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Cairo standout African destination for foreign business services in 2018

The Egyptian capital Cairo led Africa in 2018, attracting 10 foreign business services investment projects, in its strongest performance since 2012. Joshua Crawford reports.




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President inaugurates Bolivia’s 69-MW San Jose II Hydroelectric Plant

Bolivian President Evo Morales has inaugurated the 69-MW San Jose II Hydroelectric Power Plant in the municipality of Colomi, department of Cochabamba.




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Remote Chinese region looks to set new clean-power record

A sparsely populated Chinese province that’s home to the headwaters of the Yangtze and Yellow rivers is attempting to set a new record for clean energy use, serving as a test bed for the entire country.




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Sweden's EV boom under threat as electricity demand outstrips capacity

Sweden’s ambitious plan to drastically cut emissions from transport by bringing millions of electric cars onto the road could be derailed by a lack of power capacity for new charging stations in major cities.




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Statkraft announces plans to build 51.6-MW Los Lagos hydropower plant in Chile

Statkraft announces it has decided to start construction of the 51.6-MW Los Lagos hydropower plant in Chile. The construction is planned to commence in August and completion is scheduled for second half of 2022.




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Target commits to 100 percent renewables; signs PPAs to purchase wind and solar energy

On June 12, Target corporation said it was increasing its renewable energy goals by committing to source 100 percent of its electricity from renewable sources by 2030. The goal applies to all of Target’s domestic operations.




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New White Paper explores grid parity and the solar renaissance

Today, solar power has become cheaper than the production cost of any other existing conventional power generation technology. The arrival of grid parity heralds a milestone in the history of energy production. It means solar energy being commercially viable without any subsidies or state support; producing energy with the lowest possible environmental impact.




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California Energy Commission gives $3M grant to pair energy storage and fast EV charging

Natron Energy said that the California Energy Commission (CEC) awarded it a $3 million grant for “Advanced Energy Storage for Electric Vehicle Charging Support.” Natron will use the money to manufacture and install a high powered, long cycle life energy storage system at an EV Fast Charging station.




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Top 5 ways the UK government can support onshore wind and meet net-zero emissions by 2050

In early June, the UK enshrined into law a commitment to reach net zero carbon emissions by 2050, making Britain the first major economy to do so. Meeting this target will require substantial reliance on renewable energy from solar, tidal, hydro, and wind sources, both onshore and offshore.




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New York to pass 'one of the most aggressive clean energy mandates in the country'

New York is poised to pass its own version of the Green New Deal with a climate bill that would more than triple the state’s solar capacity and aggressively promote development of wind farms off the state’s coast.






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Corani seeking financing to develop 147-MW Banda Azul hydro project in Bolivia

Jose Maria Romay, general manager of Corani (a subsidiary of Ende), has announced the company is seeking financing from Latin American development bank CAF and French development agency AFD for the 147-MW Banda Azul hydro project.





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Women are missing out on the clean energy job boom in America

While the industry is welcoming more women leaders, its rank-and-file workforce is still a lot like those at fossil-fuel companies: white and dominated by men. The lack of gender diversity is being driven by manufacturing jobs, and that means women are now missing out on the biggest jobs boom America has to offer.




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Nigerian renewable energy solutions provider Arnergy closes Series A financing

Nigerian distributed utility company, Arnergy, announced it has raised $9 Million in a Series A round of funding led by Breakthrough Energy Ventures with participation from the Norwegian Investment Fund for Developing Countries (Norfund), EDFI ElectriFI and All On.




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Giant offshore wind farm takes further steps toward construction in New Jersey

Last week, the New Jersey Board of Public Utilities announced it selected Ocean Wind, an offshore wind energy project proposed by Ørsted with support from PSEG, to develop an 1,100 MW offshore wind farm. Ocean Wind will be located 15 miles off the coast of Atlantic City. Construction is expected to commence in the early 2020s, with the wind farm operational in 2024.




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Power companies in New England tapping residential batteries to reduce peak demand

Here’s the latest wrinkle in the battery boom: National Grid Plc is paying consumers to tap electricity from their power-storage systems.




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NV Energy's new 540-MWh storage and 475-MW solar project comes at a very low price

8minute Solar Energy, NV Energy and the Moapa Band of Paiutes announced that NV Energy selected 8minute to develop the largest solar plus storage project ever built in Nevada and one of the largest in the world.




