By Michael Bates, North American Windpower
In 2020, Southwest Power Pool (SPP), a regional transmission organization, became the first grid operator to have wind as its number-one fuel source – outpacing the integration of coal and natural gas. “Maintaining reliability with this large amount of wind is extraordinary,” says Barbara Sugg, president and CEO of SPP. Read more here.
Image Credit: Nebraska Public Power District
ADDITIONAL RECOMMENDED READING
- The windy windfall: LS Power releases timeline, economic projections for $1 billion wind farm, Twin Falls Times-News
- Coal-dependent West Virginia gets a $200 million wind farm, Electrek
- Coal Communities Across the Nation Want Biden to Fund an Economic Transition to Clean Power, Inside Climate News
- Leeward to acquire 10 GW First Solar project pipeline, accelerating growth ambitions, Utility Dive
- Dollars, not politics, are driving Colorado’s accelerated embrace of solar energy, The Colorado Sun. Installing solar utility generation is now cheaper than wind or natural gas-fired plants, and far cheaper than new coal generation.
- SteelZero commitments represent a new era in heavy manufacturing production, GreenBiz
- America’s investor-owned utilities: We can achieve a 100% clean energy future, Utility Dive article contributed by Tom Kuhn, president of the Edison Electric Institute, the association that represents all U.S. investor-owned electric companies.
- NextEra to add up to 30 GW new renewables in next 4 years, target more C&I customers, Utility Dive
- Virginia utility aims to shave peaks, boost solar with time-of-use rate pilot, Energy News Network
- Duke stranded gas assets could cost customers $4.8B, report finds, Utility Dive
AI & MORE EFFICIENT SOLAR POWER PLANTS
Making solar power more efficient, Case Western Reserve University News Release, Newswise
CLEVELAND–Case Western Reserve University computer scientists and energy technology experts are teaming up to leverage the diagnostic power of artificial intelligence (AI) to make solar-power plants more efficient. The work, funded by a three-year, $750,000 grant from the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), is part of a broad $130 million solar-technologies initiative announced by the DOE in 2020—including $7.3 million specifically for machine-learning solutions and other AI for solar applications.
ELECTRIC VEHICLES
Biden administration will replace the entire federal vehicle fleet with EVs, CNET
The current federal vehicle fleet is estimated at
around 645,000 vehicles, and President Biden plans to replace all of them with American-made electric vehicles. The American-made part of this is essential because the announcement was part of Biden’s “Made In America” executive order, which is set to redirect a sizable portion of the government’s spending to American businesses and on American-made products.
Nebraska’s Largest Utilities’ EV Programs & Incentives
Interested in purchasing an electric vehicle or charger? Click a link, below, if you are a customer of one of Nebraska’s largest utilities and want to learn more about their EV programs and incentives, or check your local utility’s website for any available resources.
When President Eisenhower proposed building a 41,000-mile “National System of Interstate and Defense Highways,” he was responding to the needs of the country at that time. Having marveled at Germany’s highway system during World War II, he wanted a system that would get rid of unsafe roads, eliminate traffic jams, and create efficient routes to quickly travel across the country. Supporters of this highway system also believed it would help Americans quickly escape cities that came under a nuclear attack.