The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) issued on Thursday a proposal to standardize the definition of transmission facilities subject to mandatory reliability standards. The commission’s intent is to protect the reliability of the nation’s bulk power system.

The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) released a report on Friday that highlights examples of small businesses throughout the clean, renewable energy and environmental management sectors that have received funding under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA), which was enacted in February 2009.

By Kennedy Maize Washington, March 22. 2010 — Remember all that hype about a nuclear renaissance? Push it all a couple of years into the future, as the economy has caused growth in demand for electricity to slow considerably, making the need for new baseload capacity less pressing. In a wire service interview, Marvin Fertel, […]

Dennis the Menace Takes on Obama Nuke Support By Kennedy Maize Washington, March 19, 2010 — The Obama administration’s decision to offer some $8.3 billion in loan guarantees to the Southern Company for a new, two-unit expansion at its Vogtle nuclear power station in Georgia is drawing fire from the Democratic left in Congress. Rep. […]

A power blackout on Sunday that affected about 90% of Chile’s customers may have been a result of the massively destructive February 27 magnitude 8.8 earthquake. The country’s National Emergency Office (Onemi) said that power had been restored to 98% of the country by Monday—within hours of the outage—but the energy minister noted that the system would remain unstable for up to six months.

Last week POWERnews reported that the U.S. Department of Energy had awarded $40 million for preliminary work on the Next Generation Nuclear Plant (NGNP). That was Monday. On Friday, the DOE issued two requests for applications (RFA) for scholarships and fellowships as part of its efforts to recruit and train the next generation of nuclear scientists and engineers.

Southern California Edison (SCE) and SunPower Corp. announced last Wednesday that SunPower has won a contract to provide solar technology for generating up to 200 MW, or 80%, of the solar power capacity needed for the utility’s large solar photovoltaic (PV) installation program. The agreement is an indication of the growing importance of aggregating distributed generation resources as an alternative to building large "utility-scale" generating plants.

A preliminary move on March 10 puts Turkey closer than ever to building its first nuclear power plant. The plant, which would consist of four reactors with a total 5,600 MW capacity, would be built in northern Turkey on the Black Sea coast.

Colorado Gov. Bill Ritter Jr. has said that he is prepared to sign into law later this month a bill passed by both houses of the legislature that would require the largest utilities operating in the state to generate 30% of their electricity from renewable energy sources by 2020. Only California has a higher goal for its renewable portfolio standard (RES).

On Tuesday, Vermont’s legislature took another step toward designating large hydropower resources as "renewable." The move came just days after the two largest Vermont utilities signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with Hydro-Québec for a 26-year power purchase agreement.