Saturday, June 01, 2019

The Cheapest Energy by County


The Energy Institute's Levelized Cost of Electricity interactive map shows the cheapest electricity generation technology in every US county. The map allows you to see where it is cheapest to use coal, natural gas, nuclear, wind or solar power to generate electricity.

The costs for each power source are based on a number of different factors. However users can edit the cost of each power source from the map sidebar. Users can also edit the value assigned to CO2 emissions in calculating the energy costs. Based on the Energy Institute's calculations the cheapest form of generation technology in much of the central states is wind power. In most of the south of the country solar power is the cheapest electricity technology.


You can explore how America actually generates power on the U.S. Power Plants map. U.S. Power Plants is an interactive map showing the locations, size and type of America's electric power plants. The map is a great way to see where different types of power plant are located, how much each type of energy source contributes to the country's power supply and how much each source contributes to CO2 emissions.

The number of map filters on U.S. Power Plants means that the map can provide lots of different insights into American power supply. For example the individual fuel filters allow you to see where different power sources are concentrated in America. Select hydro power and you can see that hydro power plants are concentrated in the north-west and north-east of the country. While solar power plants are mainly located in California.


Esri's Atlas of Electricity is another great way to explore where the USA gets its electricity from and how it distributes this power across the country. At the heart of an Atlas of Electricity is an interactive map plotting the location and size of the grid's power plants and transmission cables. This map allows you to explore the location and capacity of the country's electricity producing power plants and how they connect to the national grid.

As well as mapping the physical infrastructure of the electricity grid this story map examines the primary energy sources used to generate electricity in the USA. It maps the size and capacity of coal-fired power plants, natural gas power plants and petroleum power plants. Alongside these fossil-fuel sources of power An Atlas of Electricity plots the size and capacity of the U.S.'s nuclear power plants, hydroelectric power plants and solar & wind power plants.

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