The Electric Reliability Council of Texas Inc. expects more than 82,000 megawatts of resource capacity to be available to meet the system-wide projected peak demand of 62,257 megawatts for the upcoming winter season from December through February 2020, according to a Nov. 7 announcement. The final resource adequacy assessment for winter season 2019-20 includes 136…
East Bay Community Energy, Peninsula Clean Energy, Silicon Valley Clean Energy, and municipal utility Silicon Valley Power on Nov. 5 issued a request for proposals for about 33 megawatts of behind-the-meter battery projects to protect their customers and communities from Pacific Gas & Electric Company’s massive fire-prevention power outages. The entities noted that the growing threat…
A coalition of 16 attorneys general and the City of New York on Nov. 4 filed a lawsuit challenging the U.S. Energy Department’s final rule that reversed the 2017 expansion of energy efficiency standards for certain light bulbs. The group, led by California and New York, argues that the reversal enacts a less stringent standard…
The Maine Public Utilities Commission on Nov. 5 voted to authorize a contract for the 12-megawatt Maine Aqua Ventus project, the first deep-water offshore wind facility in the U.S. to feature a floating platform. A measure enacted in June directed regulators to approve a long-term power purchase agreement between the University of Maine-led initiative and…
The California Air Resources Board on Nov. 4 announced that all entities subject to the cap-trade emissions reduction system met their compliance requirements in 2018, which marks the first year of the program’s final three-year compliance period. Businesses covered by the program account for about 80 percent of the state’s emissions. The agency also reported…
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency on Nov. 4 issued two proposals that would ease the Obama administration’s 2015 regulations governing the disposal of coal ash, a toxic product of coal combustion, and wastewater management from steam electric power plants. The first proposal sets a new date of Aug. 31, 2020 for facilities to begin closure…
The Trump administration has submitted a formal notification to the United Nations to withdraw the U.S from the Paris agreement on climate change, according to a Nov. 4 announcement from the State Department. The move initiates a one-year process to leave the 2015 pact that the U.S. joined during the Obama administration, committing to achieve…
The Western Energy Imbalance market generated about $65 million in savings in the third quarter of this year, with total benefits reaching about $801 million since its launch in November 2014, according to a Nov. 1 press release from the California Independent System Operator Corporation. The energy imbalance market is an automated system that secures…
Future growth in natural gas consumption will be concentrated in developing nations, especially in Asian, including China, India, Bangladesh, Thailand, and Vietnam, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration’s (EIA) latest International Energy Outlook 2019. Annual natural gas consumption in non-OECD Asia is expected to reach 120 billion cubic feet per day by 2050, outpacing regional production by…
The Southwest Power Pool Inc.’s board of directors approved the grid operator’s 2019 Integrated Transmission Plan, requiring members to construct 44 new projects, including 166 miles of transmission lines, according to an October 29 press release. The rapid expansion of renewables has contributed to increasing price disparity between the western and eastern portions of the SPP system, creating higher average…
The California Public Utilities Commission issued its annual Renewables Portfolio Standard (RPS) report showing that the program is on track and is helping to drive down renewable contract prices and increasing in-state procurement, according to a Nov. 1 press release. As of 2019, the state’s large investor-owned utilities have executed renewable electricity contracts necessary to…
The California Public Utilities Commission unveiled a new equity program that directs 25 percent of funds for distributed energy storage to low-income households and environmentally burdened communities throughout the state, according to an Oct. 31 press release. The regulator is taking this initiative to make the incentive programs more equitable and bring them more in line with measures…