Category: Environment
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The Bizarre Local Politics of Solar Energy
by James A. Bacon As nice as it would be to generate lots of power from the wind, one can understand why people don’t like wind turbines near them. They disrupt viewsheds. They make loud thrumming noises. They kills birds and bats. What I can’t understand is why people would object to having solar panels…
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Burning Waste Coal to Restore the Land
by James A. Bacon The Virginia City Hybrid Energy Center (VCHEC) is one of the cleanest-burning coal-fired power plants in the country. Its circulating fluidized bed technology meets strict federal standards for air emissions of sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxide, particulates and mercury. But it also has been instrumental in cleaning river water — by helping reclaim the 500,000-ton,…
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BARC Launches Virginia’s First Community Solar Project
by James A. Bacon Governor Terry McAuliffe traveled to Lexington yesterday to flip the switch on Virginia’s first community solar project, installed by the tiny BARC Electrical Cooperative. “BARC’s community solar project is an excellent model for stabilizing and reducing energy costs, while delivering clean solar power to a large segment of households on the…
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The Market-Driven Path to Renewables
by James A. Bacon Texas, one of the most conservative states in the country, is not exactly what you’d call a hotbed of environmental activism. Yet the Lone Star state has added more wind-based generating capacity than any other; wind turbines and other renewables account for 16% of electrical generating capacity — and as much as…
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Dominion to Recover $140 Million for Burying Electric Lines for Outage-Prone Customers
by James A. Bacon The State Corporation Commission ruled earlier this week that Dominion Virginia Power can recover up to $140 million on what it has spent to bury about 400 miles of electric distribution lines. By putting the overhead tap lines of the 6,000 most outage-prone customers underground, the electric company hopes to significantly reduce time spent…
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Fed Official Still Optimistic about Offshore Wind
by James A. Bacon As the cost of offshore wind energy in Europe continues to decline, Abigail Ross Hopper, director of the federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, believes that offshore wind will come to the United States eventually. Responding to a question by Dave Mayfield with the Virginian-Pilot what prospect she sees for ocean…
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Hecate Announces Solar Deal in Cape Charles
by James A. Bacon Governor Terry McAuliffe has announced yet another utility-scale solar deal, this one a 20-megawatt project in Cape Charles in Northampton County. The “Cherrydale Project” will generate enough energy to power more than 3,000 households throughout the region, states the governor’s press release. The project was assembled by a newcomer to the Virginia…
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Want more Solar and Wind Power? Then You Need More Gas Backup.
by James A. Bacon Elona Verdolini, Francesca Vona and David Popp are deeply concerned about climate change and the need to deploy more renewable energy sources. “Decoupling economic activities from fossil-fuel use (and hence, from anthropogenic carbon emissions) is the only way to avoid severe and pervasive impacts from climate change while sustaining economic growth,” they…
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DEQ Approves Utility-Scale Solar Permit in Buckingham
by James A. Bacon The Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) has issued a permit for construction of a 19.8-megawatt, utility-scale solar project in Buckingham County, Governor Terry McAuliffe announced yesterday. Construction of the 200-acre facility is expected to begin early in 2017 and be finished by the end of the year. The cost is estimated…
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More on the Oceana Solar Plant: Expensive but No Cost to Virginia Rate Payers
More details dribbling in about the Oceana Naval Station solar power plant… According to Dominion Virginia Power’s SCC filing, the project is expected to cost $39.6 million, excluding financing costs, or $2,252 per kW. That is roughly three times the up-front capital cost per kW of Dominion’s newest gas-fired power plant under construction in Greensville…
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More Information, Please, about Oceana’s New Solar Facility
by James A. Bacon The Department of the Navy is collaborating with Dominion Virginia Power and the Commonwealth of Virginia to build a 21-megawatt solar energy facility at the Oceana Naval Air Station in Virginia Beach. The 100-acre facility, housing 179,0000 solar panels and scheduled for completion in late 2017, will supply enough electricity at peak…
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Guarding the Grid
by James A. Bacon It’s easy to spin nightmare scenarios leading to the collapse of the electric grid. North Korea detonates a nuclear weapon a mile overhead, sending out a super-charged electro-magnetic pulse that melts down transmission lines and blows out substations. The electricity overload races ahead of anyone’s ability to control it in a…
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Solar Technology Advances, Solar Policy Backtracks
by James A. Bacon Joshua Choi, a University of Virginia chemical engineer, is part of a research team that has discovered a new class of materials, metal halide perovskites, that can be sprayed onto a substrate where they crystallize into a thin film that captures energy in a solar cell. There are many hurdles to come before the…
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The Market Path to Green Energy
Economic forces increasingly favor wind and solar. Creating the right regulatory incentives could accelerate the adoption of renewables, says the Rocky Mountain Institute. by James A. Bacon Consolidated Edison, the utility that provides New York City’s electricity, confronted a challenge in the summer of 2014. Forecasts showed that demand for electricity in parts of Brooklyn…
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Petersburg’s Other Fiasco
by James A. Bacon Poor Petersburg. The economically depressed Southside city of 32,000 serves as a vivid warning of just about everything that can go wrong for a local government in Virginia. Not only is the city running a massive General Fund budget deficit, it is falling millions of dollars behind in the collection of revenues…