Category: Electric Reliability

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China Reveals World’s Biggest Offshore Wind Turbine

China-Wind-Turbine

By PowerMag:

“Two Chinese companies announced production of the largest offshore wind turbine built to date, a 16-MW unit developed by China Three Gorges (CTG) and Goldwind.

The groups on Nov. 24 showed off the turbine at a factory in Fujian province. The turbine has a 252-meter rotor diameter, with a 50,000-meter sweep area. The hub height is 146 meters.

Lei Mingshan, chairman of CTG, in a statement said, ‘the successful rollout of the 16-MW unit marks that my country’s wind power equipment industry has achieved a historic leap from ‘following’ to ‘running alongside’ and then to ‘leading’, creating the latest benchmark for the development of global offshore wind power equipment.’ ”

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FERC Tightens Regulations for Inverter Based Resources

FERC-Regulatory

By Renewable Energy World:

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) issued “new mandatory standards for inverter-based resources (IBRs) in an effort to enhance the reliability of the bulk electric system. IBRs are solar photovoltaic, wind, fuel cell and battery storage resources that use power electronic devices to change direct current power to alternating current power, to be transmitted on the bulk-power system.

In its November 17 action orders, FERC focused on three IBR-relateded actions:

  • An order directing the North American Electric Reliability Corp. (NERC) to develop a plan to register the entities that own and operate IBRs;
  • A Notice of Proposed Rulemaking to direct NERC to develop reliability standards for IBRs that cover data sharing, model validation, planning and operational studies, and performance requirements; and
  • An order approving reliability standards that are related to IBRs, which NERC proposed earlier in 2022.”

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Higher Electricity Prices Estimated for this Winter Season

Winter-Peak-Power-Demand

By UtilityDive:

The New York Independent System Operator (NYISO) reported that “the grid operator’s extreme winter weather scenario shows that peak demand could increase to as much as 26,086 MW, higher than its previous all-time winter peak.

NYISO repeated its earlier warning that it expects a sharp rise in wholesale electricity prices, and in consumer bills, this winter due to lingering impacts of the pandemic and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

The U.S. Energy Information Administration projected that the price of natural gas delivered to electric generators would average $8.81/MMBtu this summer, up from $3.93/MMBtu in 2021.”

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Higher Fuel Costs and Power Outages Produced a Hard Spot for TVA in 2022

TVA-Power-Expenses

By PowerEngineering:

TVA’s financial statement filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) showed fuel and power purchased expenses up nearly $2 billion in FY ’22 compared to the previous fiscal year. “Total operating expenses rose $2.5 billion for the year that ended Sept. 30, as compared to the prior year.

These increases were primarily due to higher natural gas and coal prices, along with increased market prices of purchased power. TVA said its fuel expenses alone rose by $830 million year-over-year. TVA said the average price of natural gas was almost 90% higher in 2022 as compared to 2021.”

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DOE Will Implement $350 Million in Long-Duration Energy Storage Projects

DOE-Energy-Storage

By T&D World:

The US Department of Energy (DOE) will deploy long-duration energy storage (LDES) projects for maintaining power delivery for “10 to 24 hours or longer to support a low-cost, reliable, carbon-free electric grid. Funded in part by President Biden’s Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, this funding opportunity will advance new renewable energy technologies, enhance the capabilities of customers and communities to integrate grid storage more effectively, increase grid resilience, and expand America’s global leadership in energy storage.

The Biden-Harris Administration, through the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) has announced $350 million for these emerging” type projects.

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DOE: Distributed Energy Resources Need to Be Designed with Cybersecurity Protection

Cyber-protection-of-DERs

By Utility Dive:

Distributed Energy Resources (DERs) present major obstacles in grid reliability and protection against cyberattacks and threats. DOE states “they should be designed with security as a ‘core component.’

An attack on distributed solar or battery storage resources would have ‘negligible impact’ on grid reliability today, DOE said, but the capacity of DERs on the electric system is expected to quadruple by 2025 and the agency warned that each of those systems could be hacked.”

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