The Quad Report

The long-time troubled Texas electric utility regulatory scheme, featuring the state’s unique, isolated transmission grid, the Electric Reliability Council of Texas, or ERCOT, is widely understood as dysfunctional, leading to brownouts, blackouts, and other state-wide disruptions. The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission’s recent winter reliability outlook found that the state could face the same blackout problems… More Archive, Oct. 27: Elec. Consumers: Don’t Californicate the Lone Star State

Driven in part by the response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the consequent disruption of energy markets, a view of the supply and demand for oil and gas that predicted that the world would run out of the finite resources in the ground – a.k.a. “peak oil” – may have been turned on its… More Archive, Oct. 28: The Peak Oil 180?

A major offshore wind project planned for Massachusetts is in trouble and may fail. AVANGRID, developed of the proposed 1,200-MW Commonwealth Wind project has asked state regulators for a month’s delay in reviewing the power purchase agreements for the project. The developer, a subsidiary of Spanish utility Iberdrola, said, “A one-month suspension in the proceeding… More Archive: Oct. 28: Big Mass. Offshore Wind Project in Jeopardy

California giant combination utility, San Francisco-based Pacific Gas and Electric, has asked the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission to resume its review of a request to extend the license of the two-unit, Diablo Canyon nuke, located on the coast near San Luis Obispo. NuclearNewswire noted that PG&E had originally filed a license extension request in 2009,… More Archive, Oct. 29: Closures of Nuclear Plants Passé, Life Extension Au Courant?

The FBI is investigating what was a possible terrorist attack against a prominent state-wide environmental and political organization, the Santa Fe, N.M.-based Conservation Voters of New Mexico. The group is affiliated with the national League of Conservation Voters (LCV). Last week (Oct. 26), CVNM received what Gene Karpinski, LCV president, described in an email to… More Archive, Nov. 1: New Mexico Green Group Targeted by Terrorists?

The common designation is COP27, which opens Sunday (Nov. 6) in the Egyptian Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh. The meeting will end Nov. 18. The formal designation is the “27th Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change.” Most expectations for the outcome of the meeting are low. Many… More Archive, Nov. 2: COP 27 Meets with Low Climate Expectations

Despite rumors to the contrary, the British government insists it is standing behind its controversial two-unit, 3,200-MW Sizewell C planned nuclear power project. The BBC on Friday (Nov. 4) reported that despite government denials, “A government official had told the BBC that every major project was under review ‘including Sizewell C’ as ministers try to… More Archive, Nov. 6: Sunak Save Sizewell C

Joy Ditto, the savvy CEO of the American Public Power Association, keeps close track of what’s on the minds of her municipal utility members. And she reports in an editorial in The Hill last month, what’s on their minds is transformers. It’s a somewhat arcane corner of the U.S. supply chain problems that hasn’t made… More Archive, Nov. 7: Electrical Distribution Transformers in Short Supply

The American Nuclear Society is moving toward open-source publishing of its research, giving free access to the public to material published on its new platform. “Open research is a significant and growing trend in the publishing world, and this new platform allows ANS members to publish quality content freely available for the public,” ANS CEO… More Archive, Nov. 10: ANS Rolling Out Open-Source Publishing

Former Vice President (1992-2000) Al Gore, who has long warned about the allegedly devastating impacts of global warming, caused by burning fossil fuels, viewed glaciers, and recent glacial retreat, as iconic evidence for his claims. He has focused in on Montana’s Glacier National Park to make that case. In a 1997 speech in the park,… More Archive, Nov. 13: Glaciers Not Man Made?