Solar will get too cheap to connect to the power grid.

Though it will require enormous upfront investment in the coming decade, laying a quilt of DERs over the nation’s distribution systems is the best thing we can possibly do to enable the rapid emission reductions we will need in the decade after.

By bringing demand more under grid operators’ control, DERs virtually eliminate curtailment, or discarding of renewable energy due to temporary oversupply, through 2045. Just as they allow transmission to be used more effectively, they allow us to consume more of the energy generated by existing utility-scale renewables.