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Current News
Ameren Unveils One of North America's Most Advanced Distributed Energy Resource Facilities
May 22, 2017
The $5 million facility, located at Ameren's Technology Applications Center (TAC) adjacent to the University of Illinois campus in Champaign, Illinois, is one of the only utility-scale microgrids in the nation capable of serving live (paying) customer loads on an actual utility distribution feeder.
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Greenely and Stanford University Launch Mobile App to Help Decrease Electricity Usage in California
May 22, 2017
"Many homes already receive comparisons of their energy usage to their neighbors to help encourage energy savings, what we refer to as 'static norm feedback'. We believe it will be more influential to show people 'dynamic norm feedback' by highlighting that others are reducing their home energy use, which signals that energy conservation is important and that change is possible. In other domains, like water conservation, we've seen that learning that others are changing can be three times as effective than just comparing one's own use to others," says Gregg Sparkman, PhD. researcher at Dept. of Psychology, Stanford University.
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Frost & Sullivan: Renewables Boost the Power Industry, and Solar Photovoltaic is the Fastest Growing
May 12, 2017
Continued regulatory support for renewable energy in key markets will see global power investment reach $443.5 billion in 2017, according to a new report by Frost & Sullivan. Solar photovoltaic (PV) will be the fastest growing segment, followed by wind power, accounting for 37.5 percent and 21 percent of global investment, respectively, by 2020.
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How Customer And Retail Electric Choices Are Changing Role Of Investor-Owned Utilities and Regulation in California
May 10, 2017
According to a new white paper from the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) and the California Energy Commission, the state may well be on the path towards a competitive market for consumer electric services, but is moving in that direction without a coherent plan to deal with all the associated challenges that competition poses, ranging from renewable procurement rules to reliability requirements and consumer protection.
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$96 Billion Is Lost Every Year To Electricity Theft
May 10, 2017
These non-technical losses - which include theft, fraud, billing errors and other issues - are now beginning to be addressed more aggressively by utilities, according to a new study by Northeast Group, LLC. [ more ]
Itron Announces Comverge Acquisition
May 9, 2017
Itron announced on 5/8 that it has signed a definitive agreement to acquire privately held Comverge by purchasing its parent company, Peak Holding Corp., in a cash transaction valued at approximately $100 million.
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New Atlas Shows Energy Potential of Africa and Opportunities for Investment to Meet Africa's Energy Needs
May 9, 2017
Current energy production in Africa is insufficient to meet demand. About a third of the total African population still lacks access to electricity and 53 per cent of the population depends on biomass for cooking, space heating and drying. A kettle boiled twice by a family in the United Kingdom uses five times as much electricity as a Malian uses in a year.
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Distributed Generation an Ongoing Threat to Utility Revenues and Hosting Capacity, Accenture Research Shows
May 8, 2017
The survey of more than 100 utilities executives across more than 20 countries revealed that 58 percent of distribution utility executives believe DG will cause revenue reduction by 2030. The concern is higher in North America and Asia Pacific than in Europe, due to the prevalence in these regions of vertically integrated utilities, which face the double impact of declining energy sales revenue and increased network costs to support reliable energy delivery.
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ComEd & Metropolitan Mayors Caucus Collaborate to Create National Model to Advance Smart City Solutions
May 8, 2017
The MOU provides for a one-of-a-kind collaboration between ComEd and the MMC to develop a pilot for a national model on how utilities and municipalities can work together to create greener, more resilient and sustainable communities.
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mPrest and Vector to Bring Internet of Energy to Over a Million New Zealand Customers
May 8, 2017
mPrest announced that its Distributed Energy Resource Management product - mDERMS - will be deployed in Vector's intelligent grid. Vector is New Zealand's leading multi-network infrastructure company, which distributes energy and communication services to over 1.2 million homes and businesses.
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Solar Software Platform Fast-Tracks Grid Connections
May 5, 2017
A new platform from GridUnity, developed in concert with the SunShot Initiative's incubator program, is designed to significantly reduce interconnection delays by assessing the grid impact of any distributed energy resource project, like solar or wind, at the distribution level.
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ABB Technologies to Support Smart City Development in South Africa
May 5, 2017
ABB will provide wireless network connectivity to an industrial area within Durban, South Africa's third most populated city with more than 3 million people. Durban is also one of the country's major manufacturing hubs and South Africa's busiest port.
