Cities and renewable electricity have, respectively, become the habitat and energy of choice globally. The two are increasingly inseparable. Urbanization and electrification trends have turned cities and the grid into leading platforms for human activity, presenting unique opportunities for today’s utilities to partner with municipalities to achieve their smart city goals.

kWh Analytics, a leader in solar risk management, this week announced the first refinancing supported by the Solar Revenue Put. The portfolio of 41 projects, owned by AES, totaling approximately 28 MW DC of capacity is located in Arizona and Massachusetts. The portfolio is being funded by Silicon Valley Bank and a Japanese financial services company. Swiss Re Corporate Solutions, a leading global corporate insurer, is providing capacity for the Solar Revenue Put.

A new career map, Careers in Climate Control Technology, provides a first-of-its-kind interactive, visual tool to showcase the employment opportunities that exist in the swiftly growing HVAC/R industry – Heating, Ventilation, Air Conditioning and Refrigeration. The sector is on track for projected growth of 15 percent from 2016 to 2026.

Utilities and other energy experts convene each year at DISTRIBUTECH International (DTECH) to discuss the future of energy and this week Clarion Energy, organizer of the event, announced that the call for abstracts for the 2020 event is open.

Bank asset management is known to be an opaque subject. Thankfully, Diana Weis and Sarah Disch, each co-heads of the Solar Asset Management groups at their organizations, U.S. Bank and Wells Fargo Bank respectively, shared their expertise with me at SAMNA 2019. They each have over a decade of experience in solar finance. Here are three key takeaways bank asset management experts Weis and Disch shared:

Solar energy is now providing the electricity for an entire village in Togo of 4000 people, powering streetlights, homes, schools and shops.

The insurance industry has lots of exposure to climate change. But as Warren Buffet has explained, not so much for companies that do annual policy adjustments, like Berkshire Hathaway. Their exposure is limited because the trends are baked into the premiums. But there is an opportunity for reducing insurance risk due to climate change, and it comes from the insurance industry itself. The business model is to have car insurance salespeople provide leads to virtual electric car charging services. This has perfect demographics because electric vehicle owners are very receptive to solar electricity. Who wouldn’t want a clean transportation solution with local job creation that can’t be offshore?

SOHAR deep-sea port and free-zone has signed a 600-hectare lease agreement with Shell Development Oman (SDO) for land to set up industrial and commercial solar panels. The port is managed in a joint-venture between the Port of Rotterdam and the Sultanate of Oman.

Goldman Sachs Group Inc. sees an end to the gloom for solar manufacturers as demand in China stabilizes and free-falling panel prices bottom out.

Developing carbon capture and storage technology and low-carbon hydrogen is “a necessity not an option” for the UK to achieve a net zero carbon economy by 2050.

This week, Enel S.p.A. announced the opening of its newest Innovation Hub in Boston at Greentown Labs, the largest cleantech startup incubator in the United States. The Hub will provide Enel, one of the world’s leading power companies, access to Greentown Labs’ startup community and innovation expertise.

Yesterday, the Environmental and Energy Study Institute (EESI) announced the launch of the Access Clean Energy Savings (ACES) initiative. ACES provides technical assistance to help rural electric cooperatives and public power utilities apply for the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) Rural Electric Savings Program (RESP), which provides zero-interest 20-year loans for improving energy efficiency.

Renewables firm Pangea Energy and vanadium battery producer CellCube have signed on to build a 50MW storage system alongside a solar farm in South Australia.

CleanChoice Energy on Thursday said it was opening an additional 20.51 MW of community solar capacity for residential customers of Xcel. The new capacity is being supplied by fifteen solar farms owned and operated by AltusPower America in various locations in Minnesota. CleanChoice Energy is the largest community solar provider in Minnesota with more than 85 megawatts of solar capacity.

This week, Xcel Energy announced plans to retire its last two coal plants in the Upper Midwest a decade earlier than scheduled. The acceleration of the coal closures is part of the company’s clean energy transition that includes expanding wind and solar, using natural gas and operating its Monticello nuclear plant until at least 2040.

