Natural gas seems to invoke a win/win perspective as the solution to all problems in some discussions about energy policy and the best fuels for electricity generation and transportation. In these scenarios, the only downside is the pressure it puts on renewable energy technologies. Yes, natural gas is cleaner than coal. It exhausts about half Continue reading →
Renewable energy is providing clean, reliable electricity across the United States and around the world. It is also growing rapidly, with record numbers of new wind and solar installations coming online in the U.S. over the past few years. We can readily continue this rapid expansion of renewable energy — and accelerate the transition away Continue reading →
The utility industry is being disrupted on every side, prompting worries about its stability. A new policy paper from the Edison Electric Institute (EEI), an association of shareholder-owned U.S. electric companies, details the “disruptive challenges” the sector faces. These private, for-profit companies, also known as investor-owned utilities or IOUs, serve about 70 percent of the Continue reading →
As environmental policy, improving energy efficiency isn’t just a no-brainer; it’s a no-loser. By limiting wasted energy, we reduce the number of power plants we need–along with their resulting pollution–and we save money. Cutting energy waste is first and foremost a data challenge. You can’t cut waste until you know what you’re wasting, and most Continue reading →
The Canadian Smart Grid Standards Roadmap, published by the Standards Council of Canada (SCC), recommends formation of a steering committee to promote smart grid standardization and advance policy objectives. The Roadmap development was overseen by Natural Resources Canada (NRCan) and the Canadian National Committee to the International Electrotechnical Commission (CNC/IEC). via Canada Promotes Smart Grid Continue reading →
In a bid to modernize the country’s power grid, the Department of Energy (DoE) has created a committee that will come up with a smart grid road map that will harmonize existing initiatives. Yesterday the DoE issued a circular “creating an inter-agency steering committee for the development and formulation of a comprehensive and holistic smart Continue reading →
Some 110,000 new jobs could result from the more than 300 clean energy and clean transportation projects announced in the US in 2012, according to a new report from Environmental Entrepreneurs (E2), “a national community of individual business leaders who advocate for good environmental policy while building economic prosperity.” Job creation in the clean energy Continue reading →
Progress aside, we still need a comprehensive national energy strategy insists the Business Roundtable (BRT), a group representing CEOs from major U.S. companies. BRT just released a report of its own – Taking Action on Energy: A CEO Vision for America’s Energy Future – which it says is the national energy strategy we need. In the report, BRT Continue reading →
Brandon Hollinger grew tired of the foreign-policy implications of filling up his car at the pump. The wars fought on top of oil reserves. The diminishing petroleum supplies. So he decided to stop relying on gasoline. He considered converting his car to run on hydrogen. He studied compressed natural gas. He concluded that driving an Continue reading →
As Matthew L. Wald and others reported this morning, Energy Secretary Steven Chu is poised to head back to California, leaving President Obama with a new opportunity to signal his approach to energy and climate policy in his final term. via After Steven Chu Leaves, Who Should Be Obama’s Next Energy Secretary? – NYTimes.com.
Like many firms before it, Google has come to realize that policy and regulation are the biggest obstacles to grid modernization. As Michael Terrell, one of the firm’s senior lobbyists explains on a company blog, “the challenge is that the rules governing electricity distribution were written for last century’s grid.” via Google Spending Millions to Continue reading →
It was heartening to see President Obama include an ample reference to the importance of climate-smart energy policies in his short inaugural address today. The speech is presumably a sketch of what’s to come in the State of the Union message and policy initiatives this year. In his speech, Obama framed the need to address Continue reading →
Government agencies tasked with U.S. energy policy are “like an orchestra without a conductor,” says former North Dakota Senator Bryan Dorgan, now part of a panel of experts urging the second Obama administration to change the way it approaches energy. Dorgan, a Democrat, is part of a Bipartisan Policy Center (BPC) energy project that’s hammering Continue reading →
Putting electric customers first, Vermont Law School’s Institute for Energy and the Environment yesterday presented an updated smart grid privacy policy designed to serve as a model for utility companies nationwide, Smart Grid Policy: A Model Privacy Policy for Smart Grid Customers – A guide for Utilities to use to protect their customers’ rights to Continue reading →
Now that the presidential election is over, perhaps we’ll see some reality injected into our energy policy. The existing energy policy professes to encourage “energy independence”. That policy in action embeds permanent subsidies, tax credits, and tax breaks in the US federal tax code for highly profitable fossil fuel industries. via Why A Realistic Energy Continue reading →
Many people tend to think about the smart grid from their own frame of reference, and with something so large and complex, it can be difficult to take a holistic view. Still, it is only when everything is working together, from supply and demand-side technologies to energy policy and consumer education, that we will be Continue reading →
An A-list of the renewable energy industry will be assembling this week in Eilat for one of the world’s premier conferences on the subject — the Eilat-Eilot Renewable Energy Conference, a three-day showcase of the latest in international and Israeli-developed renewable energy technologies. No fewer than 194 speakers — arguably the world’s renewable energy “brain Continue reading →
The energy industry is in the process of transforming to what is called a Smart Grid. This means a more efficient way of managing the supply and demand of electricity, using innovative, lower-carbon energy. This shift is typically accompanied with a large infrastructure investment and is also frequently associated with government policy. via Green Britain Continue reading →
Power outages along the East Coast in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy were virtually unavoidable, but the ability of utilities to understand the causes of the outages — and being able to accelerate the time necessary to restore power — could be enhanced greatly by the presence of smart-grid technology, according to an industry expert. Continue reading →