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The failure of privatization in the energy sector and why today’s consumers are reclaiming power

Back in the 1980s and 1990s, the twin forces of privatization and deregulation of public infrastructure services ascended to a global paradigm of progress and development. Government management of services such as telecommunications, transportation, water, and energy was deemed inefficient, underperforming, and monopolistic. Private industry – accountable to the profits and losses of an open market and, thus, believed more efficient than government – was proclaimed the better way for consumer choice and a more efficient use of taxpayers’ expenses.




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Q&A with an oil and gas executive turned EV charging infrastructure champion

Miriam Gozalo is an electrification project development manager at BP, one of the largest oil and gas companies in the world. Her work is squarely focused on the energy transition. Read what she has to say about her role working on ultra-fast electric vehicle charging stations in a company that most people associate with drilling rigs and gasoline.




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San Diego Airport installs 2 MW/4 MWh storage system to complement existing PV array

Yesterday, ENGIE Storage announced that San Diego International Airport (SAN) installed a 2 MW/4 MWh GridSynergy energy storage system. Paired with the airport’s existing 5.5 MW of solar capacity, the new energy storage system will reduce energy charges during peak demand, which according to ENGIE equate to approximately 40 percent of the airport’s monthly electricity costs. The system is expected to begin operation in early 2020.




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India wins trade dispute with US over solar-panel incentives

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.




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BlackRock unit aims to boost Asian renewables to $5 billion

BlackRock Real Assets is aiming to boost its renewables power portfolio in Asia by as much as 10-fold as it seeks to keep pace with the world’s fastest-growing region for green energy.




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Builder of Saudi Aramco oil rigs plans to expand into wind power

An Abu Dhabi-based company that builds drilling platforms for oil giant Saudi Aramco plans to diversify into renewable energy by supplying gear for offshore wind farms.




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New solar permit software could reduce costs and expand residential markets

Solar Foundation and the Solar Energy Industries Association (SEIA) are joining the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), several national residential solar companies, and other nonprofit organizations to develop new automated permit software for distributed solar and storage, reducing the cost of solar installations and saving resources for local governments and taxpayers.




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PNM plans early retirement of coal plant with massive addition of solar + storage

On July 1, Public Service of New Mexico filed a plan with regulators in the state for how it plans to get to a 100 percent emission-free power by 2040. The utility reviewed four scenarios, all of which involved the early retirement of the San Juan Coal Plant, to arrive at its recommended path forward.




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Clean Power Alliance signs PPA for 12-MW Isabella small hydro project in California

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

 




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Hanergy to deliver 400 MW of solar to Democratic Republic of Congo

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.




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Natural Gas beat coal in the US. Will renewables and storage beat gas?

In April 2019, in the heart of coal country, Indiana regulators rejected a proposal by its electric and gas utility, Vectren, to replace baseload coal plants with a new $900 million, 850 megawatt (MW) natural gas-fired power plant. Regulators were concerned that with the dramatic decline in the cost of renewable energy, maturation of energy storage and rapidly changing customer demand, such a major gas plant investment could become a stranded, uneconomic asset in the future. Regulators are now pushing Vectren to consider more decentralized, lower-carbon resources such as wind, solar and storage that would offer greater resource diversity, flexibility and cost effectiveness.




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AI-powered storage company enters Northeast market with “front-of-the-meter” solution

This week artificial intelligence (AI)-driven energy storage services provider Stem said that it had formed a partnership with New York-based private equity company Syncarpha Capital to build 28.2 megawatt-hours (MWh) of large-scale storage projects co-sited with solar in Massachusetts.




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POWERGEN India 2020 to support energy transition in India

Clarion Energy & iTEN Media announce the launch of POWERGEN India 2020 co-located with Indian Utility Week & DISTRIBUTECH India





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VPPs with smart inverters offer crucial flexibility to the changing grid

Energy generation and consumption is rapidly transforming into a decentralized, decarbonized, and digitized model due to a number of market forces. The declining costs of solar energy systems, as well as the increasing price of energy from the grid has led to grid parity. This has caused PV proliferation to accelerate to such an extent that in the past five years alone, PV installed capacity has increased by 300%. Simultaneously, the EV market is also on the rise and is expected to reach the electrification tipping point by 2030. This is due to support from governments trying to limit the effects of climate change, thus leading to automotive manufactures transitioning their fleets from standard petrol- and diesel-powered cars to EVs. As a result of the acceleration of both of these markets, EV charging has created demand patterns causing an even steeper and faster ramp-up in the evenings than the PV duck curve. , This is causing the grid’s balancing act to be increasingly complex. In order to support this new energy dynamic, advanced management software is required to ensure grid stabilization and to unlock the value of these energy resources.




