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Biden Presidency Promises Change for Power Industry

January 7, 2021

The post Biden Presidency Promises Change for Power Industry appeared first on POWER Magazine.

As we get closer to the presidential inauguration, and with President-elect Biden’s announcement of his Cabinet picks for the Department of Energy (DOE), Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), and the Department of the Interior (Interior), we begin the inevitable hypothesizing about which “Day 1 actions” will be taken, which actions will be among the administration’s “100 Day actions,” and what priorities will bleed into 2022 or beyond.

COMMENTARY

President-elect Biden has put forth a sweeping platform during the campaign, a platform that if accomplished would completely transform the U.S. energy system within the next several decades by putting the country on a path to achieve net-zero emissions, economy-wide, by 2050, and to generate electricity from renewable sources in order to achieve a carbon pollution-free power sector by 2035. To achieve these goals, substantial technological advancement is required, including significant changes to the power generation, transmission, and distribution systems.…

GE Will Pay $200M Penalty for Power Business Violations

December 15, 2020

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General Electric (GE) has agreed to pay a $ 200 million penalty to settle claims by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) that the company misled investors when it failed to disclose material information related to its power and insurance businesses.

In an order on Dec. 9 capping an investigation that the SEC opened in January 2018, the federal agency said GE misled investors when it failed to disclose that more than a quarter of GE Power’s reported profits in 2016, and almost half of its reported profits in the first three quarters of 2017, resulted from reductions in estimates of the cost to complete multiyear agreements to provide repairs and service for customers’ power turbines.

The order outlines a series of events related to the claim, starting with a May 2015 investor conference, when GE’s then-CEO Jeff Immelt described a framework for future earnings growth, even as GE Power was undergoing substantial changes.…

Organic Technology New Paradigm for Power

November 19, 2020

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A Florida-based company that touts what it calls a scalable organic energy-based power technology has launched operations in North America, and said it is making its technology available across several markets including for transportation and commercial buildings.

GO-OPV, LLC on Nov. 17 announced its ORENgE organic technology will be used in a 120,000-square-foot commercial property in New York, where ORENgE panel window installation will provide the property’s power over ethernet, along with meeting the UL 924 lighting standard for emergency lighting and power equipment. The company on Tuesday said it also is accelerating a zero-carbon program for large trucks that will provide vehicles with an advanced low-light power technology.

The technology is part of a growing segment of power generation that includes building-integrated photovoltaics (BIPV), where photovoltaic modules are integrated into a building. The ORENgE technology, in development since 2012, uses a building’s windows as a power generation source.…

The POWER Interview: Financial Benefits of Energy Storage

November 5, 2020

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The post The POWER Interview: Financial Benefits of Energy Storage appeared first on POWER Magazine.

Speakers at POWER’s recent Distributed Energy Experience were unanimous in their agreement that energy storage is a game-changing technology for the power generation sector. Storage provides for more reliability and resilience, and already is proving its importance to supporting the growth of solar and wind power.

Utilities are incorporating storage into their generation portfolios. It is often featured as part of microgrid configurations, and the business community has discovered the cost-effectiveness of storage in commercial and industrial distributed generation systems.

Abbot Moffat, Director of Business Development / West for Rubicon Professional Services, provided POWER with his insight into energy storage. Rubicon is a team of experienced design and construction experts that works on projects for several industries, including alternative energy, data centers, health care, telecommunications, and power plants.

POWER: What are the financial benefits for a utility to incorporate energy storage into its project portfolio?…

Coal-Fired Power in 2021: A Recovery or a Reckoning?

October 21, 2020

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The post Coal-Fired Power in 2021: A Recovery or a Reckoning? appeared first on POWER Magazine.

This has been the year from hell for coal-fired power and the coal industry. If current projections hold, coal generation in 2020 will be 21% lower than last year and 62% lower than the 2007 peak. The coal share of the generating mix, which for decades hovered around 50%, will finish the year at 20%, the lowest on record. Coal production will be the lowest since 1964 and down by a quarter just from 2019.

The new year may bring relief. The U.S. Energy Information Administration’s (EIA’s) Short-Term Energy Outlook (STEO) projects that coal generation will recover most of its 2020 losses in 2021, bringing some stability to coal plant operators and coal miners. The key factor behind a coal power recovery is higher prices for natural gas, which indeed appear likely in 2021. Nonetheless, a coal recovery in 2021 is highly contingent on other dynamics.…

AECOM Sells Power Business as Part of Restructuring

October 17, 2020

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The post AECOM Sells Power Business as Part of Restructuring appeared first on POWER Magazine.

AECOM has announced the closing of the sale of its Power construction business to affiliates of CriticalPoint Capital LLC. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

The Los Angeles, California-based infrastructure consulting firm, which this month announced a restructuring plan, earlier this year closed on the $ 2.4 billion sale of its Maryland-based Management Services business—which provides consulting services to the government sector—to New York-based private equity firms American Securities and Lindsay Goldberg.

“The sale of the Power construction business marks another milestone in the successful execution of our transformation into a higher-margin, lower-risk Professional Services business,” said Troy Rudd, AECOM’s CEO, in an Oct. 16 news release. “We have built significant momentum in our business and continue to advance efforts to align our organization around a global structure that fosters a culture of collaboration, better connects our expertise and focuses on our best growth opportunities.…