Insight and inspiration in turbulent times.
Prices for solar, wind, and battery storage are dropping so rapidly that renewables are increasingly squeezing out all forms of fossil fuel power, including natural gas.
Almost every state along the Atlantic coast — 12 out of 14 — has offshore wind potential that exceeds its current electricity needs, according to a new study. Bringing the electricity generated by offshore Atlantic wind farms ashore could help meet future electricity demand created by activities — transportation and the heating of homes and businesses — that are currently powered by gasoline, natural gas, and other fossil fuels.
In this episode, energy expert Eric Gimon answers questions submitted by Energy Transition Show subscribers on a wide range of topics, including the non-climate effects of climate change; whether we even need to keep investing in climate research; what the reliable indicators of the global energy transition might be…
As energy transition proceeds we’ll need to move well beyond decarbonizing electricity generation and into transportation and space heating powered by renewables.
Billions of people around the world need more energy than they can afford, while billions of others can buy far more energy than is required to meet their needs. Global 100-percent renewable scenarios are based on these distortions…
A new book put together by the former Chairman of Europe’s largest solar company, Lightsource — which merged with BP last year — throws light on how the world will be permanently transformed by an energy revolution in coming decades.
It looks very as much as if before “over developed” countries like Germany can hope to develop an all-renewables power system, let alone an all-renewables based energy system including non-electric energy uses, it will have to dramatically reduce its power consumption.
Demand response and demand flexibility—shifting demand to intervals where electricity is abundant and cheap, and away from when the grid is constrained or power is expensive and dirty—can help keep prices down, optimize the grid overall, and help us integrate more renewable supply into grid power while displacing more fossil fuels.
The city of Pueblo wants to go all-in on renewables. Low-income residents want affordable rates. Can they work together? The first things you see driving down from the Rocky Mountains into Pueblo, Colorado, are smoke stacks. Three big ones sprout from the Comanche coal plant at the edge of town, and then a stubble of shorter towers rises from the steel mill, which once provided good paying jobs to anyone who wanted one.
David Blittersdorf’s passion for renewable energy and earth-friendly technology started early. He built his first wind turbine at age 14 to light up the small shack where he boiled sap into maple syrup.
Now solar PV systems are beginning to integrate storage based on lithium-ion batteries, and this storage isn’t just used to supply power when the sun is down; it is providing grid stabilization services too, which only adds complexity to an already-complicated picture for the future of storage…
The idea of the energy transition (“energiewende” in German) originated in the 1980s and gained legislative support in Germany in 2010. The idea is good and also technically feasible. But it requires sacrifices and, at present, sacrifices are politically unthinkable since most people don’t realize how critical the situation really is. What we are doing for the transition seems to be is too little and too late.
