Renewable energy
Intermittency

The two most important forms of renewable energy, solar and wind, are intermittent energy sources: they are not available constantly, resulting in lower capacity factors. In contrast, fossil fuel power plants are usually able to produce precisely the amount of energy an electricity grid requires at a given time. Solar energy can only be captured during the day, and ideally in cloudless conditions. Wind power generation can vary significantly not only day-to-day, but even month-to-month. This poses a challenge when transitioning away from fossil fuels: energy demand will often be higher or lower than what renewables can provide. Both scenarios can cause electricity grids to become overloaded, leading to power outages.

In the medium-term, this variability may require keeping some gas-fired power plants or other dispatchable generation on standby until there is enough energy storage, demand response, grid improvement, and/or baseload power from non-intermittent sources. In the long-term, energy storage is an important way of dealing with intermittency. Using diversified renewable energy sources and smart grids can also help flatten supply and demand.

Sector coupling of the power generation sector with other sectors may increase flexibility: for example the transport sector can be coupled by charging electric vehicles and sending electricity from vehicle to grid. Similarly the industry sector can be coupled by hydrogen produced by electrolysis, and the buildings sector by thermal energy storage for space heating and cooling.

Building overcapacity for wind and solar generation can help ensure sufficient electricity production even during poor weather. In optimal weather, it may be necessary to curtail energy generation if it is not possible to use or store excess electricity.
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