Electricity

Texas wind power on track to outpace coal in 2020

Texas is about to go green — by 2020, more electricity will come from wind than coal, according to analytics/consulting firm Rystad Energy. Propelled by the surging shale revolution, Texas now contributes 40% of total U.S. oil production and nearly 25% of marketed natural gas production, Kallanish Energy reports. However, the “Lone Star State” is

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CEA, EDF, Westinghouse to explore SMR cooperation

CEA, EDF and Westinghouse Electric Co. have signed a framework agreement to explore potential cooperation on small modular reactor (SMR) development, Kallanish Energy reports. Worldwide demand for low carbon- electricity generation in the 300- to 400-megawatt range is an important market segment the companies believe their experience in nuclear fuel, reactor design and operation can

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San Jose moves to ban natural gas in new residential buildings

The U.S.’s 10th most populous U.S. city Tuesday moved to ban natural gas in most new residential buildings, beginning next year, Kallanish Energy reports. The 10-member San Jose, California, city council and Mayor Sam Liccardo voted unanimously to make San Jose the largest U.S. city so far to seek to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by

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Power sector still the U.S.’s largest electricity consumer

Energy consumption in the U.S. reached a record high of more than 101 quadrillion British thermal units (quads) in 2018, surpassing the previous high recorded in 2007, by less than 0.3%, the Energy Information Administration reports. For nearly 70 years, the electric power sector, which both consumes and produces energy, has been responsible for some of the

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Vistra Energy closing 4 Illinois power plants

Independent power producer Vistra Energy and its subsidiaries Wednesday named the four coal-fired power plants to be retired to meet the requirements of the recently approved revisions to the Multi-Pollutant Standard (Mps) rule imposed by the Illinois Pollution Control Board (Ipcb). Without this rule change, Vistra said the company’s entire downstate Illinois fleet was at

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PG&E names industry vet Vesey as utility head

Holding company PG&E Corp., operating under bankruptcy court protection, said the board of its Pacific Gas and Electric Co. unit (also in bankruptcy), has appointed Andrew M. Vesey CEO and president, effective Aug. 19. He will report to PG&E Corp. CEO and president Bill Johnson, Kallanish Energy reports. In his role, Vesey will have responsibility

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Power from natgas to rise in 2019, slip in 2020: Steo

The share of U.S. total utility-scale electricity generation from natural gas-fired power plants will rise from 35% in 2018, to 38% in 2019, and then decline slightly in 2020, according to the latest Steo, Short-Term Energy Outlook, produced by the Energy Information Administration. EIA/Steo forecasts the share of U.S. generation from coal will average 24%

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PG&E settles wildfire claims for $1B

Pacific Gas and Electric said Wednesday it’s reached agreements to resolve wildfire claims made by 18 local public entities (cities, counties, districts and public agencies) impacted by the 2015 Butte Fire, 2017 Northern California wildfires and 2018 Camp Fire. Under the agreements, $1 billion in payments will be made as part of a Chapter 11

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Combined-Cycle Natural Gas Power Beats Everything Else

Tom ShepstoneShepstone Management Company, Inc. … … Combined-cycle natural gas power plants offer lower cost electricity than anything else, especially renewables, the true costs of which are never counted. Our friends at the Institute of Energy Research have come out with a study that finally examines the true costs of renewables, including their impacts on

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PG&E plan to use blackouts to prevent wildfires OKed

California regulators Thursday approved PG&E Corp.’s plan to impose blackouts this summer across large swaths of its territory to prevent major wildfires — and told customers don’t count on reliable electric service as the fire season gets underway. The California Public Utilities Commission approved PG&E’s “wildfire mitigation plan,” in which blackouts could conceivably hit every

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PG&E power lines caused California’s ‘deadliest wildfire’: officials

California authorities said Wednesday power lines owned and operated by Pacific Gas & Electric Corp. (PG&E) caused the state’s most destructive wildfire ever – which killed 85 and nearly destroyed an entire city, Kallanish Energy learns. Lines owned by the San Francisco-based utility sparked the Camp Fire on Nov. 8, in Butte County, California, the state Department of Forestry and Fire

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Three Mile Island Unit 1 to shut by Sept. 30

The owner of the plant where North America’s worst nuclear power-related accident took place four decades ago, confirmed the facility’s lone remaining operating unit will shut down this September, Kallanish Energy reports. Exelon Generation said Three Mile Island (Tmi) Generating Station Unit 1, located near Middletown, Pennsylvania, on an island south of the state capital city

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Va. company proposes 200 MW wind farm in Illinois

The Goose Creek Wind Project, which would include up to 120 turbines producing as much as 200 megawatts of power in northern Piatt County, Illinois, has been proposed by Virginia-based Apex Clean Energy, Kallanish Energy reports. Apex hopes to have the wind farm project online by the end of 2021, the Piatt County Journal-Republican newspaper

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Venezuela oil output is said to have dropped by 50%

Power failures that kept Venezuela in darkness for much of March also briefly slashed the country’s crude production by 50%, people familiar with the situation told Bloomberg. Rolling blackouts across much of the country that started on March 7 temporarily paralyzed most of the country’s oil industry, Kallanish Energy finds. Oil output averaged less than

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