California’s Grid Faces an Existential Crisis. What Kind of Market Reforms Will Solve It?

This week’s episode of The Energy Gang was taped live at GTM’s Solar Summit. On the docket: California’s difficult grid-planning choices, terawatt-scale PV, and a rapid-fire overview of the news.

California released a white paper last week documenting the stunning decline of the customer base for investor-owned utilities in the state. Meanwhile, the state is facing more and more curtailments, negative electricity pricing, and, on top of it all, a looming solar eclipse. What can we learn about market design from the nation’s solar leader?

Then, getting to terawatt-scale PV. Researchers and policymakers are getting serious about the possibility of managing thousands and thousands of gigawatts of solar in the coming decades. And they’re asking some hard questions about market design. What does the world look like under that scenario?

Finally, we'll end with a fast cycle through some of the top news stories. How worried should you be?

This week's podcast was recorded live at GTM's Solar Summit. For access to videos of all our sessions -- featuring First Solar, SunPower, SunShot, Google, SEIA, Sunrun and more -- sign up for GTM Squared.

This podcast is sponsored by KACO New Energy, a leading solar inverter company with superior engineering and unmatched customer service.