POWER [December 1, 2017]

Anesco Celebrates Subsidy-Free Solar

On September 26, 2017, UK Climate Change Minister Claire Perry marched across a slightly muddy field to a 10-MW solar farm built by British renewable energy developer Anesco. The high-profile visit included a

China's Renewables Strategy Shines in Massive Solar Park

The Longyangxia Dam Solar Park, part of a hydro-solar integration in the high desert on the Tibetan Plateau, has helped the country move toward its ambitious targets for increasing generation from cleaner fuel

Nation's First Offshore Wind Farm Releases Community from Decades of Diesel

In the early morning of May 1, 2017, Block Island, Rhode Island, shut off the diesel generators that had powered the island for nearly a century. The lights on the island flickered off before turning back on

Sarulla, One of the World's Largest Geothermal Power Projects, Comes Alive with Private Finance

The 330-MW Sarulla Geothermal Power Plant in Indonesia took decades to develop. Backed by a multinational financing effort along with support from the Indonesian government, the $1.6 billion project may be on

Willow Island Hydro: A Small but Mighty Marvel on the Ohio River

Successfully designing and constructing a hydropower plant, while accounting for site space constraints and not disrupting commercial traffic on a busy waterway, presented challenges for a Midwestern utility

ASME Operation and Maintenance lnservice Testing Program Ensures Nuclear Component Operational Readiness

Originally embedded in the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) Boiler and Pressure Vessel Code , today the Operation and Maintenance of Nuclear Power Plants standard for inservice testing of pumps

Improve Power Plant Heat Rate with a Pulverizer Performance Program

Associated Electric Cooperative has spent a decade building a pulverizer performance program for its Thomas Hill Energy Center. The effort, combined with a sharp focus on maintaining proper air/fuel ratios

Increase the IQ of Your Intelligent Sootblowing

Power plants have been blowing soot using essentially the same method for decades. However, technological advances now offer boiler operators a much-improved technique. Rather than running sootblowing systems

Reducing Nuclear Plant Operations and Maintenance Costs Through Online Monitoring

The Electric Power Research Institute’s full spectrum of online monitoring-related research offers nuclear power plant operators guidance for monitoring program implementation. The research results are used

Solar Power's Golden Opportunity: Connected Tech

The solar industry has the opportunity to integrate intelligent technology, including some that was originally developed for conventional energy resources, into its solar systems. Most parts of a solar farm

Turbomachinery & Pump Symposia Show Preview

High-Pressure, Rotary Gear Pumps for Severe Applications  Northern Pump manufactures high-pressure, heavy-duty, positive-displacement, rotary gear pumps for industry, designed to perform in severe

Will North American Energy Trade Wax or Wane Under Trump?

Cross-border trade in energy—electricity, natural gas, and oil—has been an unanticipated boon to the U.S., Canada, and Mexico, exceeding $140 billion in 2015. The Trump administration’s antipathy toward

Rescinding Clean Power Plan a Positive Step Toward Free Market for Electricity

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in early October announced it would rescind yet another signature Obama administration policy: the electricity regulation known as the Clean Power Plan (CPP). As with

Renewable Power in Southeast Asia: Will the Legal Regime Catch Up with the Opportunities?

Southeast Asia offers rich renewable sector opportunities, recently exemplified by Chevron’s multibillion-dollar sale of its Indonesian and Philippines geothermal projects, and the purchase of Equis Energy

12 Tips for Centrifugal Pump Safety

Centrifugal pumps are one of the most popular types of pumps used both domestically and in industrial settings. There are various designs of centrifugal pumps (Figure 3), and they all work in a similar manner

Parts Exchange Program Saves Money, Keeps Xcel's Turbine Fleet Spinning

Keeping combustion turbines spinning at power plants across Xcel Energy’s service territory is critical to maintaining reliability and minimizing costs. One of the challenges to meeting that goal is

Australia Embraces Reliability Guarantees Over Renewable Targets

After months of controversy, Australia’s federal government in October dumped its consideration of a clean energy target (CET) that sought to slash the country’s electricity emissions of carbon dioxide by

Bangladesh Announces LNG Power Plants as Part of Generation Expansion

The state-owned North-West Power Generation Co. Ltd. (NWPGCL) in Bangladesh in early November announced plans to build a 3,600-MW regasification liquefied natural gas (LNG) combined cycle power plant in the

IAEA: Pending Reactor Retirements Will Drag Down Global Nuclear Capacity Projections

Cheap natural gas, the impact of subsidized intermittent renewables on power prices, and nuclear policies in several countries in the aftermath of the Fukushima accident will continue to hamper strong growth

POWER Digest [December 2017]

Construction Set to Begin on First Nuclear Plant in Turkey. Berat Albayrak, Turkey’s Energy and Natural Resources Minister, in mid-October said construction of the country’s first nuclear power plant would

Test of Carbon Capture Technology Underway at Iceland Geothermal Plant

The Swiss company Climeworks in October said it had begun another round of testing for a direct air capture (DAC) facility at a 300-MW geothermal power plant in Hellisheidi, Iceland. Climeworks, which is

THE BIG PICTURE: Global CCS

In a November report, The Global CCS Institute said carbon capture and storage (CCS) is the only technology able to decarbonize the industrial sector. To reach the Paris Agreement’s target…

World's First Floating Wind Farm Powers Up off Scottish Coast

The world’s first floating offshore wind farm, located roughly 25 kilometers off the coast of Peterhead, Scotland, powered up on October 18, delivering electricity to the Scottish grid. Hywind Scotland was

Power Plant Tragedies Bring Safety to the Forefront

Power plants are inherently dangerous. Although safety is taken very seriously at most facilities, every year workers around the world are killed on the job by electrocution, falls, explosions, fires, and