Markets

GE has launched a three-part strategy to address a dismal outlook for its power division that will involve operating in a “leaner, more cost-efficient way,” the company’s head told investors in a February 26 letter. The multinational conglomerate’s long-standing and lucrative GE Power business unit’s earnings plunged 45% in 2017 owing to costly operational misses […]

In what has been a much longer and more drawn-out process than Entergy could have imagined when it first proposed a new gas-fired power plant in New Orleans, the company got some good news on February 21. The Utility, Cable, Telecommunications, and Technology Committee agreed—after what has turned out to be years of discussion—to send […]

FirstEnergy Corp. bled $2.64 billion from its competitive businesses over 2017, financial losses exacerbated by marked declines in contract sales, higher operating expenses, and costs associated with asset impairment and plant exit. The Akron, Ohio–based company, which in January received a $2.5 billion equity injection from four private investment groups to boost its transition to […]

After decades of lethargic power demand—and negative growth in 2017—U.S. electricity use is expected to grow steadily through 2050, driven by a healthy economy and increasing efficiency, the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) projects in its Annual Electricity Outlook 2018 (AEO2018). However, during that period, direct-use generation will outpace growth in retail sales as more […]

NRG Energy, in a bid to shed $7 billion in consolidated debt, is selling the bulk of its renewable assets and development platforms along with several coal and natural gas power plants worth 3.6 GW tied to its South Central Generating business. The independent power producer, which recently relinquished bankrupt wholesale generator GenOn Energy to […]

Exelon Generation will shutter its Oyster Creek Generating Station in October 2018—more than a year before it is required to close the single-unit reactor as part of an agreement with the state of New Jersey. Exelon agreed in 2010 to close the unit by December 2019—10 years before its license to operate expires—after it decided […]

Two more U.S. nuclear power plants are facing early retirement, joining a string of generators whose fate was determined by market conditions, political pressure, or financial stresses assailing the sector. Several others may be poised to join them. The 647-MW Duane Arnold nuclear plant in Palo, Iowa, will likely close in 2025 after a current […]

This month’s THE BIG PICTURE infographic is accompanied by an interactive map. For more, visit: https://www.powermag.com/interactive-map-abandoned-nuclear-power-projects/

The Nigerian National Petroleum Corp. (NNPC) in December 2017 announced a plan to build three natural gas-fired power plants in the country, thanks to a $2.8 billion pipeline project that would bring natural gas from the southern part of the African nation to its northern region. The plants, sited in Abuja, Kaduna, and Kano, would […]

Increasing uncertainties concerning low forecasted load; construction financing constraints and reversals; state certification hurdles; and challenges to nuclear profitability posed by the growing share of coal plants beset the nuclear industry in the early 1970s. The nuclear suffered a renewed economic meltdown and fierce public pushback in the aftermath of the Three Mile Island accident […]