July 12
Duke Passes 1 GW of Solar Energy Production
Top consumer smart grid news hand-selected and brought to you by the Smart Energy Consumer Collaborative.
Member News
With the opening of the North Rosamond Solar Facility in California in June, Duke Energy passed a milestone with 1 GW of solar energy-producing facilities nationwide. Duke Energy now owns solar facilities in 10 states at almost 70 different sites. Also, Duke Energy is one of the largest purchasers of solar power in the nation, purchasing the output from more than 3 GW of capacity in states where it serves retail customers. The 4 GW of owned and purchased renewables makes up more than 9 percent of Duke Energy’s generated electricity.
National Grid has partnered with Utilidata and Sense to pilot the first ever digital twin of the electric grid that maps power flow, voltage and infrastructure from the substation to the home. The technology allows the utility to access real-time data regarding the operations of appliances in the home and assets on the grid. Utilidata has provided its energy optimization software and Sense its intelligent home energy monitor and integrated them with machine learning capabilities.
The booming U.S. battery storage market is showing no signs of slowing down, and a new government-funded report says its prospects could be even bigger than previously thought. The Potential for Battery Energy Storage to Provide Peaking Capacity in the United States, published last month by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), concluded that every region across the country offers the potential for peaking capacity needs to be met by short-duration, four-hour battery storage systems.
Puget Sound Energy recently announced the appointment of Mary Kipp as president of the company. Kipp joins Puget Sound from El Paso Electric, where she was president and CEO. She will report to Kimberly Harris, who is CEO of the utility. It is expected that Kipp will assume the additional role of CEO when Harris retires in January 2020. Kipp has been with El Paso Electric since 2007. She became CEO in 2015 and has served as president since 2014.
Get Your Weekly Edition
Industry News
The Los Angeles Department of Water and Power is preparing to approve a utility-scale solar-battery project that could shatter U.S. records to date, in terms of both storage capacity and low price. 8minute Solar Energy's Eland Phase 1 and 2 projects would each consist of 200 megawatts of solar capacity, along with at least 100 megawatts — and more likely 150 megawatts — of battery capacity, according to Eric Montag, LADWP director of strategic initiatives.
By June 2022, the pace of U.S. renewables growth is going to surpass fossil fuel growth by a significantly greater margin than what FERC had anticipated as recently as April, according to the commission's May 2019 Energy Infrastructure Update, released Friday. The renewable energy-focused SUN DAY Campaign said new renewable energy capacity would grow more than 10 percent by 2022 while fossil fuel capacity would only increase about one percent, compared to the April forecast of a five-percent net increase.
The installed base of smart electricity meters in North America will increase by eight percent per annum between 2018 and 2024, according to research firm Berg Insight. The total number of smart electricity meters is expected to reach 142.8 million at the end of the period. Over the next five years, smart meter penetration among electricity customers in the U.S. and Canada is projected to increase from around 60 percent in 2018 to more than 80 percent by the end of 2024.
More than 21,000 San Diego Gas & Electric customers will receive an $850 credit on their bills for adopting electric vehicles, SDG&E said Monday. The number of applicants for the EV Climate Credit is 40 percent higher in 2019 as compared to 2018, and the number of EV drivers in the region has increased by 15,000 since 2017, the company said. SDG&E launched a campaign, which included Facebook ads, Volta charging station ads, emails, press releases and website postings, to encourage EV drivers to apply for the credit.
