POWERnews

  • India Investing Millions for Microgrids

    A Colorado company that serves rural communities with solar power-based microgrids announced an investment that would provide more than 100 installations across two states in India. Husk Power Systems on Feb. 17 said it had closed $4.2 million in debt financing from the India Renewable Energy Development Agency (IREDA) to build as many as 140 […]

  • Ethiopia Produces First Power at GERD Mega-Dam

    Ethiopia began delivering power from a 375-MW turbine at its flagship 5.15-GW Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD) on Feb. 20, marking a significant milestone for the project that could become Africa’s largest hydropower producer. Prime Minister Dr. Abiy Ahmed inaugurated the project in a celebration broadcast widely in the East African nation on Sunday. Officials […]

  • POWERnews—Feb. 17, 2022

    POWER Magazine   Jobs   White Papers  Webinars   Events   Store   February 17, 2022 GE-Led Carbon Capture Project at Southern Company Site Gets DOE Funding A GE Gas Power front-end engineering design (FEED) study will receive $5,771,670 in federal funding from the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE’s) Office of Fossil Energy and Carbon […]

  • Large-Scale Green Hydrogen Infrastructure System Unveiled for California

    SoCalGas, North America’s largest gas distribution utility, has unveiled the Angeles Link, a proposed green hydrogen energy infrastructure system for Southern California that it says could be the largest of its kind in the nation. The Angeles Link proposes to utilize between 25 GW and 35 GW of curtailed or new solar, wind, or battery […]

  • Duke Energy Eyeing Coal Phaseout by 2035

    Duke Energy, the nation’s largest power producer, will dramatically slash coal generation’s share from the current 22% of total generation to 5% by 2030 and achieve a full phaseout of unabated coal by 2035. The company instead expects to deploy more than $130 billion over the next decade—$63 billion of which it will spend over […]

  • Why Smarter Grids Start with Mesh Networks and Open Standards

    Smart grids have been with us for over a decade. But for many power industry stakeholders, they’re associated almost exclusively with smart meters. Remote meter reading is certainly a compelling use case, and one which justified many initial deployments, especially in the U.S. where end-customer sites are spread out over large distances. But there’s much […]

  • White House Releases Guidance on Carbon Capture, Utilization, and Sequestration

    In conjunction with the Biden-Harris administration’s recent announcement of new agency actions to promote clean manufacturing, the Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) on Feb. 16 published its Carbon Capture, Utilization, and Sequestration Guidance (“Guidance”) in the Federal Register. Unlike traditional legal guidance documents, the Guidance addresses multiple federal agencies and provides numerous recommendations for efficiently […]

  • Poland Secures NuScale SMR as Urgency for Nuclear Energy Ramps Up Across Central, Eastern Europe

    NuScale Power has signed a definitive commercial agreement with mining and processing firm KGHM Polska Miedź S.A. to deploy a VOYGR power plant of up to 924 MWe as early as 2029 to support KGHM’s copper and silver production in Poland. Under an “early works agreement” signed in a ceremony on Feb. 14 in the […]

  • GE-Led Carbon Capture Project at Southern Company Site Gets DOE Funding

    A GE Gas Power front-end engineering design (FEED) study will receive $5,771,670 in federal funding from the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE’s) Office of Fossil Energy and Carbon Management following successful completion of the award negotiation phase. The funding is focused on carbon capture, utilization, and storage (CCUS) for power generation applications with a goal […]

  • U.S. Tops 200 GW of Renewables, but Deployment Slows

    A report from a trade group representing the U.S. renewable energy industry says the nation now has more than 200 GW of operating utility-scale generation capacity, but the pace of growth has slowed as projects have been delayed due to regulatory and equipment supply issues, among other factors. The “Clean Power Quarterly 2021 Q4 Market […]

  • Current Generation Capacity, Future Investment Plans, and Photovoltaic Projects of the Cuban Energy Industry

    The state-owned Unión Eléctrica (UNE) is responsible for supplying electricity to the Cuban population and the national economy. This is a complex process in which more than 50,000 workers intervene, highlighted Jorge Armando Cepero Hernández, UNE’s general director during a recent press conference. The executive explained that electrical energy is produced with a generation fleet […]

  • Best of POWER—February 14, 2022

    POWER Magazine   Jobs   White Papers  Webinars   Events   Store   February 14, 2022 China Starts Up First Fourth-Generation Nuclear Reactor The first of two units at China’s much-watched high-temperature gas-cooled modular pebble bed (HTR-PM) demonstration project was successfully connected to the grid on Dec. 20. The achievement marks a major TVA Unveils […]

  • French President Calls for Major Increase in Nuclear Power, Offshore Wind

    France, already a world leader in nuclear power generation, plans to build at least six new reactors, with President Emmanuel Macron on Feb. 10 saying the country will consider building an additional eight on top of that as it also moves forward with developing small modular reactors (SMR). Macron, who is up for re-election in […]

  • Siemens’ Renewable Arm Cutting 200 U.S. Jobs

    Siemens Gamesa Renewable Energy (SGRE) plans to lay off 200 workers at two U.S. wind power equipment manufacturing facilities. The company on Feb. 9 said the job cuts are due to a reduction in orders for commercial wind turbines. An SGRE spokesperson said more jobs cuts at the plants—one in Hutchinson, Kansas, and the other […]

  • Wind Power Developers Encouraged by Findings on Bald Eagle Population

    In the race to generate and distribute renewable energy, developers must clear numerous regulatory hurdles. For many projects, this may include obtaining a voluntary “incidental take” permit under the Bald and Golden Eagle Protection Act (BGEPA). The BGEPA incidental take permitting program has frustrated both developers and operators due to, among other things, uncertainty of […]

