Michael Giberson The Fort Worth Star-Telegram reported over the weekend that Texas grid operator ERCOT broke the rules during the response to last Tuesday’s emergency conditions brought on by a sudden loss of wind power. The rules call upon ERCOT to make appeals through the news media for conservation during emergencies. ERCOT officials acknowledged that …
Michael Giberson Arnold Kling notes Ray Kurzweil’s optimistic forecast on solar power (from LiveScience). Here’s the Kurzweil quote on solar power: “It is doubling now every two years. Doubling every two years means multiplying by 1,000 in 20 years. At that rate we’ll meet 100 percent of our energy needs in 20 years.” Kling’s response: …
Kling on Kurzweil on Solar Power, with an Aside on Politics Read More »
Michael Giberson Allegedly the politics of climate change policy is pretty simple in the electric power industry: on the one side you have hydro, nuclear, and renewables, and on the other you have oil, gas, and coal. A company planning a coal-fired generating plant just outside of Sweetwater, Texas is an exception to this simple …
Firm Planning a Coal-fired Power Plant Hopes for Federal Greenhouse Gas Law Read More »
Lynne Kiesling This Miami Herald article discusses the large outage earlier this week in Florida, caused by the combination of a substation fire and a switch that was supposed to trip to isolate the substation, but did not. In particular, note the comments from Colorado State University engineering professor, and emeritus GridWise Architecture Council member …
Michael Giberson On Tuesday this week, while Florida transmission operators were getting everyone back online after a sub-station fire lead to cascading outages around the state, in Texas grid operators were responding to an emergency of their own. A sudden drop off in the West Texas wind produced an almost as sudden drop in wind …
Lynne Kiesling Last week, at the National Electricity Delivery Forum, Kurt Yeager of the Galvin Electricity Initiative issued a challenge to the electricity industry and to regulators to transform the industry, its technology, and its regulation. As reported at The Fuel Cell Market Report, Speaking before an audience of federal and state regulators, utilities and …
Michael Giberson … Texas does the non-carbon thing in a pretty big way, too. Tom Fowler, at NewsWatch: Energy, pulls together some numbers. Among his points (edited and slightly rearranged): Texas leads the nation in greenhouse gas emissions; and If Texas were a country, it would rank seventh in the world in greenhouse gas emissions. …
Lynne Kiesling Few details yet, but I’m sure this will give us stuff to talk about over the next week: a large power outage in Florida, affecting 3-4 million people. Florida Power & Light representatives officials expect to have the power restored by 5:30, which is pretty quick. But can such a large outage be …
Michael Giberson Spanish company Abengoa Solar and Arizona Public Service Company have announced plans to build a large solar powered electric generator, to come online in 2011, but like many such announcements it comes with a couple of public-policy related “ifs”; they’ll build it if they get the necessary approvals from the Arizona utility regulator, …
Can Arizona Become the “Persian Gulf of Solar Energy”? Read More »
Michael Giberson Out in west Texas you can still see the occasional old-style wind mill on a farm or ranch, dutifully pumping up water when the wind blows. A much more common sight these days is the new, sleek wind power generator. A combination of good fundamentals for wind power, federal tax credits, state renewable …
Texas Wind Power: Gets by with a Little Help from Tax Credits Read More »
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