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Distributed Energy Is Disrupting the Power Industry: Is the Sky Falling?

October 19, 2018

Utilities are faced with many disruptive changes in the power market. Customers are demanding cleaner energy and turning to distributed generation as a solution. One expert suggested power companies must react and evolve their business models to change with the times.

During a keynote presentation at the Distributed Energy Conference in Golden, Colorado, on October 17, Roy M. Palk, Esq. (Figure 1), president of New Horizons Consulting and former CEO of East Kentucky Power Cooperative, said, “The utility model, in terms of planning, has just been turned upside down. It will stay that way, in my opinion, for years to come.”

1. Roy Palk, Esq., president of New Horizons Consulting, gave a keynote presentation during the Distributed Energy Conference, in Golden, Colorado, on October 17, 2018. Source: POWER

However, Palk was not pessimistic about the future. He encouraged power utilities to “embrace the changes.” The three points that Palk wanted attendees to take away from his presentation were:

Power companies were born and thrive on disruption.

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Power Market Is Changing — Distributed Energy Gaining Ground [PODCAST]

August 27, 2018

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The power market is changing. It’s being driven more and more by the retail side of the business, according to Roy Palk, Esq., president of New Horizons Consulting. Palk will give a presentation titled “The Rise of Distributed Energy — New Challenges Bring New Opportunities” during the Distributed Energy Conference, which will be held at the Denver Marriott West in Golden, Colorado, October 15–17, 2018.

Palk joined The POWER Podcast to give a brief preview of his talk. He said younger, more-sophisticated and environmentally attuned consumers, as well as commercial and industrial companies that are going green—often following edicts from their boards of directors—are forcing utilities to evolve in order to remain the energy provider for these customers.

The rise of solar and wind power, microgrids, and other distributed energy resources means member-owned cooperatives and large utilities must look at their business models in a new light, focusing on the benefits of leveraging the trend toward distributed generation.

To learn more about the Distributed Energy Conference and to register for the event, visit www.distributedenergyconference.com…

Experts: Coal Plants Must Adapt to New Energy Landscape

August 25, 2018

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The Trump administration’s Affordable Clean Energy (ACE) rule announced August 21 calls for coal-fired power plants to meet state-designed performance standards, most notably focused on increases in heat rate and overall efficiency for individual generating stations.

Energy experts speaking at the MEGA Symposium in Baltimore, Maryland, on August 22 agreed it’s a goal worth pursuing. They also said it will be difficult to achieve due to the evolving nature of U.S. power generation.

The rise of natural gas, which today accounts for the largest percentage of the nation’s electricity production, along with the addition of renewable sources such as wind and solar power to the grid, has lessened the amount of coal-fired generation across the country. It has decreased coal’s capacity factor—the average power generated by a particular energy source, divided by the rated peak power of that source—to just above 50%, behind natural gas, and well below the 73% capacity factor for coal as recently as 2008, according to the U.S.…

Bill Supporting Xcel Energy Nuclear Plants Dies in Minnesota

May 30, 2018

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A bill that would have provided more cost-recovery certainty for Xcel Energy’s two Minnesota nuclear plants didn’t get through the state House of Representatives prior to the legislative session ending on May 20, effectively killing the measure.

The bill would have allowed Xcel to submit proposals to the Minnesota Public Utilities Commission (MPUC) designating each of its nuclear plants—the dual-unit Prairie Island station and the single-unit Monticello plant—as carbon-reduction facilities. As part of the process, the company would have included a proposed statement of the total expected costs, including but not limited to capital investments and operation and maintenance costs associated with the facility’s operation.

The MPUC would then have been required to approve or reject the total expected costs within 10 months of the filing date. The solution would have given Xcel the ability to recover a facility’s total costs outside of a general rate case proceeding. Proponents of the legislation suggested that it would have given Xcel more certainty than it currently has concerning cost recovery.…

Net Metering and Time-Variant Rates Drive Solar Power and Energy Storage Growth [PODCAST]

April 29, 2018

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Nevada law has included net metering provisions for more than 20 years. Net metering is an arrangement that allows energy generated by a customer’s leased or purchased solar system to offset monthly power bills. It also permits excess energy supplied to the grid to earn credits, which are then automatically applied to future billing periods in which more energy is consumed than produced.

Historically, net metering was a one-for-one transaction in Nevada. For every kWh supplied to the grid, a credit was given to the customer for one kWh in the future. The scheme changed in 2015 when the Nevada Public Utilities Commission (PUC) created a laddered approach that ratcheted down the value of customer-generated energy over a period of years to about 2¢/kWh, which was much less than the retail rate of about 11¢/kWh. The change effectively stopped all construction on new residential rooftop solar systems.

Through Assembly Bill 405 (AB 405), the Nevada Legislature modified the net metering rate structure effective June 15, 2017.…

Report: Clean Energy Investments Hit $333.5 Billion in 2017

January 18, 2018

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Though some countries, including the U.S., have moved to support coal-fired power generation over the past year, investments in renewable energy continued to rise, according to a new report from Bloomberg New Energy Finance (BNEF).

The research group on January 16 said global investment in clean energy such as wind and solar reached about $ 333.5 billion in 2017, a 3% rise from the prior year, and just 7% below the record in 2015. BNEF said about half of all investment went to solar projects, with China accounting for nearly $ 133 billion—or about 40%—of the total investment in renewables. China’s total is 24% more than it spent in 2016, according to BNEF.

The report said two dozen countries invested more than $ 1 billion in clean energy initiatives in 2017. It noted that the falling costs of equipment such as wind turbines and solar panels has opened new markets, and is bringing electrification to areas—particularly in developing countries—where there is limited access to a transmission grid.…