Recently in Electricity Category

The Southern Alliance for Clean Energy is gathering signatures for a sign-on letter asking the House of Representatives to strengthen the Waxman-Markey climate bill to 30 percent of the nation's energy to come from renewables and efficiency by 2020. The letter is in response to reports that the current legislation will not advance renewables faster than the business-as-usual scenario. The full sign-on letter can be found here. Contact John Bonitz for further information.

The Alabama Forestry Commission has released a guide to help residential, commercial, and industrial consumers evaluate the opportunity to use woody biomass to fuel their energy needs. The guide illustrates the available woody biomass in Alabama and states that between 2001 and 2008 "Alabama's tree inventory increased by a net amount of 13.9 million tons annually or a 1.3% increase." The guide also lists helpful tools in evaluating woody biomass opportunities including the USDA Forest Service's fuel value calculator. The guide can be accessed here. 

From the U.S. Department of Energy

The Georgia Public Service Commission (PSC) has approved a request from Georgia Power Company to convert its Plant Mitchell Unit 3 from a coal-fired power plant to a biomass power plant. Located near Albany, Georgia, the facility will be able to produce 96 megawatts of power once the conversion is completed in June 2012, making it one of the largest biomass power plants in the United States. It will draw on surplus wood fuel from suppliers within a 100-mile radius of the power plant. Georgia Power, the largest subsidiary of Southern Company, requested the conversion last summer and plans to begin the conversion by spring of 2011. The Georgia PSC approved Georgia Power's request on March 17, while also approving the utility's construction of two new nuclear power units at its Vogtle Nuclear Power Plant in southeast Georgia. See the Southern Company press release on the initial request and the press release on the approval from the Georgia PSC

From Renewable Energy World:

On November 4, a ballot initiative requiring that investor-owned utilities in Missouri obtain 15 percent of their electricity from renewable sources by 2021 received "Yes" votes from an overwhelming 2/3 of the constituency. Missouri was one of the only states in which a renewable energy ballot initiative saw success. Under Proposition C, as it appeared on the ballot, the amount of renewables that are required will increase by small percentages each year until reaching the goal of 15% by 2021. There was little to no opposition to this initiative, unlike measures in other states like Calfornia where both renewable energy measures, Propositions 7 and 10 were defeated.

The Interstate Renewable Energy Council (IREC) and the Network for New Energy Choices (NNEC) recently released Freeing the Grid 2008. The report "compares and grades existing statewide net metering and interconnection policies according to an emerging national consensus on best practices." The report lists specific interconnection and net-metering policies that can hinder renewable energy development and provides information on best practices for policy making. The full report can be found here. 

The report, State of the States 2008: Renewable Energy Development and the Role of Policy, was recently release by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL). The report takes steps to identify the impact of renewable energy policy on renewable energy development. The authors found that the:

• Existence of an RPS is significantly correlated to higher renewable percentages of overall electricity generation
• Production incentives at the state level, while a small sample (n=6), are significantly correlated to higher renewable electric capacity and generation, as well as individual resource categories.
• Interconnection policies meeting best practices ... are correlated with increased renewable energy capacity and generation overall, as well as individually with higher biomass, hydroelectric, and PV capacity.

While general correlations were made between renewable energy policy and development, further research is needed to quantify direct policy impacts.

The report also provides a comprehensive overview of renewable energy policies including market and production incentives and provides, when able, best practices in policy development. The authors also report which states have enacted various types of renewable energy policies and grades them on whether they encourage or hinder renewable energy development. The full report can be found here.

From MarketWatch:

USA Biomass, the nation's leading association of biopower companies, has been awarded a $100,000 grant from the Energy Foundation to promote the importance of renewable, biomass energy generation in meeting the nation's growing energy needs, while reducing our "carbon footprint' and promoting a healthy environment.

The Department of Energy (DOE) estimates that biomass-based power currently provides nearly 45 billion kilowatt hours of electricity, or about 1.2% of the nation's electric sales. DOE projects that overtime, biomass could supply as much as 14% of the nation's power needs. Biomass in all forms, including for heat and industry, power generation, and motor fuels, supplied 3.5% of America's total energy supply in 2007.

According to recent studies, the greenhouse gas reductions from operating biomass plants are significant. For every megawatt hour of biomass power, approximately 1.6 tons of CO2 are avoided, resulting in a projected reduction of almost 30 million tons of greenhouse gas emissions annually.

USA Biomass is the only national organization devoted solely to the growth and long-term viability of biomass-powered electric generation -- a growing industry that is strengthening America's rural economy, promoting energy independence and reducing carbon emissions. It has 41 member companies operating 80 power plants in 20 different states. These power plants use a broad range of biomass fuels -- from wood chips in Maine, bagasse in Florida and rice hulls in Louisiana, to forest waste in Arizona and orchard prunings in California. Their website is www.usabiomass.org.

North Carolina State University will be home to a new national research center aimed "to revolutionize the nation's power grid and speed renewable electric-energy technologies into every home and business." The NSF Engineering Research Center (ERC) for Future Renewable Electric Energy Delivery and Management (FREEDM) Systems is focused on developing technology for transforming the nation's electric power grid into a "smart grid" that will "easily store and distribute energy produced from solar panels, wind farms, fuel cells and other energy sources." The center will begin operations immediately with support from over 60 private companies involved in electricity production. More information about the center can be found at the FREEDM Center website and the NC State press release.

Oak Ridge National Laboratory recently announced it will replace its steam plant with a wood boiler and will take additional efficiency measures to cut energy and water consumption at the lab. ORNL anticipates the improvements will cut energy consumption by 50 percent and water usage by 23 percent. Wood for the boiler will be provided by suppliers within a 50 mile radius of the lab consisting primarily of waste wood from timber mills and pallet manufacturers. Completion of the project will occur in the next 2-3 years. More on this story can be found here.

Southern Company has released a report detailing a series of tests conducted on co-firing green wood chips from whole and from approximately needle free pine trees. The purpose of the project was to "determine what level of processing of whole trees is required to successfully co-fire the chips in a boiler, and to evaluate the benefits and costs of wood processing compared with the effect of the fuel on the power plant." The tests were performed at Plant Gadsden in Gadsden, Alabama. From the report, summary results are as follows:

• Green wood chips were successfully co-fired in blends with coal between 8% and 15%
  wood by weight. Of the input fuel energy, 2.8% and 5.5% was from wood, and represented about 2.0 MW to 3.8 MW biomass power.
  
• Sulfur emissions were reduced, and particulates were no higher with co-firing. At normal operating condition, carbon monoxide emissions were unchanged. The measured impact on NOx emissions was small.
  
• With 10% co-firing, boiler efficiency was about the same as coal alone, while there was a slight reduction in efficiency with 15% wood.
  
• Higher moisture losses due to high wood moisture were offset or nearly offset by reduced dry gas losses up the stack.
  
• High moisture of the wood coal mixtures resulted in low mill temperatures and high mill bowl under pressures. This caused a 5% load derate when co-firing 15%.
  
• The coal-wood mixtures had much lower fuel energy to volume ratio than the baseline coal. The issues appear to have been related to the installation of new automatic controls. Stability issues were corrected in subsequent tests by tuning the fuel-steam pressure automatic controls.

The project was initiated by Southern Company & Alabama Power, USDA Forest Service, Forest Based Economic Development Services, University of Alabama, and Auburn University.

The full report can be found here.