Value chain · CLM-0312
In plain terms
A major financial advisory firm has estimated, using US grid operators' own published figures, what it adds to the cost of wind or solar to count them as dependable capacity alongside gas power stations; on its figures the addition is between about 8% and 85% of the plant's own cost, not many times more.
The claim as recorded
Lazard prices the cost of making a variable resource as reliable as a firm one using each US grid operator's own published ELCC and Net Cost of New Entry, and its own published results show this "Levelized Firming Cost" adding 8 to 62 USD per MWh on top of unsubsidised regional LCOEs of 59 to 138 USD/MWh for solar, solar + storage, wind and wind + storage across six US markets, a rise of about 8% to 85% (8.3% for MISO wind + storage, 84.9% for ERCOT solar), bringing firmed cost up toward, and in some cases past, its own quoted gas combined-cycle LCOE range of 51-129 USD/MWh.
Scope and limits
The per-cell figures are from a reconstruction of the pp.17-18 charts in which every unsubsidised cell closes as LCOE + firming = total to within $1 (the source notes that "Figures may not sum due to rounding"). The source states that the total "does not represent the cost of building a 24/7 firm resource on a single project site" but the renewable LCOE plus the capacity cost needed to meet each region's resource adequacy requirement, and calls the result illustrative. The uplift is on the unsubsidised regional LCOE; on the subsidised LCOE the same firming costs are a larger share. Lazard firms only the renewable side: the CCGT comparator carries no "offsetting firming charge" (p.17), though the page notes conventional generation is also subject to firming frameworks.
What it assumes
per-cell figures read from the source's own pp.17-18 charts (see limits); each cell's LCOE is "the average of the high and low of Lazard's LCOE v19.0 for each technology" re-based on the regional capacity factor (note 2), not Lazard's headline LCOE ranges; hybrid cases assume storage at 50% of PV or wind capacity with 4-hour duration (note 1).
Where it comes from
p.16: "The illustrative firm capacity value of a new resource is calculated as Nameplate Capacity x ELCC... The remaining non-firm capacity... is assumed to be 'firmed' at the Net CONE, as published by the grid operator." p.17: "The Cost of Firming Intermittency or illustrative 'levelized firming cost' is the incremental cost to firm solar, solar + storage, wind and wind + storage resources using each grid operator's own capacity accreditation and resource adequacy construct... Gas Combined Cycle LCOE v19.0 ($51 - $129/MWh)."
Basis: USD2026
Related records
- Answers question
- QST-021 not published in this release
Cite this
energyaperture.com/c/clm-0312
CLM-0312, Energy Aperture, as of 2026-07.
Connected records
Other published records linked to this one. A list, not a judgement.
- Also from SRC-146
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