International

As with many areas in North America and Europe, electricity generation in the Canadian province of Alberta is in transition toward cleaner, more efficient, more water-wise power. According to statistics from

The U.S. and China on Tuesday finalized a memorandum of understanding that will allow them to jointly advance carbon capture, utilization, and storage (CCUS) and other clean coal technologies for commercial use.  The agreement between the Department of Energy (DOE) and China’s National Energy Administration (NEA) was set up on Aug. 26 during the U.S.–China […]

Kyushu Electric Power Co.’s restart of Sendai 1—the first Japanese reactor to begin operation under new safety standards after the Fukushima disaster—hit a technical hiccup last week, prompting the company to halt ramp up of power output. The utility said on Aug. 21 that it had suspended increasing output at the unit after an alarm […]

The power generation industry is undergoing a period of rapid transformation. A growing number of operators are considering the adoption of condition-based maintenance (CBM).  This whitepaper discusses the forces that are driving demand for CBM, how CBM works and why it is an effective alternative to planned maintenance strategies.
Find out more about CBM for Power

Nearly two years after Japan’s last nuclear power plant was shut down for safety checks, Kyushu Electric Power Co. has started up the 890-MW Sendai-1. The event marks a significant milestone for the country’s nuclear sector, which was crippled by the Fukushima disaster in 2011.  Kyushu started up Sendai-1 at 10:30 a.m. local time and […]

E.ON in late June announced that it wants to shutter its Oskarshamn 2 reactor (Figure 1) in southeastern Sweden because it is unprofitable. The announcement is the latest in a string of early nuclear plant retirements from around the world. 1. Early retirement. The 638-MW Oskarshamn 2 nuclear reactor, built in 1974, is at risk […]

Courtesy: SaskPower There was no debate among our editorial team when it came to selecting the most interesting and worthy project worldwide for this year’s top award. Boundary Dam Power Station Unit 3 is the world’s first operating coal-fired power plant to implement a full-scale post-combustion carbon capture and storage system. It did so more […]

France’s state-owned utility EDF will snap up between 51% and 75% of troubled nuclear giant AREVA’s reactor business in a possible $2.96 billion deal.  While the French government owns about 87% of AREVA and 85% of EDF, the utility that operates the nation’s aging 58-reactor fleet, it has pledged to look at all options to […]

Though the U.S. Senate voted 64–29 this week to renew the charter of the Export-Import Bank of the United States (Ex-Im), the House may adjourn for its summer break without taking action on the issue.  Congress let the Ex-Im bank’s charter lapse for the first time in its 81 years of continuous operation on June […]

As part of a remedy package to appease the European Commission, Alstom will accept $331 million less than the original $13.63 billion purchase price offered by General Electric (GE) to close the deal.  The much-anticipated deal has come under close scrutiny by the European Commission, which opened a full-scale antitrust investigation into the deal on […]

Five of Germany’s largest lignite power plants will be mothballed to allow the country that is already phasing out nuclear power to meet ambitious climate goals by 2020.  In what it called a “milestone decision,” the government on July 2 agreed to scrap plans to impose a controversial—and by some accounts, illegal—climate tax for conventional […]

China on June 29 submitted its Intended Nationally Determined Contribution (INDC) for reducing carbon emissions to the United Nations in preparation for the COP21 climate negotiations in Paris later this year. The INDCs are formal pledges toward a hoped-for binding agreement. The Chinese pledge builds on its November agreement with the U.S. In its INDC, […]

This is a web supplement to “Riding Off into the Sunset: Nuclear Decontamination and Decommissioning Update,” appearing in the July 2015 issue of POWER.   The Ignalina Nuclear Power Plant (INPP) is located in eastern Lithuania near Visaginas—a town of more than 20,000 people founded in the mid-1970s for workers constructing INPP and for the […]

Several major nuclear announcements surfaced from around the world this week. South Korea plans to retire its oldest nuclear reactor early, Nigeria selected two sites for the construction of four nuclear reactors, while Pakistan approved the construction of two China-assisted reactors.  KHNP Moves to Retire Kori 1 Early  Amid growing concerns about the safety of […]

At the annual Power-Gen Europe Conference held in Amsterdam, in the Netherlands, International Energy Agency (IEA) Executive Director Maria van der Hoeven called for greater leadership as Europe tackles de-carbonization, distributed energy, and market integration. She began her presentation by highlighting one of the biggest changes to Europe’s power markets: The May 20 decision to […]