  • U.S. Details $5 Billion Plan for EV Charging Network

    The promise of a nationwide network of charging stations to serve drivers of electric vehicles (EVs) received a major boost on Feb. 10, with two federal agencies announcing nearly $5 billion has been earmarked to support such infrastructure. The U.S. Departments of Energy and Transportation said the money will be made available under the new […]

  • TVA Unveils Major New Nuclear Program, First SMR at Clinch River Site

    The Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) will invest in a major program that will explore the construction of multiple advanced nuclear reactors—starting with a GE-Hitachi BWRX-300 small modular reactor (SMR) at its Clinch River site in Tennessee. TVA Board members during a meeting on Feb. 10 unanimously approved TVA’s “New Nuclear Program,” a broad new initiative […]

  • POWERnews—Feb. 10, 2022

    POWER Magazine   Jobs   White Papers  Webinars   Events   Store   February 10, 2022 TVA Unveils Major New Nuclear Program, First SMR at Clinch River Site The Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) will invest in a major program that will explore the construction of multiple advanced nuclear reactors—starting with a GE-Hitachi BWRX-300 small modular […]

  • Fusion Energy Breakthrough: Record Performance Achieved at JET

    Scientists and engineers working at the Joint European Torus (JET) have set a new record for sustained fusion energy. The team on Feb. 9 reported producing 59 megajoules of fusion energy, more than doubling the previous record of 21.7 megajoules set in 1997 at JET. The achievement was touted as “a major step forward on […]

  • Renewable Energy Future Includes DERs to Support Decarbonization

    All market indicators show that distributed energy resources (DERs) boom will continue into this year and beyond. In fact, a recent Frost & Sullivan report states the global annual investments in DERs will increase by 75% by 2030. We’ve seen many advancements contributing to the growth of the renewable energy market, due to the convergence […]

  • GE Confirms Sale of Lucrative Nuclear Steam Turbine Segment to EDF 

    GE has signed an exclusive agreement with EDF Group, an entity majority held by the French government, to sell the equipment segment and some services that make up Steam Power’s nuclear-serving steam turbine business—part of a portfolio that GE adopted during its 2015 merger with French equipment giant Alstom. The American technology conglomerate confirmed it signed […]

  • China Group Develops Plan to Turn Biomass Into Low-Carbon Natural Gas

    Researchers in China have published the results of a study that the group said provides an efficient catalytic approach to directly transfer solid biomass into natural gas, while enabling the gas to have a low-carbon footprint. The researchers said bio-natural gas produced from the hydrogen combined with lignocellulosic biomass could be used at power plants, […]

  • The POWER Interview: Protection Testing Paradigm—How Utilities Can Adapt to the Digital Era

    The digital transformation in the power generation industry touches several areas, encompassing engineering, monitoring and control, asset performance, and operations optimization, among others. Power plant operators know the digital era has been a perfect fit for their industry, enabling digitization to reduce risk, save costs, optimize performance, and speed crisis response. Doble Engineering is a […]

  • Winter Freeze Testing Texas Power Grid Reforms

    Parts of Texas have suffered localized, distribution-level power outages as an Arctic outbreak sent temperatures plummeting across the state, but its heavily scrutinized grid is largely prepared to weather the storm, state entities said. Frigid temperatures stemming from a large dome of Arctic high pressure are sending temperatures into the single digits and below zero […]

  • CAISO Plan Calls for $30.5 Billion for Transmission—and More Renewable Energy

    California’s power grid continues to evolve and will look much different by 2040, according to a 20-year draft transmission plan released by the California Independent System Operator (CAISO). The plan calls for significant additional renewable energy resources, along with a $30.5-billion build-out of the transmission grid.  The outlook, developed by the grid operator along with […]

  • POWERnews—Feb. 3, 2022

    POWER Magazine   Jobs   White Papers  Webinars   Events   Store   February 3, 2022 Georgia Power Plans to Retire All Coal Units by 2035 Georgia Power plans to shutter most of its coal fleet by 2028 and completely exit coal-fired power by 2035, according to the utility’s latest integrated resource plan (IRP) filed […]

  • Nuclear Field Activities Completed for Idaho NuScale SMR Project

    The 462-MWe Carbon-Free Power Project—the first six-module NuScale Power VOYGR-6 power plant—has completed field investigation activities at its Idaho National Laboratory (INL) site in Idaho Falls, Idaho. The achievement announced on Feb. 3 marks a major milestone for CFPP LLC, the entity Utah state energy services interlocal agency Utah Associated Municipal Power Systems (UAMPS) established […]

  • Nuclear, Natural Gas Included in EU Taxonomy—With Potentially Problematic Conditions

    Handing a muted victory to proponents of nuclear and gas, the European Commission (EC) on Feb. 2 adopted a measure that labels some nuclear and gas energy activity as climate-friendly investments. However, it set out strict, potentially limiting technical screening criteria for those activities to qualify, prompting pushback from the nuclear and gas industries. The […]

  • Former FERC Commissioner Says ‘Market Design Problem’ Was a Leading Cause of February 2021 Texas Power Crisis

    In February 2021, a severe cold weather event, known as Winter Storm Uri, caused numerous power outages, derates, or failures to start at electric generating plants scattered across Texas and the south-central U.S. The Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT), which manages the power supply for about 90% of the load in Texas, ordered a […]

  • Infrastructure, Renewables, ESG Initiatives Lead Trends for 2022

    The Biden administration has made clear its intention to promote the transition to clean energy, setting ambitious goals like carbon neutrality for the power sector by 2035 and for the entire country by 2050. A critical step toward these goals was congressional passage of the $1 trillion Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA), which President […]