Top Plant
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Top Plant
Shimane 2 Highlights Progress in Japan’s Nuclear Restart Program
The Unit 2 reactor at the Shimane nuclear power station resumed operation in January 2025, more than a decade after it, and all other reactors in Japan, were taken offline. Japanese officials want restarted nuclear units to help supply needed power and lower the cost of energy across the country.
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Gas
Powering Taiwan’s Future: Inside the Award-Winning Sun Ba II Power Plant
Taiwan stands as one of Asia’s most dynamic economies, a densely populated island of approximately 23 million people compressed into just 36,000 square kilometers. The island is a global technology powerhouse, producing more than 60% of the world’s semiconductors and serving as home to manufacturing giants that supply everything from smartphones to advanced computing systems. […]
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Top Plant
What’s In a Name? A Truly Great Power Project
The Great Plains Power Station in Saskatchewan supports SaskPower’s effort to add generation capacity in support of the province’s rapidly growing industrial sector.
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Top Plant
India’s Largest Coal-Fired Plant Also Part of Country’s Energy Transition
The NTPC Vindhyachal Thermal Power Station, with an installed generation capacity of 4,783 MW, comprises 13 coal-fired units and includes solar and hydropower installations. The plant continues to implement advanced emission-control technologies as part of India’s broader decarbonization strategy.
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Top Plant
Award-Winning Cogeneration Project Turns Hydrogen-Rich Waste into Industrial Energy
In Brazil’s industrial heartland, a pioneering energy project has earned a POWER Top Plant award for turning hydrogen-rich waste into clean, reliable power. The Vesta Cogeneration Plant not only boosts
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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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Top Plant
Thailand’s Eight-Unit, 5,300-MW Power Project Wins Top Plant Award
Southeast Asia’s first-ever JAC gas turbines are now supplying power to Thailand’s grid. With efficiency greater than 64%, the eight units deployed—four each at the Sriracha Power Plant in Chonburi and the Pluak Daeng Power Plant in Rayong—are worthy recipients of a POWER Top Plant award.
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Hydro
How Colorado’s Cabin Creek Hydro Plant Evolved from Coal Balancer to Renewable Grid Stabilizer
Xcel Energy’s comprehensive modernization of the Cabin Creek pumped-storage facility—featuring an innovative 11-blade turbine runner—earned the station a POWER Top Plant award. The retrofit project not
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Top Plant
Reclaimed Coal Mine Shines Spotlight on Innovative Solar System
A long-dormant coal mine waste site in Pennsylvania has new life, providing solar power to the local community thanks to a groundbreaking tracking system enabling installation across challenging terrain.
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Top Plant
Geothermal Breakthrough in South Texas Signals New Era for ERCOT
In just 12 months, Sage Geosystems and San Miguel Electric Cooperative built the world’s first pressure geothermal system. It is now poised to deliver long-duration, dispatchable storage for the Electric
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Top Plant
Solar by the Numbers: Midong Is China’s Latest Mega-Marvel
A solar power project in the Gobi Desert has moved the needle on the size and scope of global photovoltaic installations, aided by innovation in equipment and construction. The numbers tell much of the story
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Top Plant
Doubling Down on Reliability: Karachi’s Engineered Smart Grid Breakthrough
Faced with soaring demand and limited visibility into upstream grid assets, Karachi-based K-Electric engineered an in-house special protection system that delivers more than 600 MW of secure power imports to
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Power
Energy Storage Project Boosts Efficiency, Provides Savings, Reduces Emissions
An innovative thermal energy storage system in use at a New York state university campus is an example of the long-term energy vision for the college, and a blueprint for other institutions.
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Energy Storage
Europe’s Biggest Battery Supports More Renewable Energy on the UK Power Grid
Zenobe, a grid-scale battery storage specialist, and Wartsila Energy Storage have launched a project designed to store excess power from several offshore wind farms in the North Sea.