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Long-term financing for solar is possible and critical for supporting continued industry growth

Installed solar capacity in the United States exceeded 10 GW for the third year in a row in 2018, and the pace of growth is expected to continue. The first quarter of 2019 was the strongest in the history of the U.S. solar market, according to a recent report from Solar Energy Industries Association (SEIA) and Wood Mackenzie Power & Renewables. Yet inefficient and costly project financing inhibits many solar developers from tapping into the market’s true potential.




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Ontario Power Generation announces plans to rebuild century-old Calabogie Generating Station

Plans are under way to rebuild one of Ontario Power Generation’s oldest hydroelectric generating stations, which was damaged by a tornado in 2018. Constructed in 1917, the 5-MW Calabogie Generating Station has produced renewable, low-cost electricity on the Madawaska River for decades.




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National Grid purchases wind and solar developer, Geronimo Energy

Yesterday, National Grid, through its competitive non-regulated unit National Grid Ventures (NGV), completed its $100 million acquisition of Geronimo Energy - a wind and solar developer in North America. The deal, which was announced on March 7th, 2019, has now satisfied all regulatory requirements and closing conditions.




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Minnesota utilities weigh energy storage as substitute for peaker plants

Gas peaker plants may be among the first casualties of a new Minnesota law requiring utilities to include energy storage as part of their long-range plans.




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Shell to install ultrafast EV chargers in the Netherlands in e-mobility push

Global infrastructure services firm AECOM said that Shell Retail has hired it to deliver ultrafast electrical vehicle (EV) chargers across the Netherlands. A total of 200 fast chargers – under the brand name Shell Recharge - will be available at Shell forecourts (filling stations).




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Fantasy Energy League Draft follow-up: breaking down the first round

In late 2018, I put out the call to see how many fellow energy nerds I could gather to indulge me in combining my passion for energy analysis and clean power policy with my love of fantasy sports. By the end of January 2019, I had my cast of characters who somehow thought this idea was as fun as I did (isn’t the Internet the greatest tool for finding people who share your interests?) and I released my Draft Preview. Coordinating this draft among 14 different teams with different time zones and schedules chock-full of actually helping to save the planet proved no easy task, but by the end of March we had conducted 5 rounds of picks for a total of 70 selections in this Inaugural Fantasy Energy League!




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Turkeler and RT Enerji choose supplier for five onshore wind farms in Turkey

Turkeler and RT Enerji have chosen GE Renewable Energy to supply equipment for five onshore wind farms being built in Turkey.




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The 150,000-square-meter sky bridge of Shanghai’s 'Rafael Gallery' will be covered in solar

Solar company Hanergy announced that its thin-film solar modules will cover the 150,000 square meter roof of the ‘Rafael Gallery’ located at a Tech City in Shanghai.




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Study: Fossil fuels are far less efficient than previously thought

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.




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4.5-MW solar plant goes live in Brittany, France

Hanwha Q CELLS GmbH said it supplied its almost 15,000 solar modules to a large ground-mounted solar farm in western France.




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HydroVision International kicks off in Portland, Ore., U.S.

The HydroVision International event is now under way in the Oregon Convention Center in Portland, with more than 3,000 hydropower professionals from around the world coming together for four days of learning and networking.




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German clean-energy fund sees promise in US distributed solar development

Germany-based clean-energy fund Hep Kapitalverwaltung AG agreed to invest $50 million to $80 million annually in a partnership to develop small solar projects in the U.S.




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The Lewis River Merwin Dam: harvest, habitat, hatcheries and hydro

On Tuesday, July 23, about 30 HydroVision attendees had to privilege of touring the 136-MW Lewis River hydropower plant located at the Merwin Dam in Ariel, Washington. The dam was constructed in 1931 and has four penstocks, which today feed three turbines. The turbines were installed in 1931, 1949 and 1958, respectively. The fourth penstock, which was the focus of much of the tour, is for fish passage.




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GE Renewable Energy announces two hydropower services contracts in the US

GE Renewable Energy announced at HydroVision that it has signed two hydropower contracts in the U.S. one for FirstLight’s Northfield Mountain project and one for PG&E’s Caribou One hydropower station.




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New York plans to install 1700 MW of offshore wind

New York has signed the biggest-ever deals for offshore wind power in U.S. history, a key part of the state’s plan to get all of its power from emissions-free sources by 2040.




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Namibia announces $338M, 5-year renewable energy strategy

Namibia’s state-run utility will build four plants powered by renewable energy over the next five years as the southern African nation seeks to guarantee local supplies and cut its use of fossil fuels.