Solar Potential Analysis Report for Minnesota

This report is part of the Minnesota Solar Pathways initiative, a three-year project sponsored by the U.S. DOE EERE Solar Technologies Office designed to explore least-risk, best-value strategies for meeting the state of Minnesota’s solar goals. The report details the results from the Solar Potential Analysis modelling tool, which helps estimate and optimize the generation cost and resource capacities required to serve a specific percentage of Minnesota’s load, subject to given production requirements. In the report, the SPA model the generation cost to achieve 10% of Minnesota’s electricity from solar by 2025 and 70% of Minnesota’s electricity from solar and wind by 2050. Among the report’s findings:

• Solar and wind can serve 70 percent of Minnesota’s load at generation costs that are comparable to the levelized generation cost of new natural gas generation.
• Additional capacity coupled with energy curtailment is considerably less expensive than, and a viable alternative to, long-term or seasonal storage in a high renewables future.
• Storage is an important part of a high renewables future as it expands the dispatch capabilities of wind and solar assets.

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