Top Innovators
PPL won the Fortnightly Top Innovator 2024 award ''John Beggs Top Innovator in Energy Transition'' for its Renewable Energy Research Facility.
PUF's Steve Mitnick: Talk about this innovation and its impact.
Aron Patrick: As you know, the sun doesn't always shine, and the wind doesn't always blow, so one of the challenges with moving toward increased renewable integration and decarbonization is the intermittency of solar, wind, and even hydro. Hydroelectric only performs if the water level behind the dam is at a sufficient level, which correlates with rainfall and snow melt.
We've deployed solar, wind, and hydro, but these technologies are intermittent. We're trying to combine them in one place to show how they're counterbalancing each other, and their integration can improve overall reliability and lower costs of renewable generation for customers.