POWER

On tax day, Dominion and BP Wind Energy announced full commercial operation of Phase I of the Fowler Ridge Wind Farm in Benton County, Ind. Of the 400-MW facility, BP and Dominion are partners on approximately 300 MW. The two companies could expand the facility to a total of 750 MW in the future.

By Kennedy Maize The Obama administration’s Environmental Protection Agency is declaring that carbon dioxide, a life-giving and ubiquitous atmospheric chemical, is a threat to public health. That’s a completely illogical determination, but also completely expected. The notion that carbon dioxide is a pollutant has nothing to do with chemistry or physics or biology or climatology, […]

Experts assert that the U.S. grid—already proven by federal agencies to be vulnerable to cyber attacks—has been compromised by spies who tried to map the system and left bugs that could be used to disrupt networks at a time of war or crisis.

A memorandum of understanding last week signed by Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar and Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) Chair Jon Wellinghoff clarifies jurisdictional responsibilities and establishes a process through which the two federal agencies will lease, license, and regulate all renewable energy development activities on the Outer Continental Shelf.

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) last week approved a 20-year license extension for Exelon Corp.’s Oyster Creek Generating Station in Ocean Country, N.J.—the nation’s oldest operating nuclear power reactor.

Southern Co. has notified the Shaw Group and Westinghouse Electric Co. to proceed fully on their engineering, procurement, and construction (EPC) contract for two new Westinghouse AP1000 reactors planned for an expansion of the Vogtle Electric Generating Plant near Augusta, Ga.—one of the first new U.S. nuclear construction projects in more than three decades.

The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), an agency of the U.S. Department of Commerce, has contracted the Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI) to help it develop an interim road map to harmonize interoperability standards for the smart grid.

Wind power projects installed through the end of 2008 now generate 1.25% of the nation’s electricity, the American Wind Energy Association (AWEA) annual wind industry report shows. Texas again installed the most capacity, but Iowa surged into second place, beating California—the state where almost all wind power capacity in the U.S. was once installed.

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) on Monday approved transmission infrastructure investment rate incentives for the Green Power Express, a proposed 3,000-mile transmission superhighway designed to deliver wind-powered renewable energy from the upper Midwest to Midwestern and Eastern states.

By Kennedy Maize A report in the Wall Street Journal that Russian and Chinese spy hackers have penetrated the U.S. electric power grid, and left malware and root kits, cyber time bombs, to explode in the future strikes me as bogus. The story had no named sources, and the details were sketchy at best. Where […]

By Kennedy Maize Is biology the key to improved battery performance? Researchers in a recent issue of Science magazine describe how genetically-engineered viruses could boost the power of lithium ion batteries, expected to be the batteries of choice for plug-in hybrid vehicles. A research team led by scientists at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology used […]

One of my favorite folk songs from the Great Depression is “The Big Rock Candy Mountain,” which I remember hearing sung by Burl Ives, the bearded and burley tenor who, among other gigs, performed with Pete Seeger and the Weavers in the 1950s (boy, does that date me). One of the lines in the song […]

Carbon dioxide emissions from power plants in the U.S. dropped 3.1% in 2008—a departure from the steadily increasing trend in preceding years, according to a new document from Environment Integrity Project (EIP), a nonpartisan and nonprofit organization.

The Maryland Senate last week approved a bill that reverses a failed 1999 energy deregulation policy and gives state regulators the authority to order utilities to build new power plants in the state. The future of the bill is unclear, however—the state’s annual 90-day legislative session is scheduled to end on April 13.

Drilling nears completion for the first large-scale carbon dioxide (CO₂) injection well in the U.S. for CO₂ sequestration, the Department of Energy (DOE) reported Tuesday. This project will be used to demonstrate that CO₂ emitted from industrial sources—such as coal-fired power plants—can be stored in deep geological formations to mitigate the release of large quantities of greenhouse gas emissions to the atmosphere.

The U.S. Supreme Court sided with power companies in a landmark decision last week, ruling that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is not prohibited from considering a cost-benefit analysis when regulating the design of cooling water intake structures. This ruling affects power plants use cooling water from the nation’s rivers, lakes, and oceans.

A $2.1 billion project to build a 190-mile high-voltage direct current (HVDC) transmission line across New York State has been suspended because rules pertaining to transmission tariffs recently made by the regional grid operator had created an “unacceptable financial risk,” the New York Regional Interconnect Inc. (NYRI) said Friday.

