True Cost of Renewables: An Analytic Response to the Coal Industry's Attack on Renewable Energy

This report is an analysis of a coal industry study critical of renewable energy. The National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) was commissioned by the U.S. Department of Energy to review the assumptions in the coal report entitled, Energy Choices in a Competitive Era: The Role of Renewable and Traditional Energy Resources in America's Electric Generation Mix, prepared by Resource DataInternational, Inc. (RDI) for the Center for Energy and Economic Development (CEED), an umbrella organization of pro-coal interests. The NREL analysis finds that the conclusions in the CEED/RDI study are based on faulty data and assumptions regarding the comparative economics of coal and renewable energy development. After correcting the errors, NREL finds that a modest growth path of renewableresource development would cost the nation little more than the projected electricity market cost for fossil-fuel-based power generation, even before considering the environmental benefits that would accompany this development