News

Coal proponents and climate skeptics often cite China’s current and future reliance on coal power to bolster talking points. What is little discussed is the recent, massive transformation of China’s vast

Beyond the bitter disputes that have recently cropped up between Ukraine and Russia concerning Russia’s 2014 annexation of Crimea and the subsequent separatist violence in Ukraine’s Donbass region

As renewables gain a greater foothold in the energy system, the importance of energy storage is going to increase in kind. With the ongoing gradual shift away from traditional baseload energy sources, the

A novel demonstration underway at Technische Universität Darmstadt (TU Darmstadt), a research university in Darmstadt, Germany, has shown a calcium carbonate looping (CCL) technology retrofitted at existing

The world’s nuclear sector saw a flurry of activity during April and May, though most of it wasn’t good news.  First Unit at Barakah Built, but Regulatory Delays Prevail. Initial construction activities

India to Sell Only Electric Vehicles by 2030. India’s power minister Piyush Goyal said at a Confederation of Indian Industry session in April that the government plans to make all its cars electric by 2030

A hybrid technology created by researchers at Penn State University could be the breakthrough needed to advance efforts to produce power based on the salt concentrations between two water sources. Researchers

By many indicators, working in the power sector today is safer than it’s ever been. In 2014, the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) found that utilities had a lower fatal work injury

Grid behavior in today’s power generation environment is a stochastic system that is more variable than in the past. One common issue is the response to economic dispatch, in which formerly baseload thermal

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) approved a settlement with GDF SUEZ Energy Marketing NA Inc. (GSEMNA) in February 2017, in which GSEMNA agreed to pay civil penalties of $41 million and disgorge

Southern Co.’s Plant Scherer was chosen as the 2017 Powder River Basin Coal Users’ Group Plant of the Year based on a rigorous selection criteria, including safety, fire protection, and risk reduction

  More grim news emerged for financially strapped Westinghouse after the Delaware Supreme Court reversed a chancery court decision that the company was counting on to recoup $2 billion from an acquisition dispute with Chicago Bridge & Iron (CB&I). The court rejected Westinghouse’s contention of CB&I’s calculations of its final purchase price—even though it paid […]

  Operations and start-up of the lignite gasification portion of the Kemper County Energy Facility, marred by exorbitant delays and cost overruns, will be suspended immediately, Mississippi Power announced on June 28. The Southern Co. subsidiary plans to continue running a combined cycle gas turbine (CCGT) plant that was completed as part of the $7.5 […]

Although President Trump has been promoting a pro-coal energy agenda, there are four things killing coal that the administration may not be able to remedy. That was the message Bill Ritter Jr. delivered to American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) Power and Energy Conference & Exhibition attendees during his keynote address on June 27. Ritter […]

A coal-fired power plant in northeastern Arizona can continue operating until at least the end of 2019 after the Navajo Nation Council approved a lease extension for the facility. The three Arizona utilities and one Nevada utility that own the plant along with the federal Bureau of Reclamation had said in February 2017 they would […]

 The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Department of Army, and Army Corps of Engineers have proposed a rule to rescind the controversial Waters of the U.S. (WOTUS) rule, which asserts federal authority over small bodies of water. The rule, also known as the “Clean Water Rule,” was promulgated by the EPA and the U.S. Army […]

The nation’s power grid may or may not have reliability issues if too many renewables are added to the energy mix, according to conflicting statements by Secretary of Energy Rick Perry and Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) Commissioner Colette D. Honorable. Speaking June 27 at the Energy Information Administration’s (EIA) 2017 Conference in Washington, D.C., […]

Groups opposed to financial relief for Connecticut’s 2,111-MW Millstone Nuclear Power Station continue to press their case against subsidies for the plant as state lawmakers prepare for a special session to prepare a state budget for the new fiscal year, which begins July 1. The regular 2017 legislative session ended June 7. Dominion Energy in […]

SCANA Corp. subsidiary South Carolina Electric & Gas Co. (SCG&E) and Santee Cooper—owners of the two-unit expansion of the V.C. Summer nuclear plant—have extended an interim assessment agreement with Westinghouse to allow the project’s owners to “continue to make progress on the site.” The companies on June 26 extended the agreement to August 10, but it […]

If the Trump administration’s efforts to roll back the Clean Power Plan (CPP) are successful, the nation could miss out on 560,000 potential jobs and a boost of $52 billion to the gross domestic product (GDP), according to a report released by Environmental Entrepreneurs (E2). “From states with relatively small populations like Maine and Montana […]

The Mississippi Public Service Commission (MPSC) at an open meeting on June 21 unanimously passed a motion instructing its counsel to prepare an order pursuing potential solutions regarding the Kemper County Power Generation Facility. In a press release, the MPSC said the “Kemper Facility should operate using only natural gas.” The commission said it wanted […]

A newly released update to the Power Sector Carbon Index, developed by Carnegie Mellon University with the support of Mitsubishi Hitachi Power Systems (MHPS), found that U.S. power plant emissions averaged 955 lb of CO2 per MWh during the first three months of 2017. 1. Carnegie Mellon University Power Sector Carbon Index. The index shows […]

A bipartisan bill extending a production tax credit (PTC) for advanced nuclear power facilities passed the U.S. House on a voice vote on June 20. The bill, introduced by Congressman Tom Rice (R-S.C.), seeks to give facilities that use novel nuclear power technologies more investment certainty. The nuclear PTC was established under the Energy Policy […]

The Trump administration says it’s not going to pick winners and losers when it comes to energy generation, but it sure doesn’t seem to like wind and solar, judging from a recent presentation by Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke. The nation needs a diverse energy mix, including nuclear, coal, natural gas, and renewables, several energy industry […]

The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) said PJM can restart two coal-fired units at Dominion Energy’s Yorktown, Va., power plant, two months after the aging units were shut down because they could not meet federal emissions standards. The emergency order from the DOE, issued June 16, allows the units to run during the hot summer […]

A group of 21 prominent energy and climate experts, writing in the June 19 edition of PNAS (“Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences”) finds that the argument by Stanford University professor Mark Jacobson that the U.S. can end carbon dioxide emissions with an energy diet entirely of wind, solar, and hydro “between 2050 and […]

Veteran global warming gadfly David Wojick is mounting a challenge to the way climate science is being taught in our schools, and raising money online for his venture. At the same time, Environmental Protection Agency chief Scott Pruitt says he wants to mount teams to debate climate science, according to the Washington Post. Full disclosure: […]

Georgia Power officials say the utility continues to work with its partners in the troubled Vogtle nuclear plant to firm up construction timelines and determine the costs to complete two new units at the facility. At the same time, a group opposed to the project and two long-time project consultants say ballooning costs should put […]

Increased use of less-expensive natural gas and renewable sources of energy for power generation is putting financial pressure on U.S. nuclear power plants, according to an analysis of electricity costs from Bloomberg New Energy Finance (BNEF). Nicholas Steckler, an analyst for BNEF, in a June 14 report said nuclear operators are losing about $2.9 billion […]

Marking a significant milestone, power generation from the combined utility-scale and small-scale wind and solar installations in the U.S. surpassed 10% of the nation’s total power generation in March, according to the Energy Information Administration (EIA). The news comes on the heels of an announcement last week by the Solar Energy Industries Association (SEIA) that […]