outage
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Top Plant
Power Under Pressure: How a Gas-Fired Plant Has Helped Address Taiwan’s Energy Transition
Taiwan’s energy transition faces a unique challenge: powering its world-leading semiconductor industry while phasing out nuclear power and reducing coal dependence. Part of the solution emerged from an unlikely location—a former pineapple field in Tainan—where engineers built what has been recognized as a POWER Top Plant award-winning facility critical to the island’s energy future.
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T&D
Understanding the April 2025 Iberian Peninsula Blackout: Early Analysis and Lessons Learned
On April 28, 2025, at 12:33 p.m. local time, a significant blackout affected the entire Iberian Peninsula, plunging Spain and Portugal into darkness. During a webcast on May 6, Sean McGuinness, Transmission and Distribution Protection Research Program Manager with EPRI, provided background on the Spanish and Portuguese power grids, and an overview of the events […]
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O&M
POWER Magazine February 2025 Operations and Maintenance Special Report Preview
POWER is the one brand that addresses all electric power generation and related technologies and fuels across North America and around the world, providing insight into this increasingly complex industry. Established in 1882, it is dedicated to providing its global audience with exclusive analysis of the latest trends, best practices, and power generation and related […]
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Nuclear
Streamlining Outage Efficiency at a Pennsylvania Nuclear Power Plant
Nuclear power plant outages demand efficiency, safety, and a high level of coordination to execute time-critical tasks and bring plants back online quickly. When a Pennsylvania nuclear power plant faced excessive critical path time due to outdated steam line plugs and a unique control rod blade transportation and storage requirement, the plant’s leadership engaged Preferred […]
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Nuclear
Planning Is Key to Successful Nuclear Refueling Outages
U.S. nuclear power plants typically refuel every 18 to 24 months. Refueling outages normally occur in the spring and fall of the year when demand for electricity is at its lowest. The Energy Information
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History
Power Grid Investments Improve Reliability and Make Blackouts Less Likely
While power outages are not uncommon in the U.S., widespread blackouts that last more than a couple of hours are pretty rare. However, this summer marks the 20th anniversary of one of the most significant blackouts in North American history. The incident didn’t just affect the U.S., but also major parts of Canada. The blackout […]
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Gas
GE Invests Heavily in Improving Gas Turbine Repair Processes and Combustor Performance
On the east side of Greenville, South Carolina, sits a 413-acre site with more than one and a half million square feet of manufacturing space and another 70,000 square feet of labs. This is one of the locations where GE Gas Power is working to improve gas turbine technology and repair processes, among other things. […]
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Energy Security
Enhancing and Hardening the U.S. Power Grid
It’s no secret that the U.S. power grid needs some work. According to the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), nearly 70% of the nation’s grid is more than 25 years old. The DOE says the U.S. needs to expand
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Press Releases
GE Expands Field Execution Best Practice “Live Outage” in Europe and in the Middle East
“Live Outage” approach utilizes digital solutions to improve the field execution experience with standardized procedures while maintaining safety best practices It was kicked off in the United States to help complete 7F outages with a substantial reduction in cycle time The best practice is now available in Europe and in the Middle East for GE […]
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Press Releases
DTN Storm Risk Analytics Offers Enterprise Level Weather Insights to Mid-Size U.S Utilities
First-to-market solution offers emergency managers access to better prepare and manage through weather impacts with advanced outage prediction technology MINNEAPOLIS, MN (November 8, 2022) – DTN®, a data, analytics, and technology company, recently launched Storm Risk Analytics, a first-to-market solution that combines advanced weather intelligence and machine learning outage prediction to help mid-size electric utilities more confidently make incident […]
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Supply Chains
Supply Chain Issues Mean Planning Is More Important Than Ever
It’s hard to imagine a company that hasn’t been affected by supply chain issues over the past couple of years. Even before the COVID-19 pandemic began, a couple of utility executives had suggested POWER
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T&D
Innovative Device Brings Fault-Testing to the Edge of the Grid, Improving Power System Reliability
