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A remarkable thing happened this March. For the first time, the fossil fuel-rich state of Texas has generated more electricity from solar power than from coal.
Perhaps even more remarkable, Texas briefly reached 19.1 gigawatts of solar farm power generation in the early afternoon of May 14. That set a new nationwide record, according to data from Grid Status, which tracks U.S. electricity generation data.
What makes the achievement even more significant is the state that pushed Texas into second place: California. The progressive stronghold that has mandated clean energy goals for more than 20 years and built a dominant lead in utility-scale solar has been overshadowed by the Republican fossil fuel powerhouse, which is running a serial roadblock of clean energy legislation.
Just five years ago, this would have been unthinkable. In 2019, Texas had just over 2 GW of large-scale solar to California’s 13 GW. Since then, however, the Lone Star State has entered a solar boom. As of this month, it has deployed 23.6 GW of solar on 21.2 GW in California.
When the latest batch of solar plants comes online, Texas will add more solar capacity per capita in a single year than any U.S. state or any country in the world, according to energy think tank Ember. Almost overnight, becoming synonymous with dirty fuels has become America’s clean energy giant, and the trend continues to accelerate.
Texas is still heavily dependent on gas, but its transition to clean energy is emblematic of a dynamic that plays out time and time again in the climate debate: economics has a habit of winning out over politics and ideology. The fact that most Texans want to increase fossil fuel production and are more hostile to clean energy goals than the average American is powerless in the face of financial incentives.
It’s not that politics doesn’t matter. But economics shaping politics can turn even the biggest climate change skeptic into a clean energy evangelist. That’s exactly what happened in Texas, where an unlikely clean energy coalition has formed. Urban progressives in blue cities like Austin have been joined by conservatives in rural West Texas who recognize that renewable energy is becoming a critical source of economic development for their communities.
Rural counties, despite representing only a small portion of the state’s population, will receive more than 60 percent of the tens of billions of dollars expected to flow to Texas in the coming years from renewables and storage, according to Joshua Rhodes’ report. energy policy expert and research fellow at the University of Texas at Austin.
Notably, the report is filled with pro-renewable testimony from small business owners, ranchers and Republican politicians. It was funded by a conservative organization and pro-business think tank. Gone are the days when brochures extolling the virtues of clean energy were the preserve of progressive non-profits appealing to the reader’s better nature.
Perhaps the clearest sign so far that economics has changed climate change policy in Texas came last year, when several proposed bills aimed at making it harder to build new solar and wind facilities failed to pass a vote.
The ease of building and connecting new renewable projects in Texas compared to others has been one of the key reasons for the state’s clean energy boom. Its electricity grid operator uses a “connect and manage” model. This assesses new projects based on the basic local requirements needed to connect to the grid rather than conducting lengthy studies on the wider potential implications.
As a result, new power generation takes about half as long to come online in Texas. The U.S. Federal Energy Regulatory Commission is now pursuing a similar approach to accelerate the transition nationwide. Red Texas became the model for going green.
The polarized nature of US political discourse can make renewable energy seem like an increasingly divisive issue. But shift your gaze from cable news to the plains of Texas and a different story unfolds. For players with skin in the game and a sense of good investment, clean energy has become a matter of course.
john.burn-murdoch@ft.com, @jburnmurdoch