Con Edison's Pushing Solar in the Big City

Posted by The Power Generation Blog on Friday, February 18, 2011

New York City is the largest city in America. To go along with its giant infrastructure needs, it's also the most demanding city to power. This need has forced city residents to be especially resourceful when it comes to getting enough precious power to all five boroughs.

During 2010, New York (and neighboring Westchester County) added 4.5 megawatts of renewable solar energy through power supplier Con Edison. There were 203 solar projects added to the grid in 2010, a 51% increase over the previous year's solar projects.

Overall, there are 8.5 megawatts of solar power pouring into Con Edison's grid. The solar energy is concentrated predominantly in Queens and Westchester. The energy company has been able to make so many inroads in solar energy by means of a $181 million federal funding reward from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.


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Wind Warriors Fighting Jobs and the Environment In Maine

Posted by The Power Generation Blog on Thursday, February 17, 2011

Grassroots efforts fall all along the political spectrum. Sometimes people protest bilious coal factories. Others protest windmills.

There's a recent story about a group of "wind warriors" in Freeport, Maine who are against the growing wind industry centered in rural Maine. At the Mountaintop Industrial Wind Legislative Summit, 100 "wind warriors" descended to protest the growth of wind power generation.

This quixotic quest is spurred on by a litany of complaints about wind power. There are those who don't want the noise and bother of wind-related construction projects. Others are against the noise generated by wind turbines. And some "wind warriors" don't like the impact wind turbines make on the landscape and property values.

Exactly what the "wind warriors" are protesting, though, is a green energy initiative that has already created more than $1 billion in investment in Maine. More than a third of that has gone directly to workers and local employers.

The aims of the "wind warriors" are narrow, short sighted, and selfish. You could characterize their take on wind power as among the common reactions to any building and development projects: Not In My Backyard. One so-called warrior reacted to these claims by saying, "The mountains of Maine are not in anybody’s backyard. They are, in fact, the character of the state of Maine." But what better character could there be than preserving the environment by ramping up green energy, and creating jobs and income for the local economy?
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Can China Learn From Europe's Solar Successes (And Failures)?

Posted by The Power Generation Blog on Wednesday, February 16, 2011

By pursuing a dedicated strategy for modernization, China has been emerging among the top industrialized nations in population, manufacturing, GDP, and many other indicators of economic success. Energy production is no different.

A recent story in Bloomberg laid out China's plan to make a big splash in the solar energy industry. The Chinese government is going to model its system after Europe, spending the next year studying European countries like Germany.

The chairman of the Solar Photovoltaic Committee of China’s Renewable Energy Society expressed his interest in learning from Germany. The European countries have been making great strides in solar energy, gaining more than $65 billion in investment for the year 2010.

Many European countries—and America—have tried spur growth in alternate energies like solar through incentives and other economic devices. But economic ups and downs have rendered subsidies somewhat ineffective in creating growth. China began offering solar energy subsidies in 2009, though it canceled 39 solar energy projects, as well. Hopefully, China—and the rest of the world—will be able to figure out how to properly spur solar power growth. Its learning-based approach is heartening.

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Will Regulation Help The Environment--Or Eventually Harm It?

Posted by The Power Generation Blog on Tuesday, February 15, 2011

Despite the fact that the world would cease to function without it, the industrial power generation industry has always faced a few hurdles. The latest set-back for industrial power generation has popped up in Chicago, at the Fisk Generating Station.

The Fisk Generating Station is 108 years old, so clearly it's not among the most cutting-edge or cleantech facilities in the world. Area residents have a decent claim to make when they cite high rates of asthma and respiratory issues; Midwest Generation, who owns the Fisk Generating Station, claims they've been cleaning up their act since taking over in 1999.

On the one hand, yes, the residents are right that old facilities need to be kept up to modern environmental stands. But on the other hand, shutting down a plant doesn't guarantee a better environment. Since it takes long years to build new power generation facilities, residents would only face higher energy costs. The ordinance many residents are pushing for would call for a drastic reduction in particulate matter and CO2 emissions--however, again, either the cost of cleaning up the plants would be passed onto residents, or the ownership would pursue a more profitable business elsewhere. It wouldn't necessarily result in any better living situation; in fact, higher prices and less competition may result in residents having to rely on even less savory power suppliers.

The best course of action may be to work on building investment and development interest in building more cleantech, environmentally friendly power generation options while still relying on conventional coal for the moment. Increasing regulation may help the environment in the immediate situation, but it could stifle development and innovation in the future, which would ultimately be a tragedy for everyone.

