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

August 27, 2018

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…

MHPS Tops GE, Siemens in Gas Turbine Market

May 5, 2018

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A report from Barclays Plc said Mitsubishi Hitachi Power Systems (MHPS) received more than half of all global orders for gas-fueled turbines in the first quarter of 2018, the company’s best-ever performance in a market that has seen traditional gas turbine manufacturers struggle in recent months.

The market report from the London, UK-based multinational investment bank was released May 3. It said Germany-based Siemens AG had 26% of global orders in 1Q2018, with Boston, Mass.-based General Electric (GE)—long the leader in worldwide turbine sales—seeing its share drop to 14%. GE CEO John Flannery, who took the reins of the company last year and immediately set out to restructure its operations, has said GE was slow in recognizing slowing demand for gas-fueled turbines. Flannery has changed the leadership of the company’s struggling Power division and said the group needs a “right-sizing” for market structure, including changes to portfolio, supply chain, and supply base by 2020.

Flannery’s outline for changes came at almost the same time in November 2017 as Siemens announced it would consolidate its power divisions and cut 6,900 jobs.…

More U.S. Coal Units Closing Despite Possible Market Pricing Change

November 22, 2017

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U.S. utilities continue to announce closures of financially troubled and older coal-fired power plants even as government officials work on a bailout plan to keep them operating.

Owners of a coal plant in Montana that has only been online since 2006 informed the state’s Public Service Commission (PSC) last week of plans to shutter the facility early next year if they can’t find a buyer. The news comes at the same time Louisville Gas & Electric and Kentucky Utilities (LG&E-KU) said it would close two long-running coal-fired units at the E.W. Brown Generating Station near Harrodsburg, Kentucky, in February 2019.

The announcements are the latest in a series of closures announced in recent months, including three large coal-fired plants in Texas—two operated by Vistra Energy and another by Luminant, a Vistra subsidiary—that generate about 4.2 GW of electricity, or about 12% of the state’s coal-fired generation capacity. Another large Texas plant, CPS Energy’s 840-MW Deely station in San Antonio, is scheduled to close in 2018.…

Dominion Resources Changes its Name to Reflect Market Evolution

May 15, 2017

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Dominion Resources, one of the nation’s largest power generators, has changed its name and the names of key subsidiaries, including Dominion Virginia Power.

The Richmond, Va.–headquartered company that has a power portfolio of 26.2 GW, sizable transmission assets, as well as natural gas storage systems and pipelines, will now be known as “Dominion Energy.”

The names of Dominion Energy’s three operating segments—through which the company manages its daily operations and that the company uses in its financial reporting to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission—have been also revised. Power Delivery Group, Power Generation Group, and Gas Infrastructure Group will replace Dominion Virginia Power, Dominion Generation, and Dominion Energy, respectively, the company said.

Several customer-facing entities are also seeing name changes. Questar Corp., a gas pipeline, storage, and local distribution company acquired by Dominion last year in a $ 4.4 billion deal, will now be known as the “Dominion Questar Corp.” The company also has a new logo.

The name changes recognize the company’s “focus on the evolving energy marketplace and to unify our brand after last year’s merger with Questar,” said Thomas F.…

Report: Cheap Natural Gas Poised to Roil PJM Power Market

May 13, 2017

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The flood of cheap Marcellus Shale gas driving massive construction of new natural gas power generation capacity could wreak havoc in the PJM power market, Moody’s Investors Service suggests in a new report.

Two of the nation’s largest power markets, Texas and California, already pose a “distressed environment” for unregulated power companies owing to declining market prices, the credit ratings agency said. Now, a glut of new gas generation in PJM—where new plants are expected to add up to 100 TWh, boosting gas power capacity 25%, by 2021—is poised to increase supply “amid little prospect of growth in demand,” it said.

The agency noted that PJM’s latest forecast report indicates load growth has declined over the last decade, with system load falling to 790 TWh in 2015 from 822 TWh in 2005. Peak demand has also fallen to 143 GW in 2015 from 154 GW in 2005. “Over the past few years PJM has also repeatedly cut its forecasts, and the grid operator currently projects weather-adjusted peak demand growth of only 0.2% per year over the next 10 years,” the report says.…

Drought Has Big Impact on California Power Market

April 27, 2017

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Rain and snow has returned to California, ending the record-setting drought with record-setting precipitation.

The drought led to forest fires, dead orchards, and brown lawns. It also took a big bite out of ratepayers’ wallets and increased global warming emissions, due to the loss of low-cost, zero-emission hydropower.

In a study released April 26 by Peter Gleick—a noted water expert at the Pacific Institute in Oakland—researchers found that lower hydropower production cost California ratepayers almost $ 2.5 billion in higher power prices, and may have raised power sector carbon dioxide emissions 10%, due to increased output from gas-fired generators (see Figure 2). Gleick’s team used data through September 2016 to calculate the figures.

Courtesy: Pacific Institute

California has 14 GW of hydro capacity, with little growth in recent decades due to environmental, economic, and political constraints. While hydro typically supplies about 18% of California’s power, the drought dropped production to as low as 7% in 2015, the driest year of the drought.…