Energy experts at Navigant Research are convinced that micro-grids are moving from a niche novelty to mainstream, writes Fereidoon Sioshansi, publisher of newsletter EEnergy Informer. They forecast cumulative micro-grid investments of over $100 billion over the next decade, much of it in North America and Asia. Europe is lagging behind, but Finland may represent a growth market. Sioshansi takes a closer look at what microgrids are and how they … [Read more...]
Rapid wind and solar cost declines keep pushing fossil fuels out. How far can they go?
Rapid cost declines made renewable energy the United States’ cheapest available source of new electricity, without subsidies, in 2017, writes Silvio Marcacci of think tank Energy Innovation. In many parts of the U.S., building new wind is cheaper than running existing coal, while nuclear and natural gas aren’t far behind, notes Marcacci. As renewable energy costs continue their relentless decline, they keep pushing fossil fuels further from … [Read more...]
Nuclear power in crisis: we are entering the Era of Nuclear Decommissioning
Nuclear power is in crisis ‒ as even the most strident nuclear enthusiasts acknowledge ‒ and it is likely that a new era is fast emerging, writes Jim Green, editor of the Nuclear Monitor newsletter. After a growth spurt from the 1960s to the '90s, then 20 years of stagnation, the Era of Nuclear Decommissioning is upon us. Article courtesy Nuclear Monitor. … [Read more...]
Beyond Bitcoin: how to build an energy-efficient blockchain that can help the energy transition
There is widespread concern over the high energy use of Bitcoin mining. But blockchains can be highly energy-efficient, writes Sam Hartnett of the Energy Web Foundation, a joint initiative of Rocky Mountain Institute and Grid Singularity who have partnered with Shell, Statoil, Engie, and other energy companies to accelerate adoption of blockchain technology in the energy sector. According to Hartnett, Â blockchain technology will help accelerate … [Read more...]
Time for German network operators to come clean about tariffs
Network tariffs are an important part of energy costs for consumers, yet, surprisingly, the way these fees are established in Germany is completely opaque, writes Andreas Jahn, Berlin-based Senior Associate at global energy policy advisors Regulatory Assistance Project (RAP). According to Jahn, it is unclear how network operators and the regulator calculate costs and how they are allocated to customers. He calls on the German government—and on … [Read more...]
China takes steps to stimulate distributed renewable energy generation
China’s spectacular expansion of its solar power capacity is mostly based on utility-scale solar, but distributed solar is also taking off, write Max Dupuy and Wang Xuan, two China experts from the globally operating Regulatory Assistance Project (RAP). According to Dupuy and Xuan, this trend may be expected to continue, as the Chinese government is creating new business and regulatory models to stimulate distributed solar PV and other … [Read more...]
Will China’s Belt and Road Initiative help or hinder clean energy?
China’s Belt and Road Initiative, the broad infrastructure and market-building initiative of the world’s second-largest economy, has a different feel than trade agreements initiated in the West – and it could have major implications for the future of energy across many parts of the world, writes Sonia Aggarwal, Vice President of think tank Energy Innovation, and Director of America’s Power Plan. … [Read more...]
Winds of change: Britain now generates twice as much electricity from wind as coal
Just six years ago, more than 40% of Britain’s electricity was generated by burning coal. Today, that figure is just 7%. Yet if the story of 2016 was the dramatic demise of coal and its replacement by natural gas, then 2017 was most definitely about the growth of wind power, write Grant Wilson and Iain Staffell. Courtesy The Conversation. … [Read more...]
The net cost of using renewables to hit Australia’s climate target? Nothing
Australia can meet its 2030 greenhouse emissions target at zero net cost, according to a new analysis of a range of options for the National Electricity Market, write Andrew Blakers, Bin Lu and Matthew Stocks of Australian National University. Courtesy The Conversation. … [Read more...]
The Polish energy problem – the Ukrainian nuclear solution
Poland can’t continue to rely on coal, because it’s dirty, inefficient and increasingly has to be imported from Russia. But is there an alternative? Yes, there is, writes Mike Parr of consultancy PWR: Poland could import excess nuclear power from Ukraine. In fact, the interconnections for this have been in place for years. But Polish politicians have not taken action. … [Read more...]
German utilities are struggling with digitalization, especially in retail
German utilities claim that they are becoming consumer-centred, service-based organisations, but research from Oliver Wyman shows that in actual fact their market share in the digitalized retail market is very small, writes energy economist Marius Buchmann of Jacobs University in Bremen. But they may still deliver on their promise: they are ready to launch digital attackers. Article courtesy of Buchmann’s blog Enerquire. … [Read more...]
The spectacular success of the German Energiewende- and what needs to be done next
While a government is being formed in Berlin, which will have important implications for the future of the Energiewende, author and scholar Professor John Mathews of Macquarie University in Australia, looks back on what Germany has achieved so far with its unique energy policy and concludes that it has been a spectacular success, whatever its detractors may say. But he also has some advice to offer: the German government, he writes, should be … [Read more...]
How Paris and Vienna are struggling to become the clean cities of the future
The success of the clean energy transition will depend to a large extent on the actions of local and regional authorities. Sustainability officers from Paris, Sabine Romon, and Vienna, Bernd Vogl, explain what clean energy goals they have set themselves and how they are planning to achieve them. “The thing to start with is the infrastructure”, says Vogl. “The first task is to work on our public buildings”, says Romon, who warns that Paris' ban on … [Read more...]
EU must take regionalisation of electricity markets a step further
The European Commission has proposed to set up Regional Operational Centers (ROCs), which is a welcome step in the further integration of the EU internal electricity market, writes Philip Baker of the Regulatory Assistance Project (RAP). However, according to Baker, the proposal does not go far enough: more regional coordination is needed if consumers are to reap the benefits of market integration. … [Read more...]
How electricity will be priced in the future
The rapid transformation of the electricity sector will make it necessary for utilities to adopt radically new pricing methods, writes Fereidoon Sioshansi, publisher of newsletter EEnergy Informer and editor of a new book, Innovation & Disruption at the Grid’s Edge. According to Sioshansi, existing volumetric tariffs will increasingly be replaced by fixed service fees. … [Read more...]
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