utilities
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Removing roadblocks to the growth of renewables
On Friday, the U.S. Energy Information Administration released new monthly statistics for renewable energy output as well as output of traditional forms of power. The good news is that renewable energy in May, the latest month for which statistics have been compiled, is at its all-time highest level, accounting for 13% of total power. The […]
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Solar wars
Note to utilities: solar is popular with your customers. Earlier in the month in Colorado, Xcel proposed a scheme to charge their customers who install a solar installation an extra fee. After 5 days of intense public outcry, they withdrew the plan. For now. And in New Mexico, Public Service of New Mexico (the largest […]
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Green jobs: debunking the debunkers
Energy markets are neither free nor efficient, so traditional economic arguments against regulation and other government interventions do not apply. In response to my recent article digging into green jobs, a reader sent me a copy of a March paper by Andrew Morriss et al at University of Illinois that attempts to debunk green jobs […]
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Warren Buffett repeats GOP talking points on energy plan
Courtesy trackrecord via FlickrOmaha zillionaire Warren Buffett repeated his criticism of cap-and-trade emissions regulation on Wednesday, telling CNBC the plan being pushed by Democrats amounts to “a huge tax” and a “fairly regressive tax” that’s going to burden poor consumers in particular. “If we buy permits, essentially, at our utilities, that goes right into the […]
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SCREEEEECH
That, my friends, is the sound of the California solar market grinding to a halt — which is exactly what will happen if we don’t lift the cap on net metering. Net metering, of course, is the policy that allows you to roll you meter backwards when you generate more solar electricity than you use. […]
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Duke Energy: We can ‘decarbonize’ without painful electricity price hikes
Major coal utilities are now publicly endorsing electricity decarbonization, an all but unimaginable position even 12 months ago. And although Duke is a member of USCAP, which was the basis of Waxman-Markey, it remains remarkable that the company has joined the call for strong climate action (see How does Duke CEO Jim Rogers sleep at […]
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Fighting Coal in the Rockies
Fighting for the Waxman-Markey climate bill may be sexy and hip (and worthwhile), but here in the Roaring Fork and Vail Valleys of Colorado, without much fanfare, we are engaged in some trench fighting to solve climate change. A view from one of the ski lifts at Vail in Colorado.Courtesy Pravin8 via FlickrThe battle: trying to elect […]
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Policy chatter is on everyone’s lips at Fortune’s green-business conference
Fortune Magazine‘s annual Brainstorm Green confab in sybaritic Southern California locales brings together Fortune 500 types (naturally), green tech entrepreneurs, venture capitalists, and environmentalists. As such it’s a barometer of sorts for the state of green in the Green State. At last year’s conference, the chatter was all about tech and the latest cool green […]
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PG&E signs first-of-a-kind space solar power deal
Not many people I know think space solar is a low-cost, scalable solution. Certainly it is worth pursuing any genuine low-carbon baseload power source if it can be practical and scalable — and affordable, which I would put at $0.15 a kilowatt hour or less for. The problem with space solar is that, like hydrogen […]