S&C Electric Co., an employee-owned company with global headquarters in Chicago, Illinois, rolled out an innovative solution designed to mitigate nuisance outages for power customers located on the grid edge. The new VacuFuse II Self-Resetting Interrupter has the ability to test if a fault is temporary, and if so, it automatically restores power, eliminating the […]
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News
New GE Digital Tool Part of Grid Management Advancements
Energy companies continue to work on providing solutions to optimize the power grid, part of their efforts to support the integration of renewables and help ensure the reliable delivery of electricity. Such systems are part of the digital transformation of power generation, bringing increased flexibility to the power supply, supporting faster power restoration after outages, […]
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Connected Plant
3 Ways Remote Assistance Can Limit Power Downtime
Innovation and power generation have always gone hand in hand. For almost 140 years, the industry has evolved through a steady stream of emerging technologies, shifting policies, infrastructure investments, and an assortment of crises. The power industry has weathered a lot over this time and been forced to adapt. The latest example: COVID-19. Over the […]
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Commentary
Storm Readiness Saves Lives: Utilities and Testing Are the Real Digital Twins
Natural calamities challenge businesses and create problems with customer experience (CX). How can a utility demonstrate the desired experience attributes such as speed, quality, consistency, and so on at the same or even at a higher level after a catastrophe? Following a winter that saw record-breaking bomb cyclones in the northern Pacific. and the biggest […]
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Press Releases
PSEG Nuclear’s Salem Unit 1 Conducts Planned Refueling and Maintenance Outage
LOWER ALLOWAYS CREEK, N.J. (Oct. 15, 2020) – PSEG Nuclear’s Salem Unit 1 entered its planned refueling and maintenance outage on Oct. 3, 2020, when operators safely removed the unit from the regional power grid. Salem 1 is one of three nuclear units operated by PSEG in Salem County, New Jersey. Collectively, the three nuclear […]
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Markets
COVID-19 Makes for an Interesting Summer Peak Season
It’s peak season for the U.S. power industry. While actual dates may vary from one utility to another, generally the summer peak period spans from Memorial Day (May 25 this year) to Labor Day (Sept. 7)
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Nuclear
Nuclear Power Plants Set Performance Records in Spite of Pandemic
It’s spring outage season in the power industry. A time when plants of all types typically shut down and perform scheduled maintenance to ensure all essential equipment is as ready as possible to run reliably at full load for days on end during the peak summer season. This year, outages have been complicated by the […]
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T&D
How to Keep the Power On
It’s been a summer of power outages as extreme weather has been wreaking havoc on the electrical grid. Violent thunderstorms, tornadoes, and record-high temperatures have all taken turns knocking out the power across the East, from Michigan and Wisconsin to Washington, D.C. The lights even went out in Times Square and Manhattan’s West Side due […]
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O&M
Using Rotor-In Major Inspections to Shorten Outages and Drive Safety
Today, some F-class operators continue to opt for rotor-out major inspections, which are cumbersome and inefficient. They involve complex lifts and moves of the rotor, as well as the need for substantial space
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Press Releases
Prairie Island Unit 1 completes 30th refueling and equipment upgrade
More than 1,500 workers performed maintenance and replaced one-third of nuclear fuel in 550 megawatt unit Red Wing, Minn.—Nov. 21, 2016—The Prairie Island Nuclear Plant’s Unit 1 is refueled and ready to provide enough carbon-free electricity to serve about 500,000 Upper Midwest customers after completing its recent refueling and maintenance activities. More than 1,600 Xcel […]
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Legal & Regulatory
ERCOT Concerned, Faces Power Shortages in Lower Rio Grande Valley
The Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) completed an evaluation of a plan to export power to Mexico from the Frontera Generation Station, located in Mission, Texas. Although the results indicated that the power system could operate effectively during normal conditions without Frontera’s capacity, ERCOT says it has concerns with power supply sufficiency and transmission […]
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News
APS Agrees to Pay $3.25M Blackout Penalty
Arizona Public Service Co. (APS), the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), and the North American Electric Reliability Corp. (NERC) reached a settlement on July 7 related to the Sept. 8, 2011 blackout that left more than 5 million people in the Southwest without power. As a result of the agreement, APS will pay a $3.25 […]