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Why Preheater Seal Upgrades are Important

Posted by The Power Generation Blog on Thursday, October 14, 2010



Thermal efficiency is a major concern when dealing with large utility boilers. By using a regenerative air preheater, you can increase efficiency with the last-expensive heat recovery system that also has the ability to endure harsh environments and extreme temperatures. The largest hindrance to the air preheating system is air leakage, which can lead to problems such as fouling, corrosion, increased auxiliary power consumption, ammonium bisulfate plugging and higher pressure differentials. These can all lead to a loss of efficiency and in turn, money. An article by powermag.com discusses the necessity of air preheaters in this month's offerings:


"The air preheater is a critical, yet often overlooked, component of the boiler combustion air system. Evaluating and optimizing a heater's performance is difficult given how entwined it is with the entire combustion system and the lack of standardized calculation tools. Reducing leakage by using modern seal technology will improve combustion efficiency, maintain fan performance, and keep your downstream air quality control equipment operating within spec."


By implementing and maintaining high-quality and high-durability air preheaters, you can rest assured that your large utility boiler will give you the maximum output without losing time and efficiency due to air leakage-related wear and tear. In a time when the economy isn't so great, even those in the power generation industry need to tighten their belts and watch their pocketbooks whenever possible. So, invest in an air preheater today and start saving that revenue for more important things: like operation expansion!


To learn more about industrial power generation, check out Power and Composite Technologies:

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To read the article from powermag.com, follow this link:

http://www.powermag.com/issues/features/Air-Preheater-Seal-Upgrades-Renew-Plant-Efficiency_3032.html

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And Array We Go! - On The Future of Solar Panels

Posted by The Power Generation Blog on Monday, September 20, 2010

(Image Source: Wikimedia Commons)

A new technology has emerged in the field of renewable energy. Engineers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology have developed a new kind of antenna forged from carbon nanotubes that concentrate one-hundred times more solar energy than a standard photovoltaic cell. This is a revolutionary discovery, as the amount of surface area needed to create an efficient solar panel is going to be decreasing in the near future. Just as computer chips have gotten exponentially smaller and more powerful over the years, so will solar arrays. An article from Power Online discusses this exciting topic in one of their latest articles:

"[These] new antennas might also be useful for any other application that requires light to be concentrated, such as night-vision goggles or telescopes. Solar panels generate electricity by converting photons (packets of light energy) into an electric current. Strano's (Charles and Hilda Roddey Associate Professor of Chemical Engineering and the team leader of the researchers who have discovered this new technology) nanotube antenna boosts the number of photons that can be captured and transforms the light into energy that can be funneled into a solar cell."

The article maintains that in the future, your entire roof might not need to be covered in solar panels, but rather just have a few small locations where these new antenna arrays are present. However, there will likely be a myriad of other uses for these nanotubes, ranging from the powering of smaller devices to advances in satellite, space station and space shuttle construction. With this new breakthrough, it is likely that the renewable resource industry will see a huge boost in the months to come as the process is streamlined for mass production.

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To read the article from Power Online, click this link:
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Electric Intelligence and the Smart Grid...

Posted by The Power Generation Blog on Wednesday, September 8, 2010
(Image courtesy of Ecolectic)

Power Magazine recently ran an article that takes a look at the 2009-2010 Platts/Capgemini Utilities Executive Study that was just recently released in July. 106 senior executives were asked questions regarding the power generation industry, particularly regarding the advent of smart grids and their effect on those in our field. For those that don't know (and if you don't, I'm surprised you read this blog), a smart grid is a system of electricity deliverance that uses computer feedback and collected data to make sure that people are getting the most efficient amount of power for their needs while taxing the power supplier less. It keeps them from sending out too much power that would otherwise be wasted. The article from Power Magazine had this to say:

"The executive summary notes that 45% of respondents' companies have a smart grid strategy in place, while 52% said their utility has one in development. "Over two-thirds of participants also said they expect their smart grid strategies will change over the next five years as a result of evolving technologies." Full smart meter implementation has been reached by 37% of respondents and advanced meter infrastructure (AMI) by 35%."

The gist of the article is that full, nation-wide implementation of these smart grids is possible in the near future, but would require more cooperation from suppliers and technology vendors. By getting a 100% implementation rate of smart meters in American homes, not only will those in the power generation field save money, but the American public will save money as well. For those in our field, this is a goal that we should definitely be striving for.

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To read the article from Power Magazine, follow this link:

To view the results of the study, click here:
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