Germany’s tax on nuclear fuel rods is not against European Union (EU) law, the bloc’s top court has ruled. The decision from the Luxembourg-based Court of Justice of the European Union on June 4 may be detrimental to utilities that own nuclear power plants, which have already paid about $5.67 billion in the levies that […]

China’s State Nuclear Power Technology Corp. (SNPTC)—general contractor of the first four AP1000 units being built in China—and China Power Investment Corp. officially announced a merger in a move to reinforce the country’s plans to eventually export reactors. The new company, State Power Investment Corp., will own assets worth more than $112.94 billion. SNPTC was […]

This interview with Dr. Fatih Birol, Chief Economist, Director of Global Energy Economics and Executive Director (starting September 2015), International Energy Agency (IEA) was conducted by Global Business Reports in May 2015. It has been edited for style and length and is a web-only supplement to the sponsored report “Power in Turkey” appearing in the […]

Workers at San Diego’s General Atomics (GA) on April 10 began the years-long process of winding the 1,000-ton superconducting electromagnet that will power the ITER fusion reactor under construction in southern France. The $16 billion ITER project, a consortium of the U.S., the European Union, Russia, China, Japan, and other nations, aims to test reactor-scale […]

From Sweden to China, the world’s nuclear sector saw an eventful spring. Sweden to Shutter Two Ringhals Units Early. On the same day that E.ON—formerly one of Europe’s most formidable power companies—announced it would spin off its nuclear assets owing to Germany’s energy transition, its Swedish partner, Vattenfall, which is 70% co-owner of the 1975-built […]

The European Commission (EC) this April launched an extensive investigation into subsidies that 11 European governments provide to utilities to ensure future power reliability, saying it is concerned that the measures may distort competition. The sector inquiry into capacity mechanisms is the first under European Union (EU) state aid rules introduced in May 2012, which […]

The Japanese Nuclear Regulatory Authority (NRA) approved Kyushu Electric Power Co.’s operational safety programs for Sendai Nuclear Power Station Units 1 and 2 on May 27. The approval is the last of three needed by the company to verify that the plant complies with new regulatory requirements implemented as a result of the Fukushima disaster. […]

GE Hitachi Nuclear Energy (GEH), the manufacturer of more than 60 of the world’s 81 existing boiling water reactors (BWRs), is making a foray into the pressurized water reactor (PWR) services field.  The Wilmington, N.C.–based company announced on May 12 that it has begun offering refueling services to PWR operators. Under a recent agreement, its […]

Siemens AG has completed a company reorganization to respond to the “persistently difficult environment” in the global power generation market. The global technology company, which had around 357,000 employees in 2014, said it would cut 4,500 jobs worldwide as part of efforts to streamline administrative functions. Siemens announced 7,800 jobs cuts earlier this year. Along […]

A Canadian joint review panel issued an environmental assessment report on May 6 for a deep geologic repository (DGR) for long-term management of low- and intermediate-level radioactive waste (L&ILW), concluding that the project is “not likely to cause significant adverse environmental effects.” Ontario Power Generation (OPG) proposed the DGR, intending to locate the facility at […]

Ending several months of speculation, electric vehicle firm Tesla Motors officially moved into the energy storage market on April 30 with the announcement that it would begin marketing two new battery products, the home-based Powerwall and the larger, utility-scale Powerpack. Tesla CEO Elon Musk unveiled the two batteries at a flashy ceremony at the Tesla […]

The life of a wind turbine can be pretty precarious. The blades—made of laminated materials, such as composites, balsa wood, carbon fiber, and fiberglass—can reach speeds up to 180 miles per hour at the tip, which means even small particles in the air can cause damage to the surfaces. It’s probably no surprise that lightning […]

Falling prices and technological improvements have brought battery storage systems into direct competition with traditional distributed generation, demand response, and peaking generation resources. But making one work efficiently and profitably is not just plug and play.   Last fall, Southern California Edison (SCE) had some big decisions to make. The giant utility, which serves 14 […]

Advocates for the continued reliance on coal for baseload electricity cheered late last year when North America’s largest power-related carbon capture and sequestration (CCS) facility was commissioned. Since then, that pool of advocates is evaporating as prominent electricity industry decision-makers publicly distance themselves from coal and champion alternatives for a low- or no-carbon future. If […]

With 38 tri-fuel engines and a combined capacity of 573 MW, IPP3—a plant constructed near Amman, Jordan—is now the world’s largest internal combustion engine–based power plant. The facility was inaugurated on April 29 in a ceremony attended by Jordan’s King Abdullah II Ibn Al Hussein. The plant was constructed by an engineering, procurement, and construction […]