Welcome to Boiling Point, a newsletter about climate change, energy and the environment in California and the American West. I’m Sammy Roth, a reporter for the Los Angeles Times.
Two days after Donald Trump was elected president, I woke up early and drove east from Palm Springs along Interstate 10, stopping just before the California-Arizona state line, about halfway between Los Angeles and Phoenix. The desert was even flatter than normal here. Thousands of acres had been scraped and graded for solar panels, which tilted en masse to face the rising sun, looking like a gleaming black sea against a backdrop of jutting mountains and blue sky streaked with wispy clouds.
Various dignitaries had gathered to commission this massive solar farm, which produces electricity for Southern California Edison. It’s now being expanded to serve additional utility customers in Los Angeles County, San Francisco and the San Joaquin Valley.
Another big change is coming to the solar facility. It’s going to get some enormous lithium-ion batteries.
Edison announced this month that it’s buying 770 megawatts of batteries, more than half of which will be installed at this remote outpost near the city of Blythe. The batteries will help Edison replace four gas-burning power plants along the Southern California coast, in part by storing electricity generated by solar panels for times when the sun isn’t shining.
For context, 770 megawatts is more energy storage than was installed in the entire United States last year. It’s enough batteries to meet about 3.5% of all the mid-afternoon electricity demand on California’s main power grid so far this week.
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