Tag Archive for: cleanenergy

The sites fight climate change and can help with another global crisis: the collapse of nature. But so far, efforts to nurture wildlife habitat have been spotty.

Solar farms have a superpower beyond clean energy

It’s not your average solar farm.

The glassy panels stand in a meadow. Wildflowers sway in the breeze, bursts of purple, pink, yellow, orange and white among native grasses. A monarch butterfly flits from one blossom to the next. Dragonflies zip, bees hum and goldfinches trill.

As solar projects unfurl across the United States, sites like this one in Ramsey, Minn., stand out because they offer a way to fight climate change while also tackling another ecological crisis: a global biodiversity collapse, driven in large part by habitat loss.

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Source: The New York Times

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Jobs in the U.S. clean energy industry in 2023 grew at more than double the rate of the country's overall jobs

US clean energy jobs growth rate double that of overall jobs, report says

Jobs in the U.S. clean energy industry in 2023 grew at more than double the rate of the country’s overall jobs, and unionization in clean energy surpassed for the first time the rate in the wider energy industry, the Energy Department said on Wednesday.

Employment in clean energy businesses – including wind, solar, nuclear and battery storage – rose by 142,000 jobs, or 4.2% last year, up from a rise of 3.9% in 2022, the U.S. Energy and Employment Report said. The rate was above the overall U.S. job growth rate of 2% in 2023. Overall energy jobs rose 250,000, with 56% being in clean energy.

Unionization rates in clean energy hit 12.4%, more than the 11% in the overall energy business, it said. That was driven by growth in construction and utility industries and after legislation passed in 2022 including the bipartisan CHIPS Act and President Joe Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act, the department said.

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Source: MSN

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California lawmakers unveiled measures to streamline renewable energy projects and reduce monthly electric bills.

California lawmakers plan to give out $500M in electric bill refunds, streamline clean energy

California lawmakers unveiled a series of measures Wednesday meant to streamline renewable energy development and lower the cost of monthly electric bills, as this year’s legislative session reached the pinnacle of a frenzied final week.

One could put about $30 in the pockets of California’s roughly 17 million customers of investor-owned utilities, Pacific Gas & Electric, Southern California Edison and San Diego Gas & Electric.

After months of negotiations and pledges from leaders to prioritize the issue, seven bills were released on the last day possible. Gov. Gavin Newsom encountered significant challenges in recent weeks to his proposals to lower energy bills and thwart gas price spikes.

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Source: The Sacramento Bee

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CA’s new centralized procurement strategy will solicit 1GW of multiday storage & 1GW of 12hr-plus storage for deployment between 2031 & 2037.

California targets up to 2 GW of long-duration storage as part of 10.6 GW clean energy procurement

Dive Insight:

The forthcoming solicitations are part of a centralized procurement strategy authorized in a law passed by the California legislature earlier this year. The California Department of Water Resources will lead the procurement through its Statewide Energy Office, which focuses on “emerging and existing technologies that need scaling to lower costs,” the CPUC said.

The CPUC advised DWR to conduct a series of solicitations and evaluate bids for quality, cost, and risk, subject to a CPUC review.

Having one agency lead the procurement “will streamline the acquisition of advanced energy resources, potentially lowering future costs for ratepayers and accelerating the development timeline for clean energy technologies,” the CPUC said.

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Source: Utility Dive

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Top Fortune 500 companies like Microsoft, Google, Walmart, and Starbucks are partnering with community solar developers.

Major US corporations embracing community solar

Community solar has recently taken off, surpassing 7 GW of installed capacity in the United States. Research firm Wood Mackenzie said it expects community solar installed capacity to essentially double in five years.

Community solar typically involves a customer subscribing to a portion of an off-site solar project’s generating capacity, receiving credits on their utility bills for the electricity produced by the facility. The CCSA noted that household names such as Microsoft, Google, Walmart, Starbucks, Rivian, Wendy’s, and T-Mobile are just a few of the Fortune 500 companies that have signed agreements with community solar developers.

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Source: PV Magazine

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California aims for carbon-neutral energy by 2045, requiring increased clean energy production and storage capacity.

