{"id":26508,"date":"2016-08-24T16:35:42","date_gmt":"2016-08-24T20:35:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.fondriest.com\/news\/?p=26508"},"modified":"2021-11-10T16:38:40","modified_gmt":"2021-11-10T20:38:40","slug":"clean-energy-ohio-rise","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.fondriest.com\/news\/clean-energy-ohio-rise.htm","title":{"rendered":"Clean Energy In Ohio On The Rise"},"content":{"rendered":"

The future for clean energy in Ohio is bright, as trends indicate more wind and solar energy generation is coming online. But the state still has far to go, according to an Ohio State University Extension expert.<\/p>\n

Speaking at a recent meeting of Great Lakes reporters hosted by the university\u2019s Stone Laboratory on Lake Erie\u2019s Gibraltar Island, Eric Romich discussed the shifting landscape of renewable energy resources in Ohio. As an extension field specialist, he has seen some of the shift firsthand through projects in which the Extension assists businesses and private entities installing their own green energy infrastructure.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re in the midst of an energy transition,\u201d said Romich, noting how the United States as a whole retired about 18 gigawatts of electricity generation capacity in 2015, 80 percent of which came from coal generators. \u201cAnd they take decades, it\u2019s not measured in years. But it\u2019s happening.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ohio is different from other states that are working to increase clean energy use because it uses annual benchmarks in its renewable portfolio standards, which can vary between goals or mandates depending on the state. Ohio\u2019s present benchmarks require the state to get 12.5 percent of its energy from renewable sources by 2027, of which 0.5 percent has to be from solar.<\/p>\n

The state has also been under the effect of legislation enacted by Ohio lawmakers that put in place a three-year freeze for its renewable benchmarks. The freeze is ending soon, but some lawmakers are pushing to extend it with Ohio Senate Bill 320.<\/p>\n

\"clean

Eric Romich, extension field specialist with Ohio State University Extension, shares an update on the status of developing clean energy in Ohio at Ohio State\u2019s Stone Lab. (Credit: Nate Christopher \/ Fondriest Environmental)<\/p><\/div>\n

A study of renewable portfolio standards led by scientists at the Lawrence Berkeley National Lab found that the goals are highly successful in translating to more clean energy use, Romich says. Investigators in that study found that around 95 percent of those in place nationwide are on pace to meet the standards set.<\/p>\n

\u201c(Ohio) Senate Bill 10 froze those benchmarks at 2014 levels. And so it\u2019s still remaining to be seen if we\u2019re going to pick those up and move and add those to the end,\u201d said Romich. \u201cThere\u2019s also been some discussion about Senate Bill 320, which is having some additional discussion. It\u2019s just been introduced, hasn\u2019t been through the Chamber.\u201d<\/p>\n

But despite the recent freeze, it\u2019s easy to see that Ohio has made some strides since its benchmarks were first set in 2008.<\/p>\n

\u201c…If we just look at what\u2019s happening in terms of development from a capacity standpoint,\u201d said Romich. \u201cIs there a connection between policy and development? Absolutely.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"clean

Wind turbine. (Credit: Paul Cryan \/ U.S. Geological Survey)<\/p><\/div>\n

The figures he presented showed that there are now nearly 540 megawatts of clean energy in Ohio coming from wind. They also showed a recent surge in solar energy generation around the state.<\/p>\n

According to the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio, 1.5 percent of the state\u2019s total energy comes from renewable sources as of June 2015. Around 58 percent still comes from coal burning.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen you talk about energy and energy transitions, it\u2019s going to be driven by a number of things. It\u2019s going to be driven by resource availability, economics, technology and then the Three P\u2019s — policy, politics and public opinion,\u201d said Romich, borrowing a line from Daniel Yergin\u2019s book \u201cThe Quest.\u201d \u201cWhen you look around, there\u2019s not many wind projects. But when you see them, they\u2019re big. Solar is the opposite, they\u2019re all over the place. If you look around when you\u2019re driving, you\u2019ll see them. They\u2019re all over the place, they\u2019re small.\u201d<\/p>\n

There were only 38 solar projects in Ohio in 2000, he says. As of July 2016, 2,064 solar projects have been certified with the state\u2019s public utilities commission. Some of the increase has come because of declining costs for installing solar panels. The costs for the photovoltaic cells have gone down, he says, and costs per watt for solar in Ohio are somewhere around $2.50 to $3.50.<\/p>\n

For wind, costs are also on their way down, but that\u2019s after surging in the recent past. Nowadays, they are sitting around where they were in 2000, at $171 per watt nationally on average. Much of that is because the wind industry migrated out of the typical \u201cwind belt\u201d regions where wind is plentiful, where it has been more expensive to generate energy from wind but also where installers deal with higher populations that have led to higher lease rates for land, among other things.<\/p>\n

As for the future of clean energy in Ohio, Romich says that it\u2019s impossible to guess. As an example, he notes that no one expected the natural gas boom that has taken place in the United States in recent years. But things are looking good for now.<\/p>\n

Top image:\u00a0Solar panels installed on Gibraltar Island near Ohio State University\u2019s Stone Lab. (Credit: Jill Bartolotta \/ Ohio Sea Grant)<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

An update on the growing use of clean energy in Ohio, marked by a recent surge in solar and a steady decline in the use of coal burning.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13,"featured_media":26507,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,52],"tags":[60,109,342,343,349],"class_list":["post-26508","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-featured-articles","category-technology","tag-featured","tag-news-ticker","tag-ohio-state-university","tag-stone-lab","tag-technology"],"remote_post_permalink":false,"remote_post_featured_image":false,"yoast_head":"\nClean Energy In Ohio On The Rise<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"An update on the growing use of clean energy in Ohio, marked by a recent surge in solar and a steady decline in the use of coal burning.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, 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