(New York) A symbolic step, wind turbines have for the first time in the United States produced more electricity in one day than coal or nuclear, the American Energy Information Agency (EIA) said on Thursday. .
Posted at 3:17 p.m.
They generated in total, on March 29, 2017 gigawatt-hours of electricity, natural gas remaining the first source in the country, details the agency in a blog.
Wind turbines had already temporarily produced more energy than coal or nuclear, but never both at the same time.
However, it is not certain that this performance will be repeated regularly in the short term.
The total capacity of energy that wind turbines can produce already exceeds that of nuclear since September 2019. But their use remains by nature intermittent and their load factor, that is to say the average rate of operation, was 35% in 2021, compared to 93% for nuclear, specifies the EIA.
On March 29, the situation was particularly favourable, the winds being particularly strong that day.
And with electricity demand tending to be weaker in the spring, some coal- or nuclear-powered generators were idling.
These generators are also often asked to reduce their production on days when the winds are blowing strongly in order to adjust supply to demand.
Also the EIA does not expect monthly wind generation to exceed that of coal or nuclear in 2022 or 2023.
In the longer term, however, the EIA predicts that with the growth of solar and wind, renewable energy will produce 44% of the electricity of the United States in 2050 against 21% currently.