Tag: Wind power
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Renewable Energy Outlook in Virginia Still Sunny
Progress toward an electric grid powered by renewable energy has been frustratingly slow to many Virginians. There have been two main obstacles to ramping up production of wind and solar power in the Old Dominion: cost and reliability. Wind still has high hurdles in Virginia. There is a limited number of on-shore locations suitable for…
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Banking on Batteries
AES Energy Storage is building a global enterprise using industrial-scale batteries to make the electric grid cleaner and more reliable. Richmond-based Dominion Resources may be the most visible energy company in Virginia — its Dominion Virginia Power subsidiary is the dominant electric utility in the state — but it is not the biggest. That distinction belongs to…
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Rocky Forge Wind Turbines Not a Threat to Aviation
The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has ruled that 549-foot wind turbines, as tall as the Washington Monument, will not pose a danger to passing aircraft, thus putting Apex Clean Energy one step closer to building Virginia’s first commercial wind farm. As proposed, the Rocky Forge Wind project would string 25 turbines along a ridge line in Botetourt…
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The Market-Driven Path to Renewables
by James A. Bacon Texas, one of the most conservative states in the country, is not exactly what you’d call a hotbed of environmental activism. Yet the Lone Star state has added more wind-based generating capacity than any other; wind turbines and other renewables account for 16% of electrical generating capacity — and as much as…
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Fed Official Still Optimistic about Offshore Wind
by James A. Bacon As the cost of offshore wind energy in Europe continues to decline, Abigail Ross Hopper, director of the federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, believes that offshore wind will come to the United States eventually. Responding to a question by Dave Mayfield with the Virginian-Pilot what prospect she sees for ocean…
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Want more Solar and Wind Power? Then You Need More Gas Backup.
by James A. Bacon Elona Verdolini, Francesca Vona and David Popp are deeply concerned about climate change and the need to deploy more renewable energy sources. “Decoupling economic activities from fossil-fuel use (and hence, from anthropogenic carbon emissions) is the only way to avoid severe and pervasive impacts from climate change while sustaining economic growth,” they…
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A Major Setback for Virginia OffShore Wind
The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) has withdrawn $40 million in funding from the Virginia Offshore Wind Technology Advancement Project (VOWTAP), dealing a major blow to plans to build two experiment wind turbines off the Virginia coast and jeopardizing the prospect of major offshore wind development in the foreseeable future. Dominion Virginia Power had hoped…
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A World Where Bats and Blades Coexist
by James A. Bacon Critics have long lambasted wind turbines for killing hundreds of thousands of birds and bats. Charlottesville-based Apex Clean Energy, which seeks to build a wind farm in Botetourt County north of Roanoke, has submitted a plan that it says will mitigate the worst effects of its 25 whirling turbine blades. Apex…
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Appalachian Power Proposes Green Power Tariff
by James A. Bacon Appalachian Power has proposed an alternative rate for customers who want to purchase 100 percent of their electricity from renewable sources. A rider attached to the company’s Virginia tariff bundles the energy output of renewable generators to provide around-the-clock, carbon-free generation. The company, whose service territory encompasses the southwestern third of the state,…
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Clean Power Plan Stalled, Green Energy Still Viable
by James A. Bacon The U.S. Supreme Court has halted implementation of the Clean Power Plan until challenges to its constitutionality can be resolved, creating uncertainty at the state level, including here in Virginia, on how to proceed. The high court gave no explanation for its stay, but foes of the plan, which would compel electric power…
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The Electric Grid Just Got Smarter
Interesting development… Dominion Voltage, Inc., a subsidiary of Dominion Resources and sister company of Dominion Virginia Power, has announced the launch of a new product, EDGE Stabilizer, to help electric utilities manage the reliability impact of solar, wind and other distributed energy resources (DER) on the electric grid. “Market forces are significantly increasing the amount…
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Gas Worse Carbon Polluter than Coal, Says Sierra Club
by James A. Bacon The Sierra Club has attacked the idea of natural gas as a “clean fuel” in a new broadside against the proposed construction of the Atlantic Coast Pipeline (ACP) and the Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP) through Virginia. When viewed over the “natural gas fuel cycle” — including production, transportation and combustion — natural…
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Wind Power Breakthrough
Virginia could finally get a wind farm. In a unanimous vote, the Botetourt County Board of Supervisors voted Tuesday to grant a permit to build 25 wind turbines on the ridge of North Mountain, clearing the way for construction of the first wind farm in Virginia. The 550-foot-tall turbines had sparked objections that they would…
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Speaking of Storing Electricity…
In the previous post, I quoted Dominion Resources CEO Thomas F. Farrell II as alluding to the impracticality of storing electricity on a large scale. He is indubitably right about the high cost of storage today, but scientists and entrepreneurs are looking for ways to drive the costs down. Battery storage of electricity is no…
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The Throne behind the Power
Who runs Virginia’s electric power industry — the SCC? the General Assembly? or an obscure Pennsylvania company that doesn’t own a single megawatt of generating capacity or mile of transmission line?