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Taiwan’s governing party has agreed to halt construction on the island’s fourth nuclear power plant due to anti-nuclear public sentiment. Protestors staged a sit-in along a main street near the central train station in Taipei, the capital city of Taiwan, beginning on April 26, which was the 28th anniversary of the Chernobyl nuclear accident. According […]

In a major ruling on Tuesday, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA’s) authority to regulate power plant emissions across state lines under the Cross-State Air Pollution Rule (CSAPR). The U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit had struck down the CSAPR in 2012, finding that the EPA had exceeded its […]

Energy Future Holdings Corp. (EFH)—the Dallas-based holding company whose portfolio includes Luminant and TXU Energy—filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection today. With support of key financial stakeholders, the company reached an agreement on a restructuring plan that it says will reduce debt, lower annual interest costs, allow access to additional capital, and create a sustainable […]

The Agua Caliente Solar Photovoltaic (PV) facility in southern Arizona, currently the world’s largest solar PV plant, completed construction on April 29. The 290-MW project—located between Phoenix and Yuma—is jointly owned by NRG Energy, through its subsidiary NRG Solar, and MidAmerican Solar, a subsidiary of MidAmerican Renewables. The plant will sell its electricity to Pacific […]

A German court on April 14 reaffirmed that a nuclear fuel rod tax is unconstitutional and has ordered federal tax authorities to reimburse €2.2. billion ($3.04 billion) paid by five nuclear-owning utilities until compatibility with European and German law is established.  The Financial Court of Hamburg had held in January 2013 that the federal nuclear […]

Oklahoma’s Gov. Mary Fallin (R) on Monday signed into law a measure that would allow regulated electric utilities to recover revenues needed to pay for transmission infrastructure as the number of distributed generation users increases.  Senate Bill 1456, which drew strong opposition from environmental and distributed generation groups, reversed a 1977 law that prohibited public […]

On Apr. 22, Duke Energy updated the N.C. Joint Environmental Review Commission on near- and long-term actions it is considering to address coal ash storage across the state. Paul Newton, N.C. state president for Duke, explained that actions outlined in a letter sent to N.C. Gov. Pat McCrory (R) and N.C. Department of Environment and […]

General Electric (GE) is in talks to buy Alstom, with the deal being announced as soon as next week, according to a report from Bloomberg News. Citing unnamed sources, the report claims GE may offer more than $13 billion for the French company, which would be about 25% above its current market value. Alstom manufactures […]

The U.S. added 6,681 MW of net natural gas-fired capacity in 2013, far outstripping any other generation source, according to Energy Information Administration (EIA) data. This figure represented a substantial drop from 2012, when 9,210 MW of new gas capacity was added, but it still accounted for just over 50% of total additions last year. […]

Entergy Louisiana’s Ninemile Point plant has been powering New Orleans and southeast Louisiana since the 1950s. The facility in Westwego, just across the Mississippi River from New Orleans, comprises five dual-fuel boiler units, the oldest of which came online in 1951. The plant currently has just under 2,000 MW of generation capacity in operation. That’s […]