Today, Alabama Municipal Electric Authority (AMEA) and Lightsource BP announced the development of a 100-MW (AC) solar energy project in Montgomery County, Alabama. Lightsource BP will finance, develop, build, own, and operate the solar facility and will deliver energy to AMEA under a 20-year power purchase agreement (PPA). The project, situated 15 miles from AMEA’s headquarters in Montgomery, will supply clean energy to AMEA’s 11 Member utilities located across the state and will generate enough electricity to power more than 20,000 homes.

Yesterday, energy storage company Saft said it delivered and installed a turnkey Energy Storage System to Bermuda Electric Light Company (BELCO). The system provides up to 10 MW power for spinning reserves and frequency response to maintain grid stability and has a storage capacity of 5.5MWh, said the company. The official ribbon-cutting ceremony was held on May 16.

Brazil is the second-largest producer of hydroelectric power in the world, after only China, and hydropower accounted for more than 70% of the country’s electricity generation in 2018. Brazil’s latest 10-year energy plan seeks to maintain this level of hydro generation while increasing the share of nonhydro renewables, particularly solar.

Seattle, WA-based LevelTen Energy helps corporate buyers of renewable energy find and purchase energy from solar and wind projects within North America through its procurement platform. The company says its solution reduces the cost, complexity, and risk of renewable energy power purchase agreements (PPAs), by incorporating analytics, aggregation, and process best practices.

“Recognizing leaders in the power and energy industry not only gives us the opportunity to celebrate them and the projects that they are involved in, it also enables us to learn vital business and life lessons from these often exceptional individuals. We find out what makes them tick, what frustrates them and the processes they follow to address challenges – this is often inspiring, eye-opening stuff and cannot but contribute to the growth of the sector.“

Hydrogen, which has been touted as the fuel of the future much of the past five decades, may finally be on the verge of converting its potential to reality.

Go Electric Inc. is a specialist in energy resiliency solutions for microgrids and commercial & industrial customers integrating renewables and generators

A series of U.S. renewable energy incentives violated international trade rules, according to the World Trade Organization, threatening to stoke tensions between the two countries as President Donald Trump prepares to meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday.

The Clean Power Alliance (CPA) has signed three long-term power purchase agreements, including two new solar projects and one existing small hydro project.

Chinese solar company Hanergy Thin Film Power Group has won a deal to build the first solar PV plants in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

General Electric Co. agreed to sell a majority stake in a solar-energy business to BlackRock Inc., giving the investment giant footing in a growing market as the ailing manufacturer shifts its focus elsewhere.

Fossil fuels, long regarded for their high-energy return on investment, are not as efficient as once thought. In fact, their final yields are not much better than those of renewable options, according to a new study.

The Skeleton Creek project will be located in three Oklahoma counties

New textile-based solar cells developed by Fraunhofer researchers, semitrailers could soon be producing the electricity needed to power cooling systems or other onboard equipment. In short, textile-based solar cells could soon be adding a whole new dimension to photovoltaics, complementing the use of conventional silicon-based solar cells.

From the way we shop to the way we socialize, the internet affects nearly everything we do these days. This dramatic change in our way of life has been fueled by a handful of large tech companies, companies that are increasingly going all in on solar.

The renewable energy transition promises to reduce carbon emissions, but it’s happening at different speeds around the world. Read on for some key insights from BloombergNEF’s New Energy Outlook 2019, which provides a detailed road map to the future.

Ireland is set to add 5.8 GW of non-hydro renewable power capacity over the next decade to reach a total 9.6 GW by 2030.

In recognition of the widely acknowledged studies that show that organizations with gender equality perform better financially, this year POWERGEN International, along with partner UL, is launching a new awards program that seeks out women of good character.

2020 Hyundai Elantra vs. 2020 Toyota Corolla: Compare Cars The 2020 Toyota Corolla and 2020 Hyundai Elantra are two compact cars—and hatchbacks—that are great values with thrifty hybrids. Mailbag: What's the difference between car, crossover, and SUV anyway? "Why isn't an SUV a station wagon or a crossover?" a perplexed reader wrote...

