How Does Your State Make Electricity?
www.nytimes.com
There’s been a big shift in how America produces power. Each state has its own story.
      • silence7@slrpnk.netOPM
        13·
        4 months ago

        They are ugly, but they also tell an important story, which is the decline of coal, and (in some areas) rise of wind and solar.

      • sinkingship@mander.xyz
        11·
        4 months ago

        Love the “gas” label in your second picture. There was no need at all to tilt letters, but I guess it would not keep the theme of “thrown together” if it was straight text.

        Also what is with all that background white in between the graphs? Is it electricity demand that didn’t get meet by any means? Asking jokingly.

      • Kaboom@reddthat.com
        63·
        4 months ago

        I honestly can’t believe those are real graphs. Looks like Ms paint and that Amiga 500 program had a baby that was dropped on his head

  • Stache_@lemmy.ml
    143·
    4 months ago

    Such a shame seeing how we’ve all but abandoned nuclear energy as an option

      • waddle_dee@lemmy.world
        44·
        4 months ago

        Yup! Turns out utilities don’t want to spend a multi billion dollar upfront cost, even though they would reap huge rewards, as nuclear, over the whole lifetime of the plant, is very cost-effective. But hey, let’s continue to subsidize gas instead!

          • waddle_dee@lemmy.world
            1·
            4 months ago

            I guess I should have clarified. When you do a cost analysis of per MW generation over the lifetime of the plant, it gets significantly cheaper. Cheaper than solar, or wind. The only issue is the large upfront cost of billions of dollars, like I previously stated. The cost of solar and wind is cheaper up front, but on a large generation scale, is lacking. Nuclear is the only solution right now to the climate. There is no other large scale generation that can sustain demand as clean as nuclear.

            • silence7@slrpnk.netOPM
              2·
              4 months ago

              I’m talking about the exact same thing. Wind and solar are cheaper by that metric.

              Nuclear is still cost-competitive with long-duration storage, so if that doesn’t fall in price (which is what has been happening with storage recently) it might make sense to use for 10% or so of overall generation.

              • waddle_dee@lemmy.world
                1·
                4 months ago

                That is inaccurate. You can look up LCOE for all of these and Nuclear is right up there with Gas. Also, you can’t have 10% of your generation be nuclear with solar and wind making up the majority. You literally cannot produce that much electricity. Nuclear, being arguably the most efficient source of energy and the largest capacity, it makes sense for nuclear to be in place of our coal and gas plants with solar and wind supplements. But hey, that’s just what I studied for a living.

  • brianary@startrek.website
    10·
    4 months ago

    I love living in Washington. But I i fear the backlash as Inslee finishes his last term. He’s been a great, green governor, but absolutely vilified for it by the right.