A number of stories have popped up in the news recently about turning traditional hydroelectric stations, which generate power by using water captured from a flowing river, into pumped storage facilities, which cycle the water using more energy to do so than they produce.
Rather than implicate renewables, it shows that low prices drove utilities into the arms of gas power plants and away from coal and nuclear power (it still has plenty of insinuations about renewable energy).
Don Harwin, the energy minister of the NSW Coalition government, has made a dramatic departure from the bulk of his state and federal colleagues by declaring that it was time to move on from the notion of “baseload” power as essential to the reliability of the future grid.
Originally published on ilsr.org. With the rich history of cost overruns in the nuclear industry, Xcel Energy and Minnesota regulators shouldn’t have been surprised when the retrofit cost for the Monticello nuclear power plant ballooned to more than twice the original estimate. Regulators asked tough questions last year about whether … [continued]
When you think about innovative energy storage leaders that might see explosive growth in the years to come, you might think of Tesla Motors, Panasonic, BYD, Samsung, LG, Ambri, Eos Energy Storage, Aquion, and ViZn. But as exciting and noteworthy as each of those companies is, there’s another energy storage … [continued]
Originally published on RenewEconomy This is what the decline of base-load and centralised generation looks like. Stanwell Corp, the Queensland government owned electricity generator, has failed to make any money in the past year from its 4,000MW of coal and gas fired generation because rooftop solar has taken away demand … [continued]
This article originally published on RenewEconomy AGL Energy, one of the big three power utilities in Australia, says that 9,000MW of fossil-fuel baseload capacity needs to be taken out of the national electricity market (NEM) to bring it back into balance. The claim was made by managing director Michael Fraser, … [continued]
Below is a wonderful video of Amory Lovins explaining the energy subsidy inequality (favoring fossil fuels) in the U.S. today, renewable energy costs, and the myths of baseload power. But first, Peter Sinclair’s apt comments on the interview, which doesn’t only include Lovins: The video above from Bloomberg shows the best … [continued]
