Recent claims of weakness at some geothermal energy projects may be more a matter of temporary local problems than an indication of widespread trouble, industry sources told Breaking Energy.
Despite the financial struggles reported by the high-profile Nevada Geothermal Power project, the slump is not necessarily a real indication of the industry’s health. Keep reading →
Investments rose in the last quarter in the cleantech sector despite market volatility and the collapse of Solyndra, CEO of Cleantech Group said today.
Sheeraz Haji said that $2.23 billion in capital investments across 189 clean tech deals were made in the third quarter this year, a 12% increase from the last quarter, and a 23% in the same quarter last year. Keep reading →
Though it is already tightly regulated, the nuclear industry might also need conduct rules.
In this video, Areva’s Corporate Business Ethics Advisor, Olivier Loubiere explains the French energy company’s “unprecedented” decision to “self-regulate” and adopt a code of conduct, what Loubiere calls in this video “a set of voluntary best practices.” Keep reading →
When a 5.8 magnitude earthquake shook the Washington DC and Virgina regions on August 23, the North Anna nuclear plant automatically shut down.
Over a month later the plant is still idle, waiting for the Nuclear Regulatory Commission green light to restart. But when an NRC inspection team, dispatched in early September, found that 25 of the plant’s 27 steel dry cask storage containers had moved several inches during the quake, that restart date may have been pushed off for much longer than initially expected. Keep reading →
NRG Energy is continuing its expansion. The generation firm’s portfolio now includes nuclear and coal in addition to wind and solar and it is increasingly serving customers around the globe.
Last Friday, NRG announced two separate acquisitions that will both broaden its portfolio and add to its generating capacity: the company bought a 250 MW solar photovoltaic (PV) plant, California Valley Solar Ranch (CVSR), from SunPower, and completed acquisition of Philadelphia-based Energy Plus Holdings, an electrical retail company that specializes in providing customers with green energy options for home and office power. Keep reading →
If approved, this will the US’ first new nuclear reactor not only since the Fukushima blowout but also since the Three Mile meltdown in 1979.
And Southern Company has been waiting since March 2008, when it first submitted an application for a combined operating license (COL) to build two new reactors–Vogtle Units 3 and 4–at its Vogtle nuclear plant, located near Waynesboro, Georgia. The COL would allow Southern Company to both construct and move directly into operating the reactors. Keep reading →
A project to install solar panels on military housing across the US, creating thousands of jobs, has been cut back sharply after SolarCity, the company behind it, failed to secure approval for a government loan guarantee before a September 30 deadline.
California-based SolarCity had pleaded with Congress to extend the September 30 deadline for loan guarantees, but on Monday was forced to admit defeat, saying it planned to move forward with a scaled down project without the loan guarantee. Keep reading →
In an ever tightening solar market, the weak may only have a few more months to live, warned MiaSolé VP Marketing Rob DeLine in an interview with AOL Energy.
“Cost is king. If you don’t have a path to a cost structure that allows you some breathing space you’re going to have some trouble,” he said. Keep reading →
In a world of heightened tension between Democrats and Republicans intensified by a seemingly endless fiscal crisis, the Solyndra bankruptcy has been a crisis of its time, prompting shock and escalating rounds of blame.
Republicans blame the Obama administration for heavy government spending and fiscal imprudence while Democrats point out that it was in fact the Bush administration that initially singled Solyndra out for government financing. Caught in the scapegoating is a saturated solar manufacturing sector that is struggling to stay afloat as prices for PV panels drop and renewable tax credits run out at the end of the year. Read more on renewable energy financing: After Solyndra: Renewable Energy Financing 3.0. Keep reading →
An iconic American company whose trash trucks are part of the landscape is increasingly also a major player in the energy space, currently producing enough electricity to power one million homes and aiming to double that number in the next decade.
Waste Management has been filling landfills and feeding recycling facilities with the famously prodigious output of American trash cans for years, but it has also become a leading developer, operator and owner of waste-to-energy and landfill gas-to-energy facilities in the US. Keep reading →
