Value chain · CLM-0318
In plain terms
Looking across every different way economists and grid operators actually measure how much extra a reliable power source is worth, it is worth a bit more: up to about four times as much when measured as an average across a grid's solar farms, which stays well short of the 12-to-80-times difference space solar power's own cost study found. Measured as the value of the last solar farm added to a grid already full of solar, it can be much larger, and the study behind that figure gives no upper limit.
The claim as recorded
Across every value-based metric this note could quantify for existing (non-SBSP) comparator technologies, being credited for firmness or market value moves a technology's apparent standing by a factor of about 1.0 to about 3.9 on an average capacity-value basis, and by more than 5x on a marginal basis at high solar shares, where no ceiling is stated (EIA's capacity-weighted LACE ratios (Table 4a) lie within 25% of 1.0; Hirth's value factor gives 1.25-2x; Munoz and Mills's capacity-value correction gives the largest figures, 2.5x to about 3.9x on an average basis between 5% and 20% solar penetration and above 5x on a marginal basis above about 15% penetration (our inversions of CLM-0310's capacity values); Ueckerdt's system LCOE gives at most about 2x; Lazard's illustrative firming cost, priced at each grid operator's Net CONE, gives an uplift of about 8% to 85% on unsubsidised regional LCOE by region and technology), and on the average basis none approaches the 12-to-80-fold gap between SBSP's baseline LCOE and 2050 terrestrial projections; the marginal basis has no stated ceiling, so it does not bound that comparison.
Scope and limits
This is a synthesis across metrics computed, mostly by modelling, for existing technologies at various penetrations: wind, solar and storage, plus gas combined cycle, geothermal and combustion turbine in EIA's ratios (CLM-0307); none of them is SBSP; it is an evidence-grounded bound on what these metrics DO to real technologies, not a direct calculation of what any of them would do to SBSP specifically, which has never been modelled by any of the originating bodies. See section 4 of this note for the strongest critique of this kind of cross-technology analogy. Some metrics also move standing below 1.0 (EIA Table 4a: onshore wind 0.92, solar hybrid 0.94, combustion turbine 0.87, battery storage 0.85). The marginal basis gives 5x where marginal capacity value is 20% of nameplate, and more above about 15% penetration, where CLM-0310 has it below 20%; SRC-181 printed p.15 (PDF 18) has it decreasing "towards 0%" above 20% penetration in the paper's approximation method, so the marginal basis has no ceiling in the source. The average basis gives 2.5x at 5% and about 3.9x at 20% penetration (1/0.40 and 1/0.256, our arithmetic). The upward floor is about 1.0x, not 1.1x: EIA's capacity-weighted ratios include 1.01 and 1.02 (CLM-0307) and Lazard's lowest uplift, 8.3%, is a factor of 1.08 (CLM-0312; our arithmetic).
What it assumes
No assumptions are recorded against this claim.
Where it comes from
This is the project's own working, shown in full:
See CLM-0307 (LACE, 0.85-1.25x), CLM-0309 (system LCOE, up to ~2x), CLM-0310 (ELCC: 2.5x at 5% and about 3.9x at 20% solar penetration on an average basis, 5x and more on a marginal basis above about 15%; our inversions of 40%, 25.6% and below 20% of nameplate), CLM-0311 (value factor, 1.25-2x), CLM-0312 (Lazard firming cost, about 1.08-1.85x on unsubsidised regional LCOE). The 12-80x comparator is SRC-012, already CLM-0123.
Related records
- Answers question
- QST-021 not published in this release
Cite this
energyaperture.com/c/clm-0318
CLM-0318, Energy Aperture, as of 2026-09.
Connected records
Other published records linked to this one. A list, not a judgement.
- Cited in articles