Tag: Could
Public Safety Power Shutoffs: How Utilities Could Partner
The post Public Safety Power Shutoffs: How Utilities Could Partner appeared first on POWER Magazine.
Catastrophic wildfires have devastated California in recent years. This article seeks to outline a plan wherein neighboring utilities can send energy to support a utility that has shut down critical paths during wildfire mitigation efforts.
On the morning of Nov. 8, 2018, the Camp Fire erupted 90 miles north of Sacramento, California (Figure 1). This fire was the deadliest and most destructive wildfire in California history, ultimately causing 85 fatalities.
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1. The Camp Fire as seen from the Landsat 8satellite. Source: NASA/Joshua Stevens |
The fire started under Pacific Gas and Electric’s (PG&E’s) 115-kV transmission line near Pulga in Butte County, and resulted in the January 2019 bankruptcy of PG&E—once the U.S.’s largest utility with annual revenues of $ 16 billion. While PG&E is the first utility to face financial ruin over its wildfire exposure, climate change could make this a cogent problem for many utilities across the nation.…
2.2-GW Coal-Fired Behemoth Could Permanently Close This Week
The post 2.2-GW Coal-Fired Behemoth Could Permanently Close This Week appeared first on POWER Magazine.
The 2,250-MW coal-fired Navajo Generating Station (NGS) in Arizona will permanently close likely this week, ending a long and bitter fight to keep the plant and its affiliated coal mine open.
The plant’s utility owners—Salt River Project (SRP), Arizona Public Service Co., Tucson Electric Power Co., and NV Energy—in February 2017 voted to shut down the plant located on tribal land near Page along the border with Utah, citing “rapidly changing economics of the energy industry,” which has seen natural gas prices sink to record lows.
SRP, the plant’s majority owner, told POWER in an email on Nov. 12 that operations at the plant are now expected to end within the next week, once fuel on site has been exhausted. “The best estimate now is for all units to be shut down permanently on Nov. 15—but that could change,” a spokesperson said.
After the project’s utility owners voted to close the plant in 2017, coal mining giant Peabody Energy, the Department of Interior (whose Bureau of Reclamation is a participant in the project), and the Navajo Nation launched concerted attempts to find an outside buyer to keep running the plant.…
PG&E: Judge’s Proposal Could Cost Utility $150 Billion
Pacific Gas & Electric (PG&E) on Jan. 23 said a federal judge’s proposal that the utility mitigate fire danger in its service territory by trimming trees, along with inspecting and repairing thousands of miles of power lines, could cost the company as much as $ 150 billion this year.
William Alsup, a judge in the U.S. District Court for Northern California, earlier this month said he could order PG&E to remove or trim all trees that could threaten the utility’s equipment and possibly lead to wildfires. The judge said the work would need to be done by June 21.
The California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC), which regulates the state’s utilities, is expected to express its opinion of Alsup’s proposal by Jan. 25. A hearing on the proposal is scheduled for Jan. 30 in San Francisco, the day after PG&E is expected to file for bankruptcy.
Alsup is supervising PG&E’s probation term that began in 2017 after PG&E was convicted of felony charges stemming from a 2010 natural gas pipeline explosion in San Bruno, Calif.,…