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What About Florida? Energy Efficiency, Solar Energy, & Regulatory Backwardness In The Sunshine State —…

7 years ago Danny Parker 0 Comments

I’ll close the series by offering two small informational gifts to my patient readers. One is my thoughts on how the Florida Public Service Commission might provide the right signals to help us to make better progress in the Sunshine State. After all, the utilities are simply doing what they can to maximize their profits within the rules of being a regulated monopoly. The rules are the problem.

What About Florida? Energy Efficiency, Solar Energy, & Regulatory Backwardness In The Sunshine State —…

7 years ago Danny Parker 0 Comments

For several years now, there have been increasing complaints from utilities about the resulting load shape from owners with solar systems. This is the so called “duck curve” which has gotten a lot of attention from utility alarmists. In some sense, it has been a way of claiming that rooftop solar is a profound problem for utilities. We will show here that this problem can be (and will be) solved.

Inspiration Off The Chain

7 years ago Zachary Shahan 0 Comments

I sat through another Zayed Future Energy Prize awards ceremony yesterday, and it again moved me to tears. No, it’s not normal for me to be moved to tears, but the deep, powerful, inspirational change that certain finalists communicated was too much for the emotional sensors behind my eyes.

2018 Zayed Future Energy Prize (Cleantech Oscars) Finalists — Vote Now!

7 years ago Zachary Shahan 0 Comments

The 2018 Zayed Future Energy Prize awards ceremony is tomorrow, January 15. I’m here in Abu Dhabi for the awards since I was on the Review Committee and will be moderating a panel discussion between some of this year’s and previous years’ winners later in the week. I will also be covering the awards ceremony, of course, covering the World Future Energy Summit, and presenting and moderating panels at The Mobility Conference. As we’ve done in previous years, I thought it would be fun to run a poll among our readers about who you think will win Zayed Future Energy Prize awards in this 10th edition of the prize.

What About Florida? Energy Efficiency, Solar Energy, & Regulatory Backwardness In The Sunshine State (Part…

8 years ago Danny Parker 0 Comments

For traditional investor-owned utilities (IOUs) in Florida, corporate policy remains keyed on maximizing electricity sales and effectively justifying construction of new generation resources that are a high source of profit for stockholders. As regulated monopolies, IOUs are guaranteed a profit by the public service commission (PSC) both for selling electricity and associated transmission lines, but particularly for building power plants. And Florida with its fast-growing population and thus expanding residential sector with high levels of cooling electricity use has guaranteed the need for new power plants. As such, the state has been a gold mine for its IOUs in the state — the average household spends nearly $2000 annually for electricity. With millions of accounts, this is a multi-billion-dollar revenue stream.