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Could Success Spoil ISO-NE?

September 6, 2017

Independent System Operator-New England celebrated its 20th anniversary last July with a solid record in its energy and capacity markets, turning around a fragmented regional electric system. Can it repeat that performance in the face of new challenges: retiring coal, oil, and nuclear plants; gas deliverability problems; the rise of renewables; and the need for decarbonization?

On July 1, the Independent System Operator-New England (ISO-NE), headquartered in Holyoke, Massachusetts (Figure 1), marked 20 years as a wholesale, competitive market covering Connecticut, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, Vermont, New Hampshire, and most of Maine (Figure 2). When the ISO began operations, competitive wholesale markets were a bold experiment for the 1990s, fostered by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC). The foundation was FERC’s belief, based in classical economics, that market competition would produce superior results compared to the conventional model of the state-regulated, vertically integrated monopoly electric companies.

1. At the controls. The control room of Independent System Operator-New England’s (ISO-NE’s) headquarters in Holyoke, Massachusetts, is the nerve center for the group’s operations.

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Wave and Tidal Power Technology Near Commercialization

September 4, 2017

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Scotland, which is authorized to set its own energy policy separate from London’s Westminster government, has set a goal of generating 100% of the nation’s annual electricity needs through only renewable sources by 2020, and 100% of its entire power and transportation needs from non-carbon energy by 2030. This decision has created an all-of-the-above clean development strategy as well as a stronger commitment to energy self-reliance. By looking inward at what internal resources exist, Scotland is now home to the most-advanced wave and tidal energy development center in the world.

For decades, engineers have been trying to turn the immense potential of tidal energy into electricity. While ocean currents don’t reach the same speeds that wind can, the inherent energy potential by comparison is enormous. Seawater has more than 800 times the density of air, so for the same rotor swept area, water moving at 2.5 meters per second (m/sec)—roughly 5 knots—exerts the same amount of force as would be applied by wind blowing at nearly 100 m/sec (about 195 knots).…

THE BIG PICTURE: Economic and Workforce Contributions

September 2, 2017

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The post THE BIG PICTURE: Economic and Workforce Contributions appeared first on POWER Magazine.

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DOE Grid Study Points Finger at Natural Gas

August 27, 2017

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In a long-awaited study of electricity markets and grid reliability, the Department of Energy has called out natural gas as the No. 1 reason for retirements of coal and nuclear plants, breaking from the Trump administration’s prior talking point blaming regulations and renewables for the nation’s shrinking coal and nuclear fleets.

The report attributes four factors to the increase in coal and nuclear retirements: low-cost natural gas; low growth in electricity demand; an increase in variable renewable energy (VRE); and regulatory compliance.

“The biggest contributor to coal and nuclear plant retirements has been the advantaged economics of natural gas-fired generation,” the report says, noting that natural gas surpassed coal as the largest source of electricity generation in the U.S.

The study goes on to conclude that: “The increased use of natural gas in the electric sector has resulted in sustained low wholesale market prices that reduce the profitability of other generation resources important to the grid. The fact that new, high-efficiency natural gas plants can be built relatively quickly, compared to coal and nuclear power, also helped to grow gas-fired generation.”…

Mississippi Power Will Absorb Costs for Failed Kemper Gasification Project

August 23, 2017

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A settlement Mississippi Power reached on August 21 with stakeholders of the Kemper County facility will ensure customers won’t be subjected to rate increases associated with the now-abandoned gasification portion of the project. While that will affect revenues, the resolution could soften controversy surrounding the project and avoid protracted legal and financial turmoil, the company said.

Mississippi Power reached the settlement with Denbury Resources—the company under contract to buy all the project’s captured carbon, and which had already built a 61-mile carbon dioxide pipeline—along with three advocacy groups: the Central Mississippi Building and Construction Trades Council, the East Mississippi Business Development Corp., and the Ministerial Alliance Partnership.

It essentially provides that the annual revenue requirement—which is necessary to cover the power company’s expenses and have the opportunity to earn a fair rate of return—for the 2018 Kemper IGCC–related costs would be $ 126 million, resulting in no rate increase for customers now or in the future. It also proposes to modify the project’s 2010-awarded certificate of public convenience and necessity to limit the facility to operations of the natural gas combined cycle power plant, which was completed in 2014.…