Utah produced more power from solar than any other source in May, a new first

epistasis•9 minutes ago

Also true for California for quite some time.

https://www.canarymedia.com/articles/solar/california-solar-...

What's going to happen in the future is that May will be a month of extreme electricity abundance, with a good chunk of the electricity just not being collected at all because the grid doesn't need it, and it will be cheaper to have unused electricity in May than to have too little solar in December.

mekdoonggi•6 minutes ago

And eventually that arbitrage will be big enough to justify a pumped hydro/gravity/iron-air storage.

kansface•4 minutes ago

Or possibly the return of some heavy industry?

toomuchtodo•about 2 hours ago

https://ember-energy.org/data/us-electricity-data-explorer/?...

laweijfmvo•about 2 hours ago

Sad to see coal going up (?)

pulvinar•about 1 hour ago

The chart defaults to ending at 2025. Move the right timeline marker all the way to the right (today).

toomuchtodo•about 2 hours ago

> In 2025, coal composes just 15 percent of U.S. electricity generation, and while 190 gigawatts (GW) of coal capacity remain online, the fleet is down 43 percent from 340 GW at its peak in 2010. This change is largely due to the fact that coal power is simply more expensive than cleaner power sources like wind, solar, batteries, and natural gas.

> Electricity demand growth and new actions by the current U.S. presidential administration may slow this decline in the short-term, but with no proposals to build new coal plants anywhere in America and worsening economic competitiveness – particularly where policymakers are strengthening air and water standards to protect their constituents – its long-term share of U.S. electricity generation will continue to decrease

https://energyinnovation.org/expert-voice/what-is-coals-futu...

https://www.sierraclub.org/coal/coal-plant-map

https://www.energy.gov/ceser/2025-doe-202c-orders

buckle8017•36 minutes ago

Utah isn't a power grid.

They're on the western interconnect.

Combined solar and wind are about 25-30% of production there.

These articles about individual states are trash.

Rebelgecko•27 minutes ago

Fwiw I think Utah is the only state with legalized plugin solar (many more on the way though!)

Xt-6•8 minutes ago

A few more states have recently joined it. https://pluginsolarus.com/states

toomuchtodo•10 minutes ago

State plug in solar legislation tracker: https://www.brightsaver.org/legislation-tracker

(passed in 10 states, 2 awaiting signatures, as of this comment)

toomuchtodo•30 minutes ago

Utah is about half of the Pacificorp East balancing authority.

https://app.electricitymaps.com/map/zone/US-NW-PACE/live/fif...

Nevada Power serves a substantial amount of western Utah.

https://app.electricitymaps.com/map/zone/US-NW-NEVP/live/fif...

buckle8017•25 minutes ago

Cool, that's still not a grid for stability purposes.

nemomarx•17 minutes ago

can you expand? I'm not sure I get it. isn't then having a wider interconnection better for stability and to handle solar? they can share cheap power in gluts and pull in other sources at night and so on.

toomuchtodo•13 minutes ago

https://www.eia.gov/tools/glossary/index.php?id=Balancing%20...

> Balancing authority (electric): The responsible entity that integrates resource plans ahead of time, maintains load-interchange-generation balance within a Balancing Authority Area, and supports Interconnection frequency in real time.

https://www.nerc.com/glossary-of-terms

> Definition & Scope: A BA is a NERC-certified entity responsible for matching electricity supply and demand in real-time within a specific geographic area. An ISO is an independent, non-profit corporate entity that manages regional transmission grids and runs competitive wholesale power markets.

https://www.ferc.gov/electric-power-markets

A balancing authority is quite literally a federally certified entity for maintaining grid stability.

(Utah only has ~2.5GW of coal generation capacity remaining, as of this comment)

https://www.gem.wiki/Utah_and_coal#Existing_coal_plants

https://www.gem.wiki/Utah_and_coal

https://utahnewsdispatch.com/2025/12/05/intermountain-power-...

https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=67427

petesergeant•20 minutes ago

I think I know what this means, but I bet you share a better explanation with us all too of the point you're making

Utah produced more power from solar than any other source in May, a new first

⚡ Community Insights

Discussion (16 Comments)Read Original on HackerNews