Geothermal resources could become California's "bread and butter"baseload power as nuclear and gas-fired plants are retired, a state commissioner said this week.
The licence for the San Onofre nuclear power plant is due to expire in 2022, and the Diablo Canyon plant will not be permitted to continue generating after 2024, unless it applies for a 20-year extension. The facilities have a combined nameplate capacity of around 4,300 MW.
California's once-through cooling policy which will prevent power stations from releasing hot water into the sea will result in the retirement or modification of 16 power plants from as early as 2015. In addition to these retirements, California also has to meet its AB32 goals to reduce the state's greenhouse gas emissions to 1990 levels by 2020, said Karen Douglas, commissioner at the Californian Energy Commission.
Douglas told media at the Geothermal Energy Finance and Development Forum in San Francisco that CEC regulators were preparing plans to maintain grid capacity of 31,000 MW of peak load electricity.
