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Environmental

Nuclear Energy: Tastes like Chicken

Combo platter, nuclear and renewables, best deal on the menu
In a world where carbon dioxide has become somehow toxic, carbon-free energy sources are sought after all over the world. Nuclear energy is the other white meat, so to speak. Renewable nuclear energy, which can be recycled, has great value and should be encouraged. Here are five things policy makers can do to enhance the taste of nuclear energy.
Byline: 

Tim Echols

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Reshaping Energy

Transition to Renewables Minimizing Societal Cost

Implementation of renewables is much more complex than simply replacing fossil fuel plants with renewables. We must transition to renewables. But let's make sure we transition to the package that minimizes total societal cost.
Byline: 

Charles Bayless

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Estimating Benefits of Reducing Greenhouse Gas Emissions

Social Cost of Carbon

In Paris at the end of 2015, the world’s governments decided to be more ambitious than ever on climate change. They set their sights on a goal of limiting the increase in average global temperature to well below two degrees Celsius. Countries committed to constrain their greenhouse gas emissions over the next 10 to 15 years.
Byline: 

Steven Rose

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Energy People: Jim Rogers

We talked with Jim Rogers, former CEO of Duke Energy.

Duke is now made up of five companies that existed in 1992. There are three difficult tasks in doing a successful combination. One is to negotiate it. The second, maybe the most difficult task, is actually getting the approval at both the state and federal levels. And lastly, the really hard work of combining the companies. It’s getting the cost savings as well as the revenue enhancements associated with the transaction. It is keeping the most talented people.
Byline: 

Jim Rogers, with Steve Mitnick

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Energy People: Ken Gerling

We talked with