All posts tagged: Electricity

Houston gets a solar, storage + electricity bundle for 6¢ per kWh

Houston gets a solar, storage + electricity bundle for 6¢ per kWh

Published by skeptic

Photo: TerraOne Houston homeowners are getting a new way to get solar and battery storage without signing up for a decades-long loan. Now, solar company Terra Energy is rolling out a new option that bundles rooftop solar, home battery backup, and electricity into one monthly bill without the usual long-term solar loan. The company today launched TerraOne, a three-year subscription that includes rooftop solar, up to 40 kWh of battery storage, and electricity service in Houston. Terra says there are no upfront costs, loans, liens, or equipment purchases required. That’s a notable shift in an industry where homeowners are often asked to sign contracts stretching 20 to 25 years. Advertisement – scroll for more content Terra says qualifying Houston customers could see electricity rates as low as 6 cents per kWh before delivery charges, depending on energy usage, system size, and eligibility. That’s less than half the typical residential electricity rate in the Houston area. The launch comes as Texas electricity prices have surged nearly 70% since 2021, according to the company. At the same …

Waymo turns old EV batteries into electricity for California, Texas

Waymo turns old EV batteries into electricity for California, Texas

Published by skeptic

Google-owned robotaxi company Waymo is giving a new life to its old electric vehicle batteries — by using them to fill energy gaps in local grids. Instead of recycling the retired batteries, Waymo’s initiative will squeeze the last drops of electricity from them, and dispatch that power where it’s most needed. B2U Storage Solutions, which Waymo has partnered with on the initiative, says its EV battery storage systems “act as a vital reservoir.” They absorb surplus solar power during midday peaks then send it back to the grid during high-demand periods, typically in the late afternoon.  Mashable Light Speed SEE ALSO: Can Waymo and Waze fix cities’ potholes? To begin with, that extra energy will benefit California and Texas, two states in which the company already does plenty of business. Cities like Los Angeles, San Francisco, Houston, Dallas, Austin, and San Antonio are all serviced by Waymo. The Waymo/B2U partnership will deploy hundreds of megawatts of storage capacity across the grids, the companies say. That’s not a huge amount — the greater Los Angeles region receives …

Republicans devise another way to make electricity more expensive with new fees

Republicans devise another way to make electricity more expensive with new fees

Published by skeptic

Image: Vineyard Wind Offshore As everything gets less affordable, republicans are proposing big new inspection fees for cheap energy projects, trying to protect their fossil fuel masters from the rise of better options. Wind power is one of the cheapest and most environmentally friendly forms of electricity generation. And offshore wind is great, too, because wind blows more consistently on the ocean, and the land use of offshore wind projects is exactly zero – same with air quality impact, as it creates no pollution. It’s a great method of cheap, secure domestic energy production, and particularly offers great options in the US Northeast, where wind resources are abundant (and where boat captains are looking for work, since fish stocks have been devastated by climate change). And getting lots of cheap electricity production online is crucial right now, as energy bills of all types rise due to increased demand from data centers and an idiotic oil war that has intelligent countries looking for better options away from fossil fuels. Countries that have excess energy available will …

Giorgia Meloni’s Italy wants to rename electricity – POLITICO

Giorgia Meloni’s Italy wants to rename electricity – POLITICO

Published by Sam Flores

For Rome, “the Italian proposal is part of a broader effort to promote the country’s scientific heritage and Italy’s role in major international technological innovation initiatives.” The diplomatic push intensified on Thursday, with junior digital minister Alessio Butti discussing the proposal with Annette Koo, director general of the Bureau International des Poids et Mesures (BIPM), a Paris-based international organization in charge of measurements. “The Italian proposal goes well beyond the linguistic question and represents the desire to give important historical recognition to one of the fathers of modern science, whose work radically changed humanity’s relationship with electricity and technological progress,” Butti said in a statement. In his meeting with Koo, Butti said that most units of measurements that are named after indivuals maintain the full family name, without abbreviations. This is the case with hertz, newton or watt, for example. The Italian official was in the French capital also to attend a G7 meeting of digital ministers. The change would need to first be implemented domestically and then pushed at the international level with the …

Data Centers Could Be 33% Of Commercial Building Electricity Use By 2050: EIA

Data Centers Could Be 33% Of Commercial Building Electricity Use By 2050: EIA

Published by Jenni Sidey

By Diana DiGangi of UtilityDive The U.S. Energy Information Administration projects that data centers will “increasingly skew more energy intensive” and that electricity consumed by them will increase across all commercial building stock, with their servers growing to make up an estimated 22% to 33% of commercial building electricity use by 2050, according to an April report. In its 2026 Annual Energy Outlook, EIA modeled various scenarios to explore how much data centers might drive demand in the medium and long term. In its high electricity demand scenario, the agency assumed “growth in the installed stock of AI servers follows an exponential trend through 2050” and didn’t make any assumptions about increases in computational efficiency beyond historical trends.  “These assumptions lead data center server energy use alone to grow to 818 billion kilowatt hours in 2050 in the High Electricity Demand case,” EIA said. “Server electricity consumption in 2050 is more than 16 times that in 2020.” In its counterfactual base case, EIA models how “U.S. and world energy markets would operate through 2050 under …

