Despite escalating growth over the past decade, the U.S. solar power sector faces potentially crippling issues concerning module supply, workforce deficiencies, and grid interconnection obstacles, according to industry experts attending…
Environmental
Legal and technical aspects of power plant environmental monitoring and control; regulatory issues
A federal appeals court has stayed a regional haze rule finalized by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) earlier this year that had threatened to close up to 8.4 GW of…
Southern Co.'s Kemper County energy facility—the only carbon capture and storage (CCS) integrated gasification combined cycle (IGCC) power plant that is under construction—is producing syngas using lignite. The plant marked…
The “polar vortex” storm of January 2014 blew in big changes to PJM Interconnection’s operations. But these changes are now the subject of a lawsuit filed by environmental groups, alleging…
Witnesses at a Congressional hearing raised concerns about the complexity, costs, legality, and feasibility of the 3,900 final rules published by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) during the Obama administration.…
Courtesy: Ad Meskens/Wikimedia Commons Europe has been in the forefront of renewable energy development, and though the scientific research on wildlife impacts is limited, European environmentalists and developers are beginning…
The niche alternative energy industry that generates power from hazardous piles of coal waste that litter the U.S. is facing an environmental Catch-22. The torrent of coal mined and processed…
Power plants are familiar with using continuous emissions monitoring systems (CEMS) to monitor pollutants, but these devices also may be able to measure heat rate—which could be handy for future…
Discussions about environmental issues related to power plants and the regulations governing their operation are as old as the industry, I discovered while thumbing through the bound July through December…
Renewable generation is usually characterized as more environmentally friendly than fossil fuels, and in many respects, that’s true. But there is a growing recognition that solar and wind generation have…