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Top Plant
Academic Undertaking: Upgrade Project Provides Uninterruptible Power Supply
A diesel-powered rotary flywheel is at the heart of an innovative backup power system for the campus at the University of Washington. The University of Washington needed to bring new life to its 1960s-era
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Nuclear
Belarusian Nuclear Power Plant Cuts Nation’s Reliance on Natural Gas-Fired Electricity Generation
In a strategic move to reduce its heavy dependence on Russian natural gas, Belarus has successfully completed its first nuclear power plant (NPP). The Belarusian NPP, featuring two VVER-1200 reactors, now
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Nuclear
Idaho Digital Twin Project Trailblazing for Nuclear
In 2023, Idaho National Laboratory (INL) and Idaho State University unveiled the industry’s first near real-time digital twin of a nuclear reactor. The virtual replica of the 5-Wth AGN-201 research reactor
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Gas
Ohio Facility Supports PJM Power Supply in Heart of Major Shale Plays
Caithness Energy’s Guernsey Power Station, which features GE Vernova equipment, is an important gas-fired facility helping replace retired coal-fired generation in the PJM Interconnection territory
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Gas
Innovative Gas-Fired Power Station Supports Taiwan’s Need for More Energy
A GE Vernova-led project, completed in just 10 months, is helping Taiwan’s efforts for a more reliable power supply, along with supporting the integration of renewable energy resources in the country. Taiwan
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Business
Attarat Power Plant Unlocks Domestic Energy Source for Jordan
Oil shale doesn’t fuel a lot of power plants around the world, but in Jordan, it’s a vital option, offering energy security and independence. The success of the Attarat Power Plant in capitalizing on this
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Renewables
Notre Dame Captures Top Plant Award for South Bend Hydro Project
A run-of-river hydro project on the St. Joseph River in downtown South Bend, Indiana, spearheaded by the University of Notre Dame, was one of the first ever in the U.S. to utilize the StreamDiver propeller
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Renewables
Repowering Project Renews Company’s Commitment to Sustainability
Shell Energy upgraded a Texas wind farm to produce more power with fewer turbines, a project that showcased repurposing of old materials with new technology to enhance efficiency, reliability, and safety
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Renewables
Solar-Plus-Storage Project Brings New Energy to California
Clearway Energy’s Daggett Solar + Storage power plant in San Bernardino County is a model for producing renewable energy, and taking advantage of existing infrastructure, at the site of a closed thermal
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Hydro
Jinzhai Pumped-Storage Hydro Facility Helps Integrate Renewable Energy and Solve Grid Stability Challenges
Pumped-storage hydropower is seen as a key technology in China to balance the grid and store excess energy from intermittent sources like wind and solar. The 1.2-GW Jinzhai pumped-storage project is a model
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Distributed Energy
Peak Performance: APS’s Virtual Power Plant Saves Big During Brutal Heatwave
Through its innovative virtual power plant (VPP), Arizona Public Service (APS) harnessed smart home devices to save 138 MW during a historic heatwave, shifting peak demand and proving critical for grid
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Renewables
A Refined Approach to Onsite Power Generation
The Pine Bend refinery in Minnesota added a 45-MW solar power array to support the facility’s supply of electricity, reaping the benefits of reduced costs, lower emissions, and more. Owners of commercial and
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T&D
Viking Link: The Epic Build of the World’s Longest Onshore and Subsea HVDC Interconnector
A marvel of modern engineering, Viking Link—the world’s longest onshore and subsea interconnector—began commercial operations in December 2023. The project garners POWER’s inaugural Transmission and
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Top Plant
Morrow Reinvented: HL-Class Gas Turbine Powers a Coal Plant’s Rebirth
The Morrow Repower Project, winner of POWER’s 2024 Reinvention Award, exemplified a strategic coal-to-gas conversion at a brownfield site that masterfully combined cutting-edge advanced technology with a
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Hydrogen
Efficiency in Production at Heart of Bloom Technology
Decarbonization of power generation and other industrial sectors relies on hydrogen, and a Bloom Energy demonstration project is supporting the fuel’s production through an advanced electrolyzer system. The
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Top Plant
2023 POWER Top Plant Award Winners
Renewables See our September 2023 issue for stories covering these plants: Gerlos 1 hydropower facility in Austria Mount Olive solar project in New Jersey Tyligulska wind power plant in Ukraine Fossil Fueled Including Gas and Coal See our October 2023 issue for stories covering these plants: Brentwood Power Station on Long Island in Suffolk County, […]