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The Edison Electric Institute (EEI), whose membership includes all investor-owned U.S. power companies, has told its members to prepare contingency plans for their operations due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Several U.S. grid operators already have announced measures designed to keep employees as safe as possible, while maintaining the reliability of the nation’s power supply. The […]

While it is currently highly dependent on natural gas generation today, about 95% of ISO-New England’s (ISO-NE’s) interconnection request queue—a proposed total capacity of 20.9 GW—comprises wind, solar, and battery projects. That clearly indicates that developers in New England’s wholesale market “are looking to take advantage of state incentives, declining technology costs, and revenues from […]

General Electric (GE) has for the first time achieved blackstart of a GE heavy-duty gas turbine using battery energy storage. The company announced on Feb. 26 it completed black start of a GE 7F.03 gas turbine at a 150-MW simple-cycle unit at Entergy Louisiana’s Perryville Power Station using a 7.4-MW battery-based energy storage system. The […]

The next decade could belong to energy storage. Project development costs are dropping. Enhanced state and corporate focus on climate-related issues is producing more opportunities for renewable generation and

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) on Jan. 23 approved two new reliability standards related to transmission system planning performance and cybersecurity. However, it also proposed to retire 74 reliability standard requirements, which it deemed duplicative or unnecessarily burdensome. Among the spate of actions it took on Thursday, FERC also green-lighted retaining the North American […]

Developers and other sellers of electricity have traditionally viewed utilities as creditworthy counterparties. Utilities are longstanding institutions that provide a public service and receive a regulated

On Dec. 19, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) directed PJM Interconnection to dramatically expand its Minimum Offer Price Rule (MOPR) to nearly all state-subsidized capacity resources, including renewables backed by state portfolio standards. It’s the latest of a series of dramatic revisions to the grid operator’s rule, which essentially functions to provide a minimum […]

A divided Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) issued a long-awaited order on Dec. 19 in which it directed PJM Interconnection to dramatically expand its Minimum Offer Price Rule (MOPR) to nearly all state-subsidized capacity resources. The order will have a significant impact on PJM’s capacity market. While it was no surprise that the decision immediately […]

A nationwide survey of state utility commissions suggests regulators are increasingly grappling with issues that could “profoundly” alter energy delivery and utility business models. However, over the next decade, they expect central station generation will continue to dominate state portfolios, and utility-scale solar growth will surpass customer-owned photovoltaic (PV).  The survey to take the “regulatory […]

A project to build a 1-GW gas-fired power plant in Rhode Island has officially ended, after developer Invenergy took no action to appeal the project’s rejection by state regulators, who earlier this year voted unanimously against the plant’s construction. Invenergy had until Nov. 15 to challenge the formal denial of a construction license for the […]