Breakthrough Renewable Energy at a price lower than power from coal

Breakthrough Renewable Energy at a price lower than power from coal

Background

In November of 2007, Google launched an initiative called “Renewable Energy Cheaper than Coal” or RE less than c.

Why RE less than c ?

Because coal is cheap, coal is the predominant source of both existing and new electricity capacity worldwide. And the greenhouse gas emissions produced from coal burning are a major contributor to global climate change, our greatest environmental challenge. However, today renewable electricity costs too much to compete with coal. Making electricity produced from renewable energy cheaper than coal, at utility scale, would be a key part of reducing global climate change. But it is an expensive undertaking.

As a result, renewable electricity has barely made a dent in global or U.S. capacity or usage.

For decades talented people have been working to lower the cost of renewable energy, and there has been great progress. But we face a simple economic reality: whether for cars, computers, hamburgers or electrons, price matters. And even though they’re attractive, green electrons simply cost too much today to compete with coal. As a result, the percentage of global electricity powered by renewables has actually decreased in recent years. RE less than c addresses this disparity – and could become an important tool in confronting the climate crisis.

Google believes there are two funding gaps in renewable energy today, and will look for opportunities to bridge them:

Research and Development. While government and university-supported research has contributed a great deal to the development of renewable energy, there has been inadequate funding, and the focus has often not been on moving technologies toward the market place.

Early utility-scale funding. There is insufficient development of early high-risk commercial-scale clean energy projects, which are risky for traditional investors. This period of early funding, before a technology becomes commercially viable, is known as the “Valley of Death.”

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Clean Electricity Definition

“Clean electricity” is defined as those know-hows which draw on natural supply, which are universal in application, which are inexpensive and which do not cause polluting residue, such as our “Clean, Constant, Fuel-less, Low Cost Clean Electricity From Water discovery.”