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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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Utility partners with climate experts on new carbon emission goals

Community stakeholders and climate experts from the University of Arizona are helping Tucson Electric Power to build an energy portfolio that supports reliable, affordable and increasingly sustainable service over the next 15 years.





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75 MW of community solar coming to Illinois in Ameren, ComEd territories

Arlington, VA based Summit Ridge Energy (SRE) announced that it will acquire 11 projects from Pivot Energy in Illinois totaling 29 MWs, increasing SRE’s portfolio of community solar projects in the state to more than 20.




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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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Wednesday webcast to reveal what's new about POWERGEN 2019 in NOLA

Clarion Energy’s Teresa Hansen, vice president of global content, for a webcast Wednesday  will be making some important announcements regarding this year’s event in New Orleans. Hansen also will offer key details on content, the exhibit floor and resources available to attendees.




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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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Stay chilled: Lessons for district cooling from the Gulf Cooperation Council

Global demand for air-conditioning is projected to triple over the next 30 years, as the planet warms and urban populations grow, particularly in emerging markets. Meeting that demand will call for significant investments in new cooling infrastructure and the electrical generating capacity necessary to power it. Although traditional cooling technologies are expected to become more efficient in coming years, countries will need to plan for these additional loads, which will be expensive. Emerging markets can also make use of district cooling, an approach that the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), which consists of six Middle Eastern countries — Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Bahrain, and Oman — have successfully adopted.




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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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LIHI certifies two low-impact hydroelectric facilities

The Low Impact Hydropower Institute recently announced it had awarded low-impact certification status to two hydroelectric facilities:




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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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Farmers Irrigation District hydropower facility offers sustainable solution to a growing challenge

On Monday, July 22, about 30 HydroVision attendees visited the beautiful Hood River Valley outside of Portland, Oregon to tour in-conduit hydropower projects and learn how modernizing irrigation districts is a sustainable solution to help combat a changing climate.




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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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Envisioning the future of hydropower: What do you see?

On Tuesday, July 23 at the HydroVision International keynote, Vice President Marla Barnes asked the audience to close their eyes and envision their next vacation. “Are you sitting on a beach? Are you packing your family into the car for a wild adventure? What do you see,” she asked.




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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.




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Lincoln Clean Energy: Texas' Lockett Wind project commercially operational

The Lockett Wind farm in Wilbarger has the potential to generate more than 700,000 MWh of renewable energy per year, enough to power the equivalent of 70,000 homes. 




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Energy storage plant set for southeast Asia

Finnish energy technology group Wärtsilä has signed an EPC contract for a 100 MW/100 MWh total capacity energy storage project in southeast Asia.




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Small Missouri utility proposes big pivot to clean energy in latest resource plan

Missouri’s smallest investor-owned utility is charting a dramatically different course two years after being acquired by new owners.




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Louisiana’s military families to benefit from ground-source geothermal and modern energy-saving devices

Last week, Corvias announced that it had entered the final phase of its geothermal installation and energy upgrades effort at the U.S. Army’s Fort Polk in West-Central Louisiana, a milestone that once complete will not only modernize the aging infrastructure but save the Army significant money and benefit military families.




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Glendale Water & Power to repower Grayson power plant with solar plus storage

Last week, California’s Glendale Water & Power (GWP) received approval from the Glendale City Council to move forward with a plan to repower the aging Grayson Power Plant with a combination of renewable energy resources, energy storage and a limited amount of thermal generation.




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Utility device and data management technologies revenue could exceed $22 billion by 2027edit

A new report from Navigant Research released this week says that revenue from device and data management technologies could grow from approximately $14.8 billion in 2018 to more than $22.1 billion in 2027 at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 4.6%.




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Energy CEOs extol virtues of hydropower while bemoaning its lack of public support

Last week at the HydroVision International plenary session, a panel of three CEOs — Darrel T. Anderson, President and CEO IDACORP and Idaho Power, Mitch Davidson, CEO and Managing Partner, Brookfield Renewable Power, and Paul Jacob, President and CEO, Rye Development — along with moderator Elizabeth Ingram, Content Director, Clarion Energy, discussed both the merits and the challenges of hydropower development in the United States and Canada.




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Energy industry mourns the death of Global Wind Energy Council’s Steve Sawyer

Steve Sawyer, 63, Senior Policy Advisor and former Secretary General of the Global Wind Energy Council, passed away on July 31, 2019 of a sudden and aggressive lung cancer.




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Democratic debate 2019 takeaways

Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders stuck together, Pete Buttigieg took the middle path, Marianne Williamson took on racism and Beto O’Rourke faded into the background.




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BNEF: Energy to storage increase 122X by 2040

According to the latest forecast by BloombergNEF (BNEF), energy storage installations (not including pumped hydropower) around the world will multiply exponentially, from 9GW/17GWh deployed as of 2018 to 1,095GW/2,850GWh by 2040.




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Energy storage sites provide unique wholesale market participation

ENGIE Storage has announced it will supply and operate a 19 MW/38 MWh portfolio of six energy storage sites that will contribute to the Solar Massachusetts Renewable Target Program and participate in ISO-New England wholesale markets.




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Digitalisation and the transformation of the energy value chain

Digitalisation is one of the biggest enablers of the global transition to clean energy. From intelligent asset management, to Artificial Intelligence and the Internet of Things. Find out how digitalisation is transforming the management, operation and maintenance of renewable energy assets, and driving a more efficient renewable world.




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NY governor announces $1.1 billion project to extend life of Niagara Power Project

Governor Andrew M. Cuomo has announced that the New York Power Authority is launching a 15-year modernization and digitization program to significantly extend the operating life of the Niagara Power Project.





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US wind farm activity by Fortune 500 breaks records

The American Wind Energy Association (AWEA) has released data for Q2, indicating activity rose to new heights in the wind development sector.




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648 MW of wind power capacity to be purchased by AES Colombia

This week, DNV GL said that it acted as a technical advisor to the energy company AES Colombia during its planned purchase of the Jemeiwaa Kai portfolio of wind power projects. DNV GL carried out an independent analysis of the La Guajira wind farms wind and power generation regime.




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Dominion plans $33 million battery storage pilot

Dominion executives said in an interview this week that battery storage has the potential to improve the resiliency of the electrical grid




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A modern Cinderella story: California’s record on wholesale distributed generation leaves much room for improvement

California, long a progressive leader on renewable energy and climate change mitigation, has neglected a key market segment for renewable energy: the “community-scale,” or “wholesale distributed generation” (DG), market. This market segment is defined as projects below 20 megawatts that connect to the distribution grid and export power to the grid for sale.




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The hydrocarbon era’s spectacular end

Dustin Yellin, a Brooklyn, N.Y.-based artist whose intricate 3D photomontages adorn the likes of New York’s Lincoln Center, wants to draw your gaze to climate change. Not in a subtle way, either. He plans to stand an oil supertanker on its end in the ground—a structure soaring 1,000 feet into the air.




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Sunverge raises $11 million for utility distributed energy resource controls

The round was led by Ecosystem Integrity Fund with participation from Equinor Energy Ventures and Evergy Ventures





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Report covers costs of various storage technologies, including pumped storage hydro

A report recently released by the U.S. Department of Energy defines and evaluates cost and performance parameters of six battery energy storage technologies (BESS) and four non-BESS storage technologies.