Compact sedans like the Elantra and Corolla mostly form the role of commuter cars in American households, and they’re spacious enough to be family vehicles for those with smaller kids or pets to put in the back seat. If your budget is tight, the 2020 Toyota Corolla and 2020 Hyundai Elantra are two of the best values on the market. They both...

The Ford F-150, Ram 1500, and Chevy Silverado have been the best-selling light vehicles in America for a long time, but for the first time ever, the pickup truck segment as a whole outsold the car segment in the month of April, Bloomberg reported on Tuesday. The difference was by a large margin, too, with pickups outselling cars by more than...

These are halcyon days for fleet-footed crossover SUVs. Saucy ‘utes like the 2020 Mercedes-Benz GLC 43 AMG hardly look like they’re just as quick as their smaller siblings but stopwatches don’t lie. In the example above, Mercedes says the GLC43 crossover takes just 4.7 seconds from 0-60 mph compared to the C43 sedan’s time...

After 11 seasons and more than 80 episodes, it looks like funny man and avid car nut Jerry Seinfeld's "Comedians In Cars Getting Coffee" is finally running out of gas. During a press conference to discuss his new Netflix special “Jerry Seinfeld: 23 Hours to Kill,” Seinfeld said he feels like there's nothing left to achieve with...

Fully electric delivery trucks, cargo vans, shuttle vehicles, and transit and school buses are all due to become increasingly common as fleets go green and diesels are retired. That’s where a recent surge of interest in mobile-charging solutions comes in. As a backup plan for the times when charge points and infrastructure won’t quite...

At the reveal of Tesla's redesigned Roadster in 2017, the company said the car would start production in 2020. At the time we said the company was notorious for being late on deadlines, and we were right to say it. In a podcast interview with comedian Joe Rogan on Thursday, Tesla CEO Elon Musk said the redesigned Roadster would be pushed back to...

Nissan’s Leaf-based van for Europe gets larger. More mobile charging is on the way for bigger electric trucks. And could the pandemic pinch material supply for EV makers and the clean energy sector? This and more, here at Green Car Reports. The coronavirus pandemic could tighten the supply of some materials needed for the creation of...

A build team in Ohio is in the process of turning an old Porsche Boxster into a supercar that was limited to just seven units worldwide and originally priced at $3.4 million. The car we're talking about is the W Motors Lykan Hypersport that bowed in 2013, and a replica was recently acquired by a workshop in Bowling Green, Ohio. The replica was...

DOE released a final programmatic environmental impact statement for Hawaii to provide federal, state and county governments as well as the public and developers with a reference document for project-specific environmental reviews.

DBL Partners, the same venture capital fund that supported SolarCity for many years, has led the largest venture capital funding for distributed energy in Africa. Off Grid Electric announced today that it raised $25 million in a Series C investment.

Off Grid Electric, based in California and Tanzania, is installing solar in over 10,000 homes and businesses per month with what it calls “its radically affordable solar leasing platform.” The company designs, manufactures, sells, installs and services solar home units in Tanzania and is announcing today that it will be entering

Care Technology provides technological solutions to the needs of customers through innovations like energy-efficient LED lighting and transportable heat sources that operate without power racks or induction heaters. We spoke to co-founder Belinda Wong about the production of their sustainable offerings and the benefits of green technology.

A report that examines statements about rolling blackouts made by regional grid operator ISO-New England, shows that sustained growth of renewables, and not more gas, will boost reliability of New England’s electric power system.

In commemoration of Flag Day, PennWell Corp. is partnering with the Folds of Honor Foundation to raise money for military families. The effort is in conjunction with PennWell’s Wall of Honor, a traveling wall highlighting the names of our military service personnel (past and present) and displayed at all PennWell power generation events in North America. The wall displays the branch, the company and the name of each person honored.

IEA report reveals that more than US $750 billion went to the electricity sector while US $715 billion was spent on oil and gas supply globally as the world continues on the path to electrification.