Dundee University is to lead a major research project to determine whether cheaper, more environmentally responsible and more effective foundations can be developed for the offshore renewables industry.
The UK Government has given development consent to Dogger Bank Teesside A & B offshore wind farm, Britain's Planning Inspectorate said on Wednesday.
Natural gas, once seen as a clear winner in President Barack Obama’s push for cleaner power, isn’t looking like much of a champ these days. That so-called bridge that gas was supposed to be, leading America away from dirtier fossil fuels such as coal and toward renewable power, just got a lot shorter under the final Clean Power Plan released by the US Environmental Protection Agency on Monday. The agency will reward early investments in wind and solar power to get the nation generating 28 percent of its power using renewables by 2030, up from a previously proposed 22 percent. The more aggressive goal weakens natural gas’s role in America’s energy future in favor of a quicker transition to zero-carbon sources of electricity. It’s yet another blow for gas producers who’ve seen prices for their fuel slide amid a glut of supply from shale formations.
Conservation charity WWF has hailed Scotland's "wet and windy" summer weather as a “belter" for renewable energy.
Scotland’s summer may have been a washout, but the wet and windy weather has proved to be a “belter” for renewable energy, with the amount of electricity produced by wind turbines up by more than 50% on last year. Wind power alone supplied 660,117.23 Megawatt hours (MWh) of electricity to the National Grid in July, which is enough to supply on average the needs of 72% of Scottish homes - the equivalent of 1.75 million households. That is up by 58% from the same month in 2014, according to environmental campaigners at WWF Scotland.
The North Sea is the focal point of a new EU-backed conference on the future of energy in Europe.
Fuel cell power company AFC's has reached a key milestone with the successful activation of its Kore fuel cell power system.
Barack Obama has moved ahead with even tougher greenhouse gas cuts on American power plants, aiming to jolt the rest of the world into action.
Count bikers, boaters and, to hear some say, even God, among those who oppose the US law that forces refiners to use corn to make gasoline. In more than 413,000 public comments to the Environmental Protection Agency, ethanol opponents are battling it out with big oil producers and farmers in a bid to reshape the 2007 law. The agency, which in May proposed lowering the amount of ethanol refiners must use in gasoline, is expected to release final targets Nov. 30. The plan drew passionate responses from both sides.
President Barack Obama will release on Monday a final version of the Clean Power Plan in what he calls the nation’s most important step to combat climate change. The administration has been working with states and power companies to ensure they have the flexibility needed to cut pollution while lowering energy bills, Obama said in a video released in a White House Twitter post. The first U.S. rules to curb greenhouse gases from power plants are the centerpiece of Obama’s fight to combat climate change, an issue he’s made a priority of his final two years in the White House. The regulations are among the most sweeping and complex in the Environmental Protection Agency’s history and they promise to revamp the way electricity has been generated and distributed for a century.
Controversial plans to build the first UK nuclear power station in over 20 years have taken a huge step forward with an announcement of which companies are set to be involved in the giant energy project.
The former chairman of Tokyo Electric Power Co., Tsunehisa Katsumata, and two other executives may face indictment over the 2011 accident at the Fukushima Dai-Ichi nuclear power plant, according to an independent inquest by the Tokyo Prosecutors Office.
The Scottish Government has refused planning consent for a controversial windfarm proposed for the edge of the Cairngorms National Park. Deputy First Minister John Swinney concluded that the 31-turbine Allt Duine plan, for the Monadhliath Mountains near Kincraig, did not represent “sustainable development.” He said it would result in “significant and unacceptable landscape and visual impacts on the park.”
Inspired Energy has snapped up fellow energy consultant Wholesale Power UK Limited in a £2million deal.
GE Power Conversion has delivered conversion technology to support the Japanese solar industry.
A plan for a 31-turbine wind farm near one of Scotland’s most picturesque mountain ranges has been refused. The proposed Allt Duine wind farm, near Kincraig on the edge of Cairngorms National Park, has been vetoed by Scottish ministers who ruled that it would have a significant impact on the landscape. The Scottish Government said it is committed to generating 100% of Scotland’s electricity demand from renewables by 2020 but it will not permit wind farms that have an unacceptable impact on the local area.
A leading political figure has called for greater deployment of solar energy in Scotland. Energy minister Fergus Ewing said more work needed to be done to help homes and businesses generate their own supply of electricity. The call comes after the Department of Energy and Climate and Change (DECC) made moves to reduce the Feed-in –Tariff and Renewable Heat Incentive (RHI) subsidies in the UK and set proposals to reduce the renewables obligation support.
The decision to remove renewable energy sources from the Climate Change Levy (CCL) exemption will have a negative impact on the country’s renewable sector, according to a research and consulting firm. GlobalData said that while the move is expected to generate around £490million by 2016 and up to £1billion per year by 2020, the energy sector will suffer as a result in the short term. However this negative affect is likely to help growth in the long term – but areas such as the UK’s wind sector the hardest in the immediate aftermath of the decision.
Renewables investor Bluefield Solar has acquired 10MW of solar capacity in the UK for £11.2 million.
The offshore vessel service industry must consider news ways of working together to support the next round of offshore wind farms, it has been claimed.
Erasmus Wambua no longer has an excuse for not doing his homework. In the past, the 18-year-old would have to find light elsewhere when his family's off-grid home in the village of Ndela, 80 kilometers (50 miles) east of then Kenyan capital, ran out of paraffin. That's changed since his mother, Rebecca, signed up with M-Kopa, a Nairobi-based provider of solar- lighting systems. The 35-year-old mother says she was paying 100 shillings ($1) a day for kerosine. Her daily expense has since plunged to 42 shillings a day, she said. The laptop-sized solar panel and battery generates about 8 watts of energy, enough to run two LED light bulbs.
Sgurr Energy has signed a deal worth several million pounds with Chinese lidar manufacturer Oasis. The agreement was announced as Scotland’s First Minister Nicola Sturgeon visited Beijing. The company said the deal will complement their package of wind farm SgurrOptimiser services.
Hillary Clinton said she would both defend and go beyond the efforts by President Barack Obama to address climate change in the first detailed description of her potential environmental polices if elected president. Clinton released what her campaign said was the opening salvo of the Democrat’s energy and climate change agenda Sunday, while she was campaigning in Iowa. Among other things, Clinton pledged to defend from legal or political attack the Obama administration’s rule to cut carbon pollution from the nation’s fleet of power plants. A Clinton administration would go further, rewarding communities that speed rooftop solar panel installation, backing a contest for states to go beyond the minimums called for in the environmental rules, and boosting solar and wind production on federal lands. A four-page campaign fact sheet said the goal was to increase the share of U.S. power generation from renewable sources to 33 percent by 2027, compared to 25 percent under Obama’s carbon plan. The announcement “makes it more clear than ever that she cares deeply about climate change and will make it a top priority throughout her campaign,” Tiernan Sittenfeld, senior vice president of the League of Conservation Voters Action Fund, said in a statement.
Amec Foster Wheeler has won a contract for the design, supply and construction of a new steam generating combined heat and power plant in Poland. The company said commercial operation of the plant is expected to start by the end of 2018 and has the potential to provide heat to around 70,000 households. The plant, which was commissioned by Fortum Zbarze will be built in southern Poland.
A new user friendly web-based monitoring system for wind turbines has been developed by US-based Renewable NRG Systems (RNRG).