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United States Announces €1 Million Pledge for Modernization of IAEA Nuclear Applications Laboratories
May 4, 2017
The United States announced recently (5/2) a pledge of €1 million to support the modernization of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Nuclear Applications Laboratories in Seibersdorf, outside Vienna. These facilities opened their doors in 1962 and play a key role in the peaceful uses of nuclear science and technology to assist countries in areas such as human and animal health, food security and the protection of the environment.
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United Renewable Energy Completes First Community Solar Project with National Grid in New York
May 4, 2017
The project is unique in that it is entirely supported by members within the nearby communities, including homeowners, low income homeowners, farms, and local businesses. The members of the solar farm receive a percentage of the solar plant's generation each month, which is credited to their bill exactly like the panels were installed on their own roofs.
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Microgrids or VPPs or Both?
May 3, 2017
While pundits like to pick winners and losers, Peter Asmus at Navigant Research sees future growth globally for both microgrids and virtual power plants (VPPs).
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Landis+Gyr's Smart Meters to Power Ambitious Project in Spain
May 3, 2017
The initial phase of the rollout was focused on urban areas having a high consumer density, plus high demands in terms of security, reliability and service. To date, IBERDROLA has equipped more than 8 million of its consumers with smart meters, of which almost 20 percent have been supplied by Landis+Gyr.
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Dominion Virginia Power Plan Sees More Clean Energy
May 2, 2017
The carbon footprint for a typical Dominion Virginia Power customer would shrink by as much as 25 percent over the next eight years under a plan the company presented recently (5/1). When added to reductions already made by Dominion, carbon emissions to meet the energy needs of a typical residential customer would fall by up to 46 percent between 2007 and 2027.
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Dubai Electricity and Water Authority Completes Transformation of Smart Power Plants System
May 2, 2017
Dubai Electricity and Water Authority (DEWA) has transformed all its independently-operating power stations into a network of smart-grid-enabled smart power plants. This is a step forward for DEWA's clear and integrated innovation-based strategy to adopt new initiatives, plans and technologies, and it supports the UAE National Innovation Strategy, to make the UAE one of the most innovative countries in the world.
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Entergy Arkansas and Comverge to Deploy Bring Your Own Device Demand Response Program
April 28, 2017
Comverge will aggregate consumer-purchased Wi-Fi-enabled smart thermostats to evaluate a potential new demand response resource for Entergy Arkansas, Inc.
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Southern California Edison Named No. 1 Solar Utility in U.S. for Second Year in a Row
April 27, 2017
SCE connected 1,648 megawatts of solar energy to the grid last year through new and expanded residential and commercial solar installations as well as through utility power-purchase agreements. This represents a 31 percent increase over the 1,258 megawatts SCE connected in 2015, when it also earned SEPA's top spot for megawatt capacity.
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Schneider Electric and Accenture Build a Digital Services Factory to Speed Development of Industrial IoT Solutions and Services
April 27, 2017
The collaboration is part of a five-year contract that Schneider Electric awarded to Accenture in January 2016 to support the ongoing roll-out of Industrial internet of things (IoT)-enabled solutions and digital services.
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Huawei Releases eLTE SmartGrid Solution to Promote the Digital Transformation of Electric Companies
April 27, 2017
"Taking one step beyond 4G, Huawei's eLTE SmartGrid solution applies advanced 4.5G wireless communication technology in the electric power industry," says Edward Deng, President of Huawei's Wireless Solution. "The solution will bring about a paradigm shift in the way that power utilities work, and will vastly accelerate their digital transformation."
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Halving Global Carbon Emissions by 2040 Within Reach
April 26, 2017
Governments, investors and businesses must seize the opportunity to halve global carbon emissions by 2040 while ensuring economic development and energy access for all, but they must act now to accelerate clean electrification, decarbonization beyond power and energy productivity improvement, says the Energy Transitions Commission (ETC) in a recent report.
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City of Hartford, Constellation and Bloom Energy Power Up Microgrid in Parkville Neighborhood
April 26, 2017
The project is Connecticut's first developed through a public-private effort and one of the first implemented through DEEP's Microgrid Grant Program. Additionally, the project is part of the state's Low-Emission Renewable Energy Credits Program, which enables participants to sell qualified Connecticut Class I Renewable Energy Credits created from renewable projects to the local utility under a long-term contract.
