Packing 150 mph winds, Hurricane Michael has made landfall along the Florida Panhandle. The almost–Category 5 storm might well be the strongest to hit the Emerald Coast in more than 100 years. Not since Hurricane Opal, back in 1995, has there been a storm even remotely as strong as Michael to strike the coastal area. Causing major havoc […]
According to a recent maintenance study published by Plant Engineering, more than 50% of respondents said their plants are still heavily relying on reactive maintenance. However, organizations and industries (including the power industry) have slowly started to move toward a more proactive maintenance approach because of the numerous benefits its implementation provides. This article addresses […]
At this moment, the lights are on around the country in homes and workplaces. Most don’t realize, perhaps take it for granted, that those lights come on because of the hard work of dispatchers operating one of the most important manmade systems ever built, the national electric power grid. Without oversimplifying the process too much, […]
Unlike their regulated counterparts, merchant power generators have increasingly struggled to compete over the last few years and the outlook for many is that this won’t change any time soon. While regulated power companies often enjoy near monopolies in their respective markets, merchant power companies build out their power generating capacity on a speculative basis […]
Driven by increased energy efficiency and the relocation of electricity-intensive industries, electricity demand and consumption has steadily declined in many developed markets during the last decade, according to the International Energy Agency (IEA). Yet middle- and working-class households, as well as small businesses, are spending more of their income on electricity than their parents’ generation. […]
According to the Center for Climate and Energy Solutions, renewable energy is the fastest-growing energy source globally where 24% of the energy generated in 2015 came from renewable sources such as biomass, geothermal, solar, hydro, wind, and biofuels. This is expected to increase to 31% by 2040 and will heavily depend on a number of […]
Energy companies are currently taking a hard look at distributed energy and microgrid technologies. That’s a good thing. Microgrids also need advanced communications networks to operate at optimum efficiency. That’s a fact. Microgrids offer incredible potential benefits, including the ability to disconnect from the traditional power grid and deliver electricity during blackouts, natural disasters and […]
You put in a lot of time choosing the most energy efficient appliances you can find, and you work hard to cut back on energy use around the house. But what if there was a way to make your electric bill even lower with very little effort? Introducing the five gadgets you didn’t know you […]
Kenneth W. Irvin and Christopher Polito1 Sidley Austin LLP – Washington, D.C. What is “resilience,” and do we need it? As anyone who has not been on Mars knows, last year, U.S. Secretary of Energy Rick Perry petitioned the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) to craft policies to provide for “resilience” in our generation resource […]
When Hurricane Maria made landfall in Puerto Rico on September 20, 2017, no one could predict the level of devastation those 155-mph sustained winds would deliver. In its wake, Maria plunged the entire island of Puerto Rico into darkness, and decimated its aging distribution, transmission and generation infrastructure. By all predictions, it was going to […]