CA plans to transform old oil town into world’s first geologic solar energy storage site

California has a stated goal of making its energy production carbon neutral by 2045 — but in order to accomplish that goal, it will need to ramp up both its clean energy production and its clean energy storage capacity.

Now, efforts to turn an oil field into a geological thermal energy storage facility could be a big step in the right direction, YaleEnvironment360 reported.

Kern County has long relied on its oil fields for jobs. Now, with dirty, polluting energy sources like oil going out of fashion, the county is looking to turn toward clean energy production and storage instead.

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Source: TCD

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Since the introduction of NEM 3.0, a significant uptick in interest in battery add-ons among residential solar customers has been observed.

California solar installers get well-acquainted with batteries in NEM 3.0 era

California is regularly seen as a leader in clean energy, and no area of the country has more solar or energy storage deployments. Remarkably though, the attachment of batteries to residential solar installations has been low — until recently, only 10% of home solar systems in California also had batteries. New net-metering rules in the state are dramatically changing the solar + storage landscape though, and solar installers are keeping busy with the new normal.

In 2022, the California Public Utilities Commission enacted an overhaul of the state’s net-metering program. Since April 15, 2023, any new solar installation feeding energy onto the grid is now compensated for that power through a net-billing tariff. This new structure, known as NEM 3.0, significantly reduces the compensation for behind-the-meter solar systems — by as much as 75%, when compared to systems operating under the NEM 1.0 and NEM 2.0 structures.

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Source: Solar Power World

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As the deployment of solar energy continues to accelerate, American farmers are finding new opportunities to share the benefits

Making hay (and solar power) while the sun shines

Farmworker Appreciation Day is a celebration of the men and women whose labor feeds America, sustains our global leadership in agricultural exports, and produces many of the fuels and materials that are driving our transition to a clean energy economy. At the Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE), we’re especially excited by the growing collaboration between American agriculture and our clean energy industries. As the deployment of solar energy continues to accelerate, American farmers are finding new opportunities to share the benefits—and, in some cases, the land.

Renewable energy siting can be a complex process in which both public and private entities weigh the costs and benefits of new renewable energy deployments in a particular location. Developing renewable energy infrastructure that can share space with other forms of production can help resolve certain siting challenges. That is why agrivoltaics, or the co-location of solar energy infrastructure with productive farmland, is such a promising method of renewable energy deployment.

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Source: Clean Technica

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The US Department of Energy (DOE) plans to build a 1 GW solar farm on a former top-secret Manhattan Project nuclear site in Washington State.

The US to turn a Manhattan Project nuclear site into a 1 GW solar farm

The US Department of Energy (DOE) plans to build a 1 GW solar farm on a former top-secret Manhattan Project nuclear site in Washington State.

The DOE’s plan is to work with Hecate Energy to repurpose the Hanford Site, an 8,000-acre federal land site, as part of the Cleanup to Clean Energy initiative launched in July 2023. The program aims to repurpose parts of DOE-owned lands – parts of which were previously used in the US’s nuclear weapons program – for clean energy generation.

Hecate Energy was chosen through a competitive qualifications-based process for evaluating and ranking proposals. DOE and Hecate Energy will undergo a negotiation process for a realty agreement, and DOE notes that it may cancel negotiations and rescind the selection for any reason during that time.

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Source: electrek

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GSCE and MCE agreed to collaborate toward California's clean energy future by developing solar+battery storage projects in Fresno County.

MCE signs on for up to 400 MW of new solar + storage in Fresno County

Golden State Clean Energy (GSCE) and MCE have agreed to work together toward California’s clean energy future, building much needed solar + battery storage resources in Fresno County. The master-planned development program known as the Valley Clean Infrastructure Plan aims to repurpose up to 130,000 acres of drainage-impaired or water-challenged lands within Westlands Water District in Fresno County to develop transmission infrastructure, solar generation and storage.

At full buildout the plan will include up to 20 GW of solar and 20 MW of energy storage, potentially providing up to one-sixth of California’s electricity requirements in 2035. MCE has entered into a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with GSCE for up to 400 MW each of solar and battery storage.

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Source: Solar Power World

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