Nuclear

Two nuclear energy milestones were reached in the past week, as the world’s first commercial AP1000 and EPR reactors were connected to China’s power grid. Westinghouse announced Sanmen 1, the first AP1000 unit, was connected to the grid June 30, one day after Électricité de France (EDF) connected the first EPR reactor—Taishan 1—to the system. […]

Japan’s government on July 3 approved a new Basic Energy Plan for the country, saying it is committed to increasing the role of renewable resources for power generation while also confirming it wants nuclear power to remain a vital part of the nation’s energy strategy. Japan issues a revised Basic Energy Plan, which outlines the […]

Officials with the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) on July 2 said Oyster Creek Nuclear Generating Station, the country’s oldest operating nuclear power plant, will officially close on September 17. They also said radioactive material is likely to remain at the site in New Jersey until at least the late 2070s, and perhaps beyond. The […]

Solar power generation reached new highs in the United Kingdom recently, with a heat wave and stretch of sunny days across the country highlighting the potential for renewable energy in Britain. Solar produced a record 533 gigawatt hours (GWh) of power from June 21-28. Solar output topped 8 GW on each of the eight days, […]

The safe transportation of transformers, gas turbines, generators, and other electrical production equipment is a vital component in suppliers’ current business models and future growth potential. Equipment

Successfully operating a power plant or other industrial complex depends on many things, including the vendors who supply equipment for construction of the facility, along with those who provide the materials

Germany is often touted as a leader in the global energy transition. Energiewende has been part of the country’s public discourse since the 1970s, stemming from an anti-nuclear movement prevalent at the

Nigeria’s government joined with Russia’s State Atomic Energy Corp. (Rosatom) last year with a goal to develop the country’s first nuclear power plant, a plan that both sides confirmed and talked about

A cooling tower water recovery system designed by engineers from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) could capture water from power plant fogs and plumes, potentially rendering them into a source

The Tennessee Valley Authority’s Watts Bar Nuclear Plant Unit 2 was the first new nuclear unit added to the U.S. fleet in more than 20 years. There were challenges along the way, but the colossal effort

The New York Power Authority’s Integrated Smart Operations Center (iSOC) is the first step in the public power utility’s goal to become the first end-to-end digital electricity system. And it’s a big

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 […]

General Electric (GE) saw its stock price surge more than 7% on June 26 after the company said it would dissolve its stake in oil services company Baker Hughes and spin off its healthcare unit over the next few years. The announcement comes one day after GE said it would sell its Distributed Power business, […]

There are often multiple closed-loop water cooling systems installed in a power plant. Chances are good that they cool or control temperature on some very critical components. It can be easy to ignore these systems because they are usually quite reliable. By its very nature, when a closed-loop system remains closed and operates properly for an extended period of time, it is often […]

Two Westinghouse AP1000 nuclear power plants being constructed in China have successfully completed significant project milestones. Sanmen Unit 1—the world’s first AP1000 reactor—achieved initial criticality on June 21. Initial criticality is a nuclear industry term meaning the reactor’s neutron population has remained steady from one generation to the next and the nuclear fission chain reaction […]

Siemens and General Electric, two rivals battling financial problems due to fewer orders for their flagship energy products and services, could each announce major restructuring moves in the coming weeks, according to media reports. Reuters on June 21, citing a person familiar with the matter, said Siemens plans to merge or trim some of its […]

About half the world’s power will be generated by wind and solar resources by 2050. Generation from coal will drop more than 70% from today’s levels. That’s according to research from energy analysts published June 19 in the “New Energy Outlook 2018” (NEO) from Bloomberg New Energy Finance (BNEF). The NEO report outlines information from […]

A Tokyo Electric Power Co. (TEPCO) executive on June 14 said the utility is prepared to decommission the four idle units at its Fukushima Daini nuclear plant in Japan. The comments come as TEPCO continues to struggle with large compensation payments and cleanup costs associated with the March 2011 accident at its Fukushima Daiichi nuclear […]

Genoa, Italy (14 June 2018) – RINA, a leading specialist in additive manufacturing, has announced the release of its ‘Guidelines for the certification of metallic products made by additive manufacturing’, for the Power industry. The use of additive manufacturing (or 3D printing) is expanding rapidly, especially as technology now enables the production of larger components […]

President Trump wants to provide financial support to struggling coal and nuclear power plants. He’s told the Department of Energy (DOE) to make it happen. But a bipartisan group of lawmakers on Capitol Hill, along with commissioners from the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), made it clear June 12 they don’t support federal government intervention […]

Showcasing innovative gearbox, driveshaft, fan, and heat transfer fill options Overland Park, Kan. – SPX Cooling Technologies, Inc., a full-line, full-service industry leader in the design and manufacture of evaporative cooling towers and air-cooled heat exchangers, has outfitted an 18-foot mobile trailer with displays of field-erected cooling tower components. Visitors to the trailer can see […]

VÄSTERÅS, Sweden–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Westinghouse Electric Company today announced the signing of a contract for manufacture and delivery of boiling water reactor (BWR) fuel to Cofrentes Nuclear Power Plant (CNC) in Spain in 2019 and 2021. CNC is wholly owned by Iberdrola Generación Nuclear S.A. “The reliability and excellent performance of our fuel products are the main […]

General Electric’s (GE’s) power unit has said it will end manufacturing operations at its plant in Salem, Virginia, next year, with more than 260 workers losing their jobs, according to union officials. Officials noted that 42% of the affected workers are eligible for retirement. The plan announced June 8 said the Salem plant, which opened […]

Xcel Energy, citing “historically low” costs for wind and solar power, said it wants to double its generation from renewable sources. Colorado’s largest utility also said it will retire two coal-fired units representing 660 MW at its Comanche Generating Station in Pueblo at least 10 years ahead of schedule. The changes were outlined in a […]

The Trump administration’s attempt to prop up uneconomic “fuel secure” generators in competitive markets is just the latest in a string of recent “extra-market” interventions that experts said imperil independent organized markets for electricity. In a recent white paper, Raymond Gifford and Matthew Larson, energy partners at Wilkinson Barker Knauer LLP, said the restructured administrative […]

Chris Crane, CEO of Exelon Corp., seemed to take umbrage with the way comments he made on June 5 were reported by Utility Dive. The website published the headline “Exelon CEO: No grid emergency to justify DOE coal, nuke bailout,” but Crane went out of his way to clarify his position while on stage participating […]

Optimization through advanced testing and modeling tools will increase NuScale Power’s small modular reactor (SMR) capacity by 20%, which could make it “even more competitive with other electricity generation sources,” the Portland, Oregon, company announced on June 6. The breakthrough would boost the power capacity of a 12-module SMR plant currently planned by Utah Associated Municipal […]

San Diego, June 5, 2018 – The U.S. Department of Energy’s Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E) on Monday awarded General Atomics (GA) a total of nearly $3 million in funding to continue development of two key technologies associated with GA’s Energy Multiplier Module (EM2) concept. The awards are part of ARPA-E’s Modeling-Enhanced Innovations Trailblazing Nuclear […]

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 […]

Few entities have expressed approval of the Trump administration’s plan that includes a directive for system operators to buy or arrange purchase of energy or capacity from designated “fuel secure” power plants for two years until the Department of Energy (DOE) can address “grid security” challenges. The 41-page draft memo dated May 29—which was presumably authored […]