The California wildfires, the third year in a row for a high fire season, raise a number of perplexing questions: are these evidence of global warming affecting the ecosystem; are investor-owned utilities incapable of protecting the public; have the state’s aggressive renewable energy goals diverted resources away from protecting the grid? There are no definitive … More Fundamental questions about California’s fires and no easy answers

“The future of electric power in the U.S.” is the focus of a National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine Nov. 1 workshop in Washington. The meeting is part of a two-year NAS project. In the 2018 Department of Energy appropriations bill, Congress told the academies to “conduct an evaluation of the expected medium- and … More NAS Nov. 1 electric future workshop looks at information technologies

Facing the now-familiar problems of construction cost escalation and missed milestones, the British government has acknowledged that is ambitious two-unit, 3.2 GW Hinkley Point C nuclear project is in trouble. The Brits are proposing a new regulatory model for future nuclear projects. The government has now admitted that its schedule and cost estimates for the … More Will a new UK nuclear financing model work?

Hydropower, the politically-incorrect renewable, gets ignored or shortchanged in most discussions of renewable energy technologies in the U.S. Yet hydro, the oldest of the renewables, is still the dominant source of renewable generation in the nation. According to the Energy Information Administration, in 2018, hydro supplied 7% of U.S. electric generation. That compares to wind … More Can hydropower contribute to U.S. renewable energy goals?

In the wake of the devastation of Puerto Rico’s electric generating and distribution system two years ago by Hurricane Maria, the U.S. Department of Energy has okayed a feasibility study of whether advanced nuclear reactors could solve the island’s energy calamity. The energy agency approved a proposal from DOE’s Idaho National Laboratory to examine market … More Puerto Rico nuclear inquiry gets DOE funds

The White House on Monday announced its intent to nominate James P. Danly to the vacant Republican seat on the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. He is currently FERC’s general counsel. FERC Chairman Neil Chatterjee named Danly, 43, general counsel just over two years ago. Before joining the FERC staff, Danly was a member of the … More FERC general counsel to get Republican seat

Last Monday, the White House announced a series of new judicial and law enforcement nominees for Senate confirmation. Ari Peskoe, director of the Electricity Law Initiative at Harvard Law, tweeted using the hashtag #FERCWatch, “White House sends 8 nominations to the Senate. No FERC nominee(s).” Those of us who follow FERC (it’s an addiction, I … More Don’t look for FERC nominees anytime soon

In a case that has roots going back decades, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit yesterday largely upheld an Obama administration air pollution rule – supported by the Trump EPA – that aims to crack down on pollution from one state’s power plants blowing into another state. The unanimous decision also said … More DC Circuit upholds Obama Cross-State Air Pollution Rule

It’s time for the U.S. nuclear industry and its advocates to acknowledge an unpleasant truth: it’s time to start over from square one on disposing of the high-level radioactive waste (spent fuel) from the nation’s nuclear reactors. Nevada’s Yucca Mountain, which has been the great waste hope for over 30 years, is dead. The latest … More Senate votes more nails in Yucca Mountain’s coffin

Remember when natural gas had a limited future in the U.S. and oil production worldwide was running out? A decade ago, the fracking revolution hit, changing the prospects for gas and consigning “peak oil” to the dustbin of history. All the conventional forecasts were 180 degrees wrong. In the years since horizontal drilling and hydraulic … More Examining the perils of energy forecasting