AES Increases Its Battery Energy Storage by an Additional 908 Megawatt-hours in California

AES-Energy-Storage

By Renewable Energy World: AES confirmed two new future battery storage sites in Lancaster CA for a total of 227 MW / 908 MWh capacity. “The two facilities are expected to provide a boost to California’s grid, storing renewable energy to be dispatched during periods of high demand.”

AES is awarding contracts for both Clean Power Alliance and PG&E for purchasing the renewable energy from its Luna and Lancaster (LAB) facilities. “In its own announcement, Fluence said the LAB system will use its Mosaic platform for intelligent bidding in the state’s wholesale market, operated by CAISO. Mosaic will “integrate directly with Gridstack, processing operating constraints and parameters in real-time, and employ advanced machine learning and artificial intelligence to generate bids that maximize LAB’s market earnings.”

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Duke Energy Is Planning $145 Billion in Critical Energy Infrastructure Upgrades Over the Next Decade

Duke

From T&D World: “Eighty-five percent of the planned investment will fund the company’s generation fleet transition and grid modernization.”

Duke is planning the critical energy infrastructure upgrades to in order to meet customer demands on affordable, reliable, and green energy. Over the next ten years in energy upgrades, Duke plans to move towards its goal of achieving zero carbon emissions by 2050.

“Our customers’ expectations are clear – they want affordability and reliability to remain a central focus as we work to achieve net-zero carbon emissions by 2050,” said Lynn Good, Duke Energy chair, president and CEO. “We look forward to continuing our collaboration with customers, regulators, community leaders and other stakeholders to meet these expectations. These critical energy infrastructure investments will also provide substantial economic benefits, including job creation and tax revenue for essential governmental services in our regions.”

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To build or not to build: TVA asks public to weigh in on construction of large solar farm

TVA-PV-Solar-Farm

RenewableEnergyWorld – The Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) is asking for public input on the draft Environmental Impact Statement for the North Alabama Utility-Scale Solar Project in Lawrence County.

In January 2019, TVA announced that it holds a two-year purchase option on 3,000 acres in Lawrence County to study the feasibility of building a large solar farm in order to continue reducing its carbon footprint.  

The purpose of this EIS is to address the potential environmental effects associated with constructing, operating, maintaining, and decommissioning the solar facility.

The draft EIS includes two alternatives: a No Action Alternative and an Action Alternative. Under the No Action Alternative, TVA would not execute the purchase under the Purchase Option Agreement, and TVA would not develop a solar facility at this location. Under the Action Alternative, TVA would execute the purchase under the Purchase Option Agreement for the Lawrence County, Alabama, property. 

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Minnesota governor accelerates state’s carbon-free power target 10 years, to 2040

Minnesota-Carbon-Free-Electricity

UtilityDive – Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, D, on Thursday proposed a series of policies that would bring the state to 100% carbon-free electricity by 2040, a decade earlier than the goal he proposed in 2019.

His proposed policy goals follow a report from the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency issued earlier this month, finding the state is not on track to meet its previous goals of reducing economy-wide greenhouse gas emissions 30% below 2005 levels by 2025, and 80% by 2050. Overall, greenhouse gas emissions have declined 8% since 2005, according to the agency’s latest data, which measures emissions through 2018.

Minnesota’s largest investor-owned utilities (IOUs) — Xcel Energy and Minnesota Power — are pursuing 100% carbon-free energy by 2050 targets, and said their plans are more realistic.

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Why Grid-Tied Solar Power Systems Are Recommended Over Other Solar Systems?

Off-Grid-Solar-System-with-Backup
by the 3 Phase Associates “TEAM”
Renewable energy and distributed energy resources (DERs) continue to flood the electric utility grid providing cleaner and more sustainable energy. As the traditional power grid evolves into a smarter electric grid, environmental regulations push for more cleaner renewable energy sources. Solar PV electric power systems are leading the path in this effort with improvements in technologies, efficiencies, and cost reductions. The grid-tied solar systems are gaining popularity and becoming more favored over other solar electric systems. 
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Amazon Becomes World’s Largest Corporate Purchaser of Renewable Energy, Advancing its Climate Pledge Commitment to be Net-zero Carbon by 2040

Amazon-Renewable-Energy

EE Online – Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN) today (Dec 10) announced 26 new utility-scale wind and solar energy projects totaling 3.4 gigawatts (GW) of electricity production capacity, bringing its total investment in renewable energy in 2020 to 35 projects and more than 4 GW of capacity the largest corporate investment in renewable energy in a single year. These new projects will make Amazon the largest-ever corporate purchaser of renewable energy.

Amazon has now invested in 6.5 GW of wind and solar projects that will enable the company to supply its operations with more than 18 million megawatt hours (MWh) of renewable energy annually. This is enough to power 1.7 million U.S. homes for one year. These projects will supply renewable energy for Amazon’s corporate offices, fulfillment centers, and Amazon Web Services (AWS) data centers that support millions of customers globally. They will also help advance Amazon’s goal to reach net-zero carbon emissions across its business by 2040. Part of that commitment is powering Amazon’s infrastructure with 100% renewable energy, and the company is now on a path to achieve this milestone by 2025, five years ahead of the initial 2030 target.

“Amazon is helping fight climate change by moving quickly to power our businesses with renewable energy,” said Jeff Bezos, Amazon founder and CEO. “With a total of 127 solar and wind projects, Amazon is now the biggest corporate buyer of renewable energy ever. We are on a path to running 100% of our business on renewable energy by 2025 five years ahead of our original target of 2030. This is just one of the many steps we’re taking that will help us meet our Climate Pledge. I couldn’t be more proud of all the teams across Amazon that continue to work hard, smart, and fast to get these projects up and running.”

The 26 new wind and solar projects announced today are located in Australia, France, Germany, Italy, South Africa, Sweden, the U.K., and the U.S. The new projects are Amazon’s first in France, Germany, Italy, and South Africa. In the U.S., Amazon has now enabled wind and solar projects in California, Delaware, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Nebraska, North Carolina, Ohio, Texas, and Virginia. Amazon has a total of 127 renewable energy projects globally, including 59 utility-scale wind and solar renewable energy projects and 68 solar rooftops on fulfillment centers and sort centers around the globe.

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