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Originally seen as promising deep and widespread access to the Internet service provider market, broadband over power line (BPL) technology has failed to deliver. Today’s options for deploying BPL are more numerous but, to date, they involve niche markets.

No utility can fully prepare for power outages caused by severe weather, but there are things that power generators could do to prevent severe disruptions to power supplies that could easily result from a flu pandemic.

Power plant managers are familiar with selective catalytic reduction (SCR), a technology to reduce emissions of nitrogen oxides from fossil-fueled generating plants. Starting in 2010, SCR technology, using a urea reagent, will also be required on new diesel-powered vehicles in utility fleets, ranging from light-duty pickups to 18-wheelers.

Layoffs in the wake of the economic crash dive have begun to hit the power business. Here are some links to announcements related to layoffs that directly affect the people who make, distribute, and buy electricity:

Along with a focus on the development of a clean energy economy, President Barack Obama’s proposed $3.55 trillion budget for 2010 factors in a carbon cap-and-trade system to fund investments in clean energy, and it slashes funding for the proposed Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository.

The first loan guarantees issued by the Department of Energy (DOE) could reportedly be announced within the next two weeks, with awards likely going to solar and energy efficiency technologies.

Building new transmission lines indicates support for the development of a national grid, but doing so would ultimately stifle entrepreneurship and innovation, a campaign focused on the creation of a “perfect” consumer-focused electric energy system has warned.

The UK government has reportedly delayed its decision on an application by German power generation giant E.ON to build a 1,600-MW clean coal power station at Kingsnorth, in Kent, until after the summer.

China’s State Grid Corp., the national transmission and distribution body that commercially deployed a 1,000-kV ultra-high-voltage (UHV) AC demonstration project 640 kilometers long in January, has reportedly said it will now build 17,600 km of UHV lines by 2012.

The Kansas House on Friday passed by a 79-44 vote a bill that could resurrect two coal-burning power plants proposed for western Kansas, but it was five votes short of the two-thirds majority needed to overturn a veto by Gov. Kathleen Sebelius.