Potential impacts of climate change on wind and solar electricity generation in Texas

Ignacio Losada Carreño, Michael T. Craig, Michael Rossol, Moetasim Ashfaq, Fulden Batibeniz, Sue Ellen Haupt, Caroline Draxl, Bri-Mathias Hodge and Carlo Brancucci ()
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Ignacio Losada Carreño: National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL)
Michael T. Craig: National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL)
Michael Rossol: National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL)
Moetasim Ashfaq: Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL)
Fulden Batibeniz: Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL)
Sue Ellen Haupt: National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR)
Caroline Draxl: National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL)
Bri-Mathias Hodge: National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL)
Carlo Brancucci: National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL)

Climatic Change, 2020, vol. 163, issue 2, No 7, 745-766

Abstract: Abstract Wind and solar energy sources are climate and weather dependent, therefore susceptible to a changing climate. We quantify the impacts of climate change on wind and solar electricity generation under high concentrations of greenhouse gases in Texas. We employ mid-twenty-first century climate projections and a high-resolution numerical weather prediction model to generate weather variables in the future and produce wind and solar generation time series. We find that mid-twenty-first century projections based on five global climate models agree on the multiyear average increases across Texas in direct normal irradiance, global horizontal irradiance, surface air temperature, and 100-m wind speed of up to 5%, 4%, 10%, and 1%, respectively. These changes lead to multiyear average relative changes across Texas of − 0.6 to + 2.5% and of + 1.3 to + 3.5% in solar and wind capacity factors, respectively, with significant regional, seasonal, and diurnal differences. Areas with low solar resource show an increase in solar capacity factors but reductions in wind capacity factors. Areas with high solar resource show reductions in solar capacity factors. The spatial and temporal differences in our results highlight the importance of using high-resolution data sets to study the potential impacts of climate change on wind and solar power.

Keywords: Climate change; Wind power; Solar power (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (5)

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DOI: 10.1007/s10584-020-02891-3

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