Finland’s government has proposed to enact a tax on nuclear and hydro power plants that were built before adoption of the 1997 Kyoto Protocol to cut “windfall profits” that have resulted from the EU’s carbon emission trading program.

Renewable energy, though still accounting for a comparatively small portion of overall supply, generates a larger portion of the world’s electricity each year. Combining many of the available solar energy conversion technologies with conventional fossil-fueled technologies could reduce fuel costs while simultaneously helping utilities that are struggling to meet their renewable portfolio goals.

As European utilities vie in an auction for the pubic land on which the UK’s new fleet of nuclear power plants will be built, the UK government on Monday announced it would sell the UK Atomic Energy Authority’s commercial arm, an entity that provides nuclear decommissioning, waste management, and new nuclear build support services.

It may seem counterintuitive, but fire can be a serious danger in hydropower plants. In some respects, the danger is even greater than in thermal power stations. Most U.S. hydro plants are 30 to 70 years old but can deliver another 20 or 30 years of service with upgrades — including state-of-the-art fire protection systems. The design options outlined here also apply in large part to other generating stations.

According to a new study from Emerging Energy Research, more than $20 billion will be spent on carbon capture and storage (CCS) projects this year at 50 power generation projects totalling 16 GW around the world. The European Union (EU), with an investment of $11.6 billion, leads all efforts, because it is pressed to achieve a target to reduce carbon emissions by 20% of 1990 levels by 2020. In December, the governing body reached agreement on a climate and energy package, which includes a framework for CCS and a directive on the way EU members and Norway will regulate licenses to ensure reliable carbon storage. The U.S. takes second place, earmarking $6 billion, and Canada is third, at $2.7 billion.

Upgrading a 1970s-era generator control system to new millennium technology in 12 days during a three-week shutdown would require careful planning and teamwork under any circumstances. The quick replacement of the governor and control system at the PT Inco smelter’s hydroelectric generation system is even more impressive because the facility is located in the middle of an Indonesian jungle.

"The Russian Nuclear Industry: Status and Prospects," a February report from a Canadian-based think tank, Centre for International Governance Innovation, examines a revival of Russia’s Soviet-era plans for a massive nuclear expansion within the current state of the country’s nuclear power industry. It concludes that although the industry has been greeted with renewed funding and enthusiasm, achieving its ambitious plans will require the federation to overcome considerable problems and limitations.

President Obama promoted "green energy" as a signature theme in his presidential campaign. During his first weeks, he reaffirmed his administration’s commitment to renewable resources. In a radio address, he promised to double the nation’s alternative energy capacity within three years and to construct a 3,000-mile transmission grid to "convey this new energy from coast to coast."

About 110 years after the Belgica expedition — a polar voyage organized by the Geographical Royal Society to establish the world’s first Antarctic scientific research program — a new, unique research station sponsored by the Belgian Federal Government has been commissioned. Inaugurated on Feb. 15 after two years of construction, the Princess Elizabeth Station (Figure 4) is the only polar base to run entirely on renewable energies.

A 16% national RPS would require almost a 500% increase in renewable generation in the next decade, or about 32,000 MW. EIA data show that the U.S. had about 8% renewables online at the end of 2007. What’s worse is that very few existing projects would count toward the requirements of this proposed legislation.

The current Spanish electricity model is unsustainable: Carbon dioxide (CO₂) emissions are hard to control, demand shows no sign of weakening, and the country is overly dependent on imported fuel. These are the conclusions of a team of scientists from the Institute for Research in Technology of the University of Pontificia Comillas in Madrid, who looked at how the Spanish electricity sector would evolve in four different scenarios.

The pace at which next-generation nuclear power is developing in the U.S. accelerated this February as the U.S. arm of Toshiba inked an engineering, procurement, and construction (EPC) agreement with an advanced boiling water reactor (ABWR) nuclear development company jointly owned by NRG Energy and Japan’s Toshiba Corp. The agreement seeks to ensure that the two ABWRs planned to expand the South Texas Project (STP) in Bay City, Texas, will be constructed on time, on budget, and to exacting standards.

Post-consumer waste could be the newest, ubiquitous fuel source for distributed energy generation if a mobile waste-to-energy conversion system launched this January finds its way onto the parking lots of facilities that produce more than two tons of waste daily. According to its developer, Massachusetts-based IST Energy, the GEM system can process up to 3 tons of waste daily — which can include paper, plastic, food, wood, and agricultural materials — and produce up to 120 kWe and 240 kWth.