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Choosing the right technology isn’t easy for anyone.
Proliferation of problems to solve and ways to solve them have made every consumers life more difficult, whether the consumer is a large electric utility or a teenager looking for an iPod. Keep reading →
A new Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) rule is either a rush to regulate or chickens coming home to roost. But it’s certainly going to raise your electric bill.
EPA’s most expensive power plant clean air initiative ever is scheduled for a final decision on implementation in November. Opponents say its hasty enactment will raise electricity prices 20-25% in coal-dependent regions like the Midwest and South. Proponents say the rule was authorized in 1990 and has been in process since 2000, giving industry decades to prepare, and areas with big costs got two decades of cheap power by avoiding pollution controls. Keep reading →
“A time to search and a time to give up, a time to keep and a time to throw away,” says Ecclesiastes.
For energy it may be: a time for coal and nuclear and a time for renewables. Keep reading →
Nuclear power regulators are rethinking their approach to safety after recent data releases showed that post-9/11 measures were often insufficient.
Implementing a “safety culture” of constant measurement and improvement has been central to the industry’s safety progress since the now minor-seeming accident at Three Mile Island, which resulted in a rule-making binge. Keep reading →
The scale of the energy business is such that firms with more than $10 billion in revenue can fly beneath the radar of public attention and, sometimes, even within the industry itself.
Dutch firm DSM is one such company. Despite its leading role in first developing, and then manufacturing, a significant number of the components that go into making the daily business of the energy industry possible, it remains comparatively low-profile. Keep reading →
IBM’s recent successful implementation of infrastructure for a smart grid throughout the Mediterranean island country of Malta may provide important lessons for other countries seeking to lower energy costs and reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
Some images from the project help illustrate why smart grid is becoming an increasingly attractive option for American utilities, power generators and consumers. Keep reading →
Weekly #Oil Analysis: Projected increase in world oil demand may require OPEC production increase http://t.co/VEaCrXi #energy @EIAgov
With their minds on a sustainable future, Dutch firm DSM and Skysail have looked to the past. The companies have taken a centuries-old approach to solving the fuel challenges of today’s cargo ships, reintroducing the use of sails onto massive oil tankers.
The kite sail doesn’t look a traditional sail on ships from the seafaring past. It attaches to a variety of vessels by a light weight tow rope made with Dyneema, which DSM says is the world’s strongest fiber. Shipping accounts for 90% of international trade and in turn is responsible for over 3% of World CO2 emissions. DSM and Skysail’s kite sail reduces fuel use and related CO2 emissions by 35%, the company says. Keep reading →
Is free choice the same if you are forced to choose?
Encouraging residential electricity users to take a more active role in reducing their own electricity bills has proved difficult for many states, where regulators have proved hesitant to require active participation in programs that allow customers to use electricity providers that are not their traditional utilities. Keep reading →
