The North Carolina Utilities Commission on May 10 authorized Duke Energy Progress LLC to construct the generation components of the company’s proposed Hot Springs microgrid project consisting of a 2-megawatt solar facility and a 4-megawatt lithium-based battery storage facility. The project, to be located in Madison County, is designed to provide an innovative grid solution…
During the 2018-2019 winter, spot prices at the Algonquin Citygate, a trading hub and benchmark for natural gas prices in New England, remained under $14 per million British thermal units and averaged at about $7 in January and February, according to a May 13 report from the U.S. Energy Information Administration. Last winter, the bomb…
U.S. power plants are projected to generate 2 percent less power during the summer months of 2019 compared to last year due to changes in the mix of energy sources, according to a May 9 report from the U.S. Energy Information Administration. Coal is forecast to supply 25 percent of generation this summer, down from…
The South Carolina legislature on May 9 passed a measure that will eliminate the 2 percent cap on net metering for rooftop solar customers until a successor program is in place. The bill directs the Public Service Commission to open a generic docket by January 1, 2020 to investigate and determine the costs and benefits…
A bipartisan group of state legislators re-introduced a pair of bills aimed at getting Pennsylvania to 100 percent renewable energy by 2050. Christopher Rabb, a Democrat, introduced HB 1425, while Tom Killion, a Republican, is sponsoring the Senate version, SB 630. The proposals will set benchmarks for phasing out nonrenewable energy by requiring 50 percent…
The United States produced a record amount of energy from various sources in 2018, reaching 96 quadrillion British thermal units, 8 percent higher than in the previous year, according to the Energy Information Administration’s latest Monthly Energy Review. While fossil fuels like crude oil and natural gas saw increases of 17 and 12 percent respectively…
California’s large investor-owned utilities procured about 38 percent of their total generation from renewable resources, which accounted for nearly 42 percent of their total generation costs in 2018, according to a May 8 report from the California Public Utilities Commission. Wind and solar dominated utility power contracts, with the average prices for contracts dropping to…
Tucson Electric Power Company entered into an agreement to join the Western Energy Imbalance Market from April 2022, according to a May 8 news release from the California Independent System Operator Corporation. Tucson estimates the participation to result in about $13 million in annual energy cost savings for its customers by expanding real-time access to…
The Electric Reliability Council of Texas on May 8 released its seasonal assessment report for the upcoming summer, which forecasts a peak demand of about 74,850 megawatts, which is 1,300 megawatts higher than the all-time record set last July. The grid operator identified a potential need for an energy emergency alert status, in order to…
More than half of U.S. states with competitive retail energy markets face proposals for stricter oversight rules from lawmakers, including measures to phase out the industry altogether, as efforts mount to put in place more consumer protections. Just five months into most states’ legislative sessions, over two dozen proposals have emerged to toughen rules around billing and marketing practices, licensing and registration and contractual terms.
The California Public Utilities Commission approved a preferred system portfolio that calls for 12 gigawatts of new renewables and storage by 2030, including 1.7 gigawatts of geothermal, according to a May 1 decision. The agency said that geothermal is valuable for balancing the intermittency of wind and solar resources. The plan will require “concrete procurement…
The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission on May 1 denied Pacific Gas and Electric Company’s requests for rehearing of the agency’s order asserting concurrent jurisdiction with bankruptcy courts over wholesale contracts that the utility may seek to reject through its Chapter 11 filing. While FERC’s role in evaluating rates and terms of power contracts is to protect…
