For the Chinese wind industry as a whole, 2012 appears to be another year combining elements of the best of times and the worst of times. China surpassed 50 gigawatts of grid-connected […]
This year was a big year for solar, both domestically and globally, with some unlikely players throwing their hats into the ring and upping the ante on achievable power generating capacity. Here’s […]
Combinations of onshore wind, offshore wind, and photovoltaic solar, paired with battery and hydrogen storage in a widespread grid system, could meet 90 percent to 99.9 percent of expected 2030 demand at […]
Currently (as of July 2012), there are 104 commercial nuclear reactors in the United States. In 2011, these plants provided 786 billion kilowatthours of electricity, or nearly one-fifth of total generation. The […]
Electrons are cheap – at least electrons are cheap to create. Until recently, it was also cheap to deliver electrons from power plants to customers. That is no longer the case. The […]
The evidence is piling up that when the real value of energy is considered, electricity generated from concentrating solar power (CSP) plants with storage capability outperforms solar photovoltaic (PV) and wind power. […]
The variable operating cost of electric power generators is a key factor in determining which units a power system operates (or “dispatches”) to meet the demand for electricity. Other things being equal, […]
CSP Alliance Executive Director Tex Wilkins believes that if utilities and other load-serving entities (LSEs) saw the value in owning CSP plants with storage, it would grow competition and economies of scale […]
Recently published (April 2012) electric power data show that, for the first time since EIA began collecting the data, generation from natural gas-fired plants is virtually equal to generation from coal-fired plants, […]
The two traditional excuses for not adding more wind and solar into grid operations have been that they could not be called on (“dispatched”) when energy was needed and they were too […]
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