Solar farm on the ocean outperforms land-based solar in Taiwan

Solar farm on the ocean outperforms land-based solar in Taiwan

Published by skeptic

A floating photovoltaic project by Chenya Energy Getty Images/iStockphoto The ocean could be the next frontier for the world’s rapidly expanding solar energy industry. That’s the finding of a study showing a floating solar farm off the coast of Taiwan produces more electricity and more profit than a nearby solar farm on land. Taiwan is roughly the same size as the Netherlands, but it is mostly mountainous and has 5 million more people, meaning open space is scarce. As a potential solution, Chenya Energy built a 181-megawatt offshore floating photovoltaic (OFPV) project – sometimes called a “floatovoltaic” – on 1.8 square kilometres of water in the protected bay of an industrial park in western Taiwan in 2020-21. The year before, the Taiwan Power Company had constructed a 100-megawatt land-based photovoltaic (LPV) project on 1.4 square kilometres near the bay, providing an ideal comparison once researchers excluded the additional 81 megawatts of capacity at the floating solar installation. Pound-for-pound, the floating solar produces 12 per cent more electricity than the land-based solar, they found. Even though …

Brexit is already dominating the battle to replace Keir Starmer – POLITICO

Brexit is already dominating the battle to replace Keir Starmer – POLITICO

Published by Sam Flores

“Many businesses are saying that it’s been a challenge, that Brexit and the way in which it was implemented has challenged their ability to be competitive to get access to the EU market and therefore we should be addressing those challenges not going back to the old argument [of] are we in or out,” she said. That position hasn’t stopped her blasting Farage over the decision to leave, accusing the Reform UK leader of having promised “the moon on a stick.” She’s also declared that “when we left the European Union people were promised more money into the NHS, your living standards will be better — and the opposite has happened.” Keir Starmer What about the man himself? Starmer’s position on the EU has shifted several times already. Running for leader in 2019, he pledged to defend the free movement of people. Then, in opposition, he made it a red line, along with staying out of the EU’s customs union and single market. Before taking power, he talked about Brexit as little as possible. In office, …

Power prices are up 76% on America’s biggest grid, and a watchdog is pointing fingers

Power prices are up 76% on America’s biggest grid, and a watchdog is pointing fingers

Published by skeptic

The largest electrical grid in the U.S., the PJM Interconnection, saw prices nearly double over the last year, according to a report published yesterday by Monitoring Analytics, an independent market monitor that serves as a sort of watchdog for the PJM grid. The culprit? Data centers. Wholesale prices for one megawatt-hour of electricity rose to $136.53, up from $77.78 at the same time last year. Crain’s Chicago Business was first to report on the spike. Monitoring Analytics pointed the finger at data centers and PJM’s failure to handle their surging demand adequately. The market monitor pulled no punches. “The price impacts on customers have been very large and are not reversible,” Monitoring Analytics wrote. “The price impacts will be even larger in the near term unless the issues associated with data center load are addressed in a timely manner.”  PJM is a ripe target for such criticism. In 2022, just as data center construction was ramping up, the grid operator paused applications for new generating sources, citing a years-long backlog. It only recently started accepting …

UK must drop ‘red lines’ for real EU reset, Brussels warns – POLITICO

UK must drop ‘red lines’ for real EU reset, Brussels warns – POLITICO

Published by Sam Flores

Moving target The latest round of negotiations, which come almost a decade after the U.K. voted to leave the EU, center around a landmark summit between the two sides set to be held this summer. While July is considered the most likely month, two officials expressed frustration that the date is still unconfirmed and plans have fallen through several times. The European Commission has indicated it is open to making progress on a number of technical issues. “We have a shared interest in a stronger cooperation that delivers for our security, our economies and our citizens,” said a spokesperson. “In view of the next Summit, we are working to conclude the key files of last year’s Common Understanding: an SPS [agricultural standards] agreement, [Emissions Trading System] linkage, and a Youth Experience Scheme, and to advance work on electricity trading,” the Commission spokesperson said. Despite the skepticism, European Parliament President Roberta Metsola told POLITICO that the momentum is genuinely in favor of closer ties. | Nicolas Tucat/AFP via Getty Images A British government spokesperson said future …

Sweden generates 99% of electricity from clean sources. So why is wind power under attack?

Sweden generates 99% of electricity from clean sources. So why is wind power under attack?

Published by Sam Flores

Sweden has been hit the hardest by a coordinated attack on wind power, according to a new analysis. Last year, Sweden generated a staggering 99 per cent of its electricity from low-carbon sources, the highest of any EU country. This was spearheaded by hydropower (40 per cent) followed by nuclear (27 per cent), wind (23 per cent) and solar (two percent). According to energy think tank Ember, Sweden only relied on fossil fuels for 1.2 per cent of its electricity in 2025, pushing emissions per capita well below the EU average. Despite its impressively green energy mix, an online investigation warns that mis- and disinformation about wind power has become rife in the country – posing a “systemic risk to Europe’s security”. Sweden’s anti-wind power movement WindEurope, who call themselves “the voice of the wind energy industry”, partnered with CASM Technology to map Europe’s anti-wind energy system for the first time. The study analysed more than 42,000 social media posts across Facebook, Instagram, X (formerly Twitter), YouTube, TikTok and LinkedIn – from 1 May 2024 …