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Alabama Power Partners with Signature Homes to Develop Smart Neighborhood
April 24, 2017
The state-of-the-art community of 62 homes will feature emerging energy-efficient technologies, materials and appliances, and a community-scale microgrid. The microgrid will have the capability to generate more than 586,000 kilowatt hours of energy annually. Data from Smart Neighborhood will be collected for two years and used to evaluate the neighborhood-scale microgrid system.
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Energy Department Announces New National Laboratory Collaborations with 38 Small Businesses
April 24, 2017
With this recent announcement, the Department of Energy's Small Business Vouchers (SBV) pilot will have forged partnerships between 114 American small businesses and the national labs. A full list of SBV projects and participating DOE national labs is available at www.SBV.org.
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State Officials Celebrate California's Leadership in Hydrogen Fuel Cell Electric Vehicle Adoption
April 24, 2017
Leaders from three state agencies recently caravanned from Sacramento to the Bay Area and back to demonstrate how easy it is to drive fuel hydrogen fuel cell electric vehicles in California, and to celebrate the state's global leadership in efforts to get more zero-emission vehicles (ZEVs) on the road.
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U.S. Department of Energy's Secretary Perry Orders Study on Grid Reliability, Market Distortions
April 21, 2017
"Analysts have thoroughly documented the market-distorting effects of federal subsidies that boost one form of energy at the expense of others," said Rick Perry, secretary of the U.S. Department of Energy. "Those subsidies create acute and chronic problems for maintaining adequate baseload generation and have impacted reliable generators of all types."
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Report Examines Explicit Demand Response in Europe
April 20, 2017
The new report by the Smart Energy Demand Coalition maps the progress of member states in enabling "explicit" demand response, reviewing the regulatory structures of 18 countries: 16 EU member states, plus Norway and Switzerland. The research indicates that interest in enabling demand response continues to increase with notable progress achieved in several member states. However, significant barriers remain in the majority of EU countries. These concern the market opening to demand response, access for service providers such as independent demand response aggregators, product definitions as well as verification, payments and penalties for demand response services.
[ download report ]
SDG&E Seeks More Storage To Harness Clean Energy And Enhance Reliability
April 20, 2017
San Diego Gas & Electric (SDG&E) recently announced that it has signed contracts for five new local battery storage facilities for a total of 83.5 megawatts (MW). These four-hour energy storage facilities would be like having batteries from more than 5,500 all-electric, long-range vehicles at the ready. In addition, the company signed a contract to add a 4.5 MW demand response program. SDG&E has submitted all six contracts to the California Public Utilities Commission for approval.
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Energy Storage Guide for Policymakers Released
April 20, 2017
A new tool published by the independent Interstate Renewable Energy Council, Charging Ahead: An Energy Storage Guide for State Policymakers," (http://irecusa.org) provides regulators and other decision makers with specific guidance on key issues for policy consideration, including foundational policies for advanced energy storage a new generation of technologies characterized by flexible operating capabilities and diverse applications.
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Seattle City Light Selects Landis+Gyr for Advanced Grid Analytics
April 19, 2017
The analytics solution is cloud-based and will be hosted by Landis+Gyr's network operations center. Installation is already underway and scheduled to be completed by the summer of 2018.
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Experts Outline Pathway for Generating Up to Ten Terawatts of Power from Sunlight by 2030
April 19, 2017
Even the most optimistic projections have under-represented the actual deployment of PV over the last decade, and a recent paper from Global Alliance of Solar Energy Research Institutes (GA-SERI) discusses a realistic trajectory to install 5-10 terawatts of PV capacity by 2030.
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Alectra Study Identifies Residential Solar Storage Potential
April 19, 2017
Alectra Inc., with the support of the Independent Electricity System Operator (IESO), has completed a feasibility study for mass adoption of the utility's residential solar storage pilot, POWER.HOUSE, in Southern York Region.
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East Central Energy Using N-Dimension to Strengthen Cybersecurity Defenses
April 18, 2017
"While we had a hardened shell on the outside, we were soft on the inside," stated ECE IT Manager, Ty Houglum. "We had layered security protection to stop threats from getting into our network but lacked visibility into security issues on the inside, leaving us exposed."
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GE and Southern California Edison Debut World's First Battery-Gas Turbine Hybrid
April 18, 2017
The energy storage capacity of the battery has been specifically designed to provide enough time coverage to allow the gas turbine to start and reach its designated power output. As a result, the system does not need to burn fuel and consume water in stand-by mode to be able to dispatch power immediately when demand surges.
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