50-100% of electricity generated from #WindWaterSolar ... Denmark now 60.3%, almost all non-hydro..." Tweet from Mark Z. Jacobson, March 31, 2024: "In 2023, South Dakota, produced the equivalent of 96.5% of the electricity it consumed with just #WindWaterSolar: 69.69% Wind 26.45% Water 0.38% Solar..." (goes on to list percentages for MT, IA, WA, OR, KS, NM, ME, OK, WY, ND, CA).
September 26, 2025 at 9:47 PM
dvschroeder.bsky.social
Just learned that Peter Scott, prof. emeritus of physics at UCSC, died last Oct. at 91. In the 1970s he and William Burke wrote an unpublished text booklet called Special Relativity Primer. I got my hands on a copy in 1981 and couldn't put it down. RIP. #iTeachPhysics web.archive.org/web/20250504...
Photo of the head and one shoulder of an old man with a huge white beard, wearing a gray stocking cap and sweater. Trees with bright green leaves are to either side, and we are looking down from a high location toward a tree-covered plain, under a bright cloudy sky.
September 12, 2025 at 7:43 PM
dvschroeder.bsky.social
Here's a slightly out of date attempt to do the same for US crude oil. Perhaps a mistake to put so many curves on a single static chart!
Chart comparing US crude oil production from 1990 through 2021 to the reference case projections of the 2002 through 2022 editions of the EIA's Annual Energy Outlook. Actual production declined gradually through 2008, increased gradually through 2011, then turned up sharply, roughly doubling by 2015 (relative to 2008), with a further sharp increase from 2017 to 2019. The EIA AEO projections repeatedly failed to anticipate the sharp increases, even when they were imminent.
September 6, 2025 at 3:18 PM
dvschroeder.bsky.social
Will solar generation overtake wind before or after wind overtakes nuclear? 🔌💡
Chart of world electricity generation, 12-month running totals, broken down by source, from January 2020 through June 2025. From top to bottom are curves for coal, gas, hydro, nuclear, wind, other fossil (mostly oil), biomass, and other renewables (mostly geothermal). The data come from ember-energy.org. Most of the curves have been pretty flat for the last year or more, but wind is gradually rising to approach nuclear, while solar is quickly rising to approach both wind and nuclear. It appears that these three curves will cross within the next year or so.
August 29, 2025 at 7:45 PM
dvschroeder.bsky.social
Nice list of housing reforms from @ebwhamilton.bsky.social and others in this new report.

Ironic that Utah's governor and his housing guy have their names on this report when they've helped undo one of these reforms in the city where I live.
A table excerpt from page 143 of the National Housing Crisis Task Force State and Local Housing Action Plan, https://nationalhousingcrisis.org/app/uploads/2025/06/State-and-Local-Housing-Action-Plan.pdf. The excerpt lists 8 specific regulatory reforms for promoting new housing construction, with links to examples of places that have already enacted each reform. I've highlighted one item, "Allowing apartment buildings by-right on commercial or industrial land", because last year Steve Waldrip, a member of the task force and senior advisor to Utah Governor and task force co-chair Spencer Cox, endorsed an ordinance in Ogden, Utah that did the opposite, newly banning nearly all housing in commercial zones.
August 28, 2025 at 1:40 PM
dvschroeder.bsky.social
My understanding is that Jacobson's claims about CAISO gas use being down from 2023 are based on the data shown on this chart from www.caiso.com/todays-outlo.... He's downloading each day's data and adding it all up to get YTD generation from gas.
Screen capture of chart from https://www.caiso.com/todays-outlook/supply showing CAISO electricity supply, broken down by source, at 5-minute intervals for August 26, 2025.
August 27, 2025 at 5:08 PM
dvschroeder.bsky.social
His claim about how much CAISO gas generation is down in just 2yrs seems too good to be true. Maybe it's correct, or maybe it's an artifact of incomplete reporting in the daily data he's using. McKibben quotes it but says "California" not CAISO yet the statewide drop is much less according to Ember.
Chart of California statewide (not just CAISO) monthly electricity generation from natural gas, from 2002 through May 2025. There are large seasonal fluctuations as well as longer-term ups and downs. The 12-month trailing average is also plotted, to help focus on the long-term trends. Over the time period shown, this average reached a high of 10,329 GWh in October 2014, and fell to a minimum of 6,803 GWh in April 2025. That change represents a 34% decrease, most of which occurred during 2016. The 12-month average then increased somewhat in 2020 and early 2021. More recently, the 12-month average dropped by about 18% from spring 2023 to spring 2025. There is no indication in this statewide data of the 40+ percent drop from 2023 to 2025 that Mark Jacobson says has occurred in the CAISO gas generation data.
August 27, 2025 at 1:38 AM
dvschroeder.bsky.social
As @kevinleecaster.bsky.social has pointed out, Nordhaus's closing words are rather outrageous. Disagreeing over the threat level of climate change or the prospect for wind+solar is one thing. Calling anyone who disagrees with you about these things unserious is just being a jerk.
"But what his new book really marks is the end of an era that McKibben largely wrought, where serious people believed that climate change rivaled nuclear warfare, pandemics, and asteroids as existential threats to human civilization, and believed that a world of eight billion people living modern lives could be powered predominantly, or even entirely, with wind and solar power. In Here Comes the Sun, McKibben has, unwittingly, written that era’s eulogy."
August 23, 2025 at 6:35 PM
dvschroeder.bsky.social
Ember says the fossil percentage of generation in KS in 2024 was 32%. Nearly all of that is coal at the east end of the state (see image). Of course new gas plants could change this, but it wouldn't seem very economical to send gas power 800 miles to compete with other gas power.
Map of power plants in Kansas, color-coded by energy source, with dot sizes according to the amount of generation in 2023. Wind farms are most abundant. There are a few large coal plants at the east end of the state, and one small one near the west end. There are also a few small gas plants scattered about, and one large nuclear plant south of Topeka. Source: https://physics.weber.edu/schroeder/energy/PowerPlantsMap.html?lat=39.92659&lng=-97.29492&zoom=7&yr=2023&dotm=0&dotsz=0.2&show=2047
August 20, 2025 at 10:20 PM
dvschroeder.bsky.social
I feel unable to tell from afar whether the NIMBYs are a giant part of it or mostly a front for the fossil and utility interests.

Does anybody buy the gas+coal claim? Not a ton of either near Dodge City.
Screen capture from map of US power plants, with dots sized according to net generation in 2023, showing the region around Dodge City, KS. The image shows about 20 wind farms of various sizes, one coal plant that produced slightly more electricity than the largest wind farm, and four very small gas plants. Source: https://physics.weber.edu/schroeder/energy/PowerPlantsMap.html?lat=38.48369&lng=-99.44824&zoom=8&yr=2023&dotm=0&dotsz=0.7&show=2047
August 20, 2025 at 9:15 PM