By Jillian Ambrose Energy correspondent Sun and wind generated 60% of all electricity on Monday, data showsGreat Britain’s electricity system recorded its greenest ever day over the Easter bank holiday as sunshine and windy weather led to a surge in renewable energy.The power plants generating electricity in England, Scotland and Wales produced only 39g of…
By Seb Kennedy The impoverished Australasian island of East Timor has pulled a notable U-turn by pursuing imports of liquefied natural gas, drawing a line under years of fruitless efforts to develop the country’s own domestic gas resource – and ignoring cheaper and cleaner alternatives.Timor wants to convert three power plants from light fuel oil…
By Billy Ludt Power plant developer J-POWER USA and funds managed by affiliates of Fortress Investment Group have agreed to jointly develop Birchwood Solar, a 50-MWac solar plant and Birchwood Storage, a 190-MWac energy storage facility. These projects would convert Birchwood Power Facility, a coal plant that has been in operation since November 1996 in…
By Kelly Pickerel Queens, New York, residents may be eligible for discounted solar + storage systems through Con Edison after it entered into a partnership with Swell Energy. Con Edison plans to have a virtual power plant managed by Swell Energy with solar powered home batteries. Con Edison’s Non-Wires Solutions procurement efforts, which include the…
By Billy Ludt Bank OZK received approval from the Arkansas Public Service Commission (APSC) and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation to construct a solar power plant that is expected to have a generating capacity of 4.8-MWdc. The APSC approval sets in motion Bank OZK’s $6 million sustainable energy initiative to produce enough renewable energy to…
By John Farrell Originally published on ILSR.org Since rooftop solar became possible, electric utilities have struggled to incorporate it into their outdated business model. In recent years, this lag in utility recognition has become increasingly problematic, risking the health, environmental, and financial impacts of over-investment in large fossil fuel power plants. In over 30 states,…
By [email protected] Small modular reactors (SMRs) — nuclear reactors using novel technologies to fit into much smaller and mass-producible packages than the behemoth nuclear power plants of today — are presented as a way of rapidly decarbonizing the grid in the face of an ever more pressing need to meet climate targets. But some opponents…
By [email protected] Duke Energy’s plan to build gigawatts’ worth of new natural-gas generators to supply its grid over the next 15 years has already drawn fire from clean-energy advocates who say it violates the utility’s long-range decarbonization goals and could leave customers paying for power plants that can’t economically compete with cleaner alternatives. This week,…
By [email protected] The business of demand response — cutting energy use to reduce peak grid demands — has evolved with the growing capability of technologies to enable it over the decades, from the manual emergency load-shedding of the past to the modern incarnation of virtual power plants, which coordinate digitally connected devices to shift loads…
By [email protected] Green hydrogen is both an untested and a potentially vital way for renewable-energy-powered grids to store their intermittent power for later use, not just for hours at a time, but for days, weeks or even seasons ahead. Most of the early-stage work on hydrogen’s grid storage potential is happening in Europe and Asia,…
By [email protected] The catastrophic breakdown of Texas’ natural gas and electricity system last week lacks a single villain to blame for it all. Instead, the widespread constraints in natural-gas supply and the shutdown of core power plant capacity that left millions without power can be chalked up to cascading failures between these two interdependent systems…
By [email protected] Plans for a new 3.6-gigawatt natural gas power plant in the U.K. have been shelved by the developer Drax, highlighting the challenging economics of converting coal-fired power to a cleaner, but still fossil-fuel-fired, alternative. It would have been the largest gas plant in Europe and, unsurprisingly, drew the attention of environmental groups. They…
By [email protected] Exelon Corp. announced plans Wednesday to separate its financially challenged nuclear power plant fleet and other generation assets from its multistate regulated utilities business. The plan, which will require approval from federal and state regulators, would separate Exelon’s six regulated electric and gas utilities, dubbed “RemainCo,” from its competitive power generation and retail…
By Billy Ludt Duke Energy has begun construction on the 50-MW Broad River Solar power plant in Cleveland County, North Carolina, expanding its renewable energy portfolio. The project will be owned and operated by the utility’s commercial subsidiary Duke Energy Renewables. The project was selected as part of the competitive bidding process established by 2017’s…
By National Wind Watch As a world leader in renewable energy and a major exporter of low-carbon electricity, Sweden is among the green elite. Yet a cold snap provoked a political storm this winter when, in order to keep the lights on, the authorities started up a 52-year-old oil-fired power plant. A furious debate centered…