Although coal-fired power plants have no mandatory retirement age, power plant owners and operators have reported to EIA that they plan to retire 28%, or 59 gigawatts (GW), of the coal-fired capacity currently operating in the United States by 2035. As of September 2021, 212 GW of utility-scale coal-fired electric-generating … [continued]
Originally published by the EIA. Nearly 18 gigawatts (GW) of electric generating capacity was retired in 2015, a relatively high amount compared with recent years. More than 80% of the retired capacity was conventional steam coal. The coal-fired generating units retired in 2015 tended to be older and smaller in … [continued]
Carbon capture and sequestration is expensive because it has three components, each with its own expensive challenges: capture, distribution, and sequestration. The mass of CO2 produced is 2-3 times the mass of coal or methane* burned and is more challenging per unit to ship than coal, so the cost of capture, … [continued]
The latest US Energy Information Administration’s (EIA) “Electric Power Monthly” report with data through to the end of June, 2013, shows that renewable energy generation is continuing to grow, making up over 14% of the nation’s net generation (not including hydroelectric sources). According to the EIA, “the e Electric Power Monthly … [continued]
This post first appeared on the US Energy Information Administration Site Recent developments in Virginia put a spotlight on feed-in tariffs (FITs), which are a policy mechanism used to encourage deployment of renewable electricity technologies. FITs are used to a limited extent around the United States, but they are more … [continued]
Source: U.S. Energy Information Administration, Form EIA-923, Power Plant Operations Report. Notes: Non-hydroelectric renewables include generation from wind, solar, geothermal, and other renewable sources such as wood and wood wastes, municipal solid wastes, landfill gas, etc. Data for 2011 are preliminary. Non-hydroelectric renewable generation has increased in many states over the past … [continued]
The U.S. has 78 GW of hydropower – that supplied about 63 percent of all the power from renewable sources last year. But there are also 80,000 navigation locks, dams and high river flows that could be utilized to generate electricity. The Ohio River and the Mississippi River are especially rich in this untapped renewable resource. … [continued]
By 2020, we will use more energy storing all of our virtual lives “on the cloud” than we will by flying in airplanes. As we all add more and more of all of our all-too-easily-uploaded data to humanity’s ever growing attic where all our virtual stuff is stored, the need … [continued]
Until this year, California homeowners have usually arranged to have their solar installations slightly undersized, because it didn’t pay to get stuck with excess “roll-over” kilowatt hours at the true-up period at the end of each year. But that will change in six months. If voters are not tricked by … [continued]
With so much of our planet covered in the stuff, it is a surprise that water does not receive the attention that renewable technologies like wind and solar do. Nevertheless, with renewable energy being the catchphrase of many countries at the moment, advancements are being made towards a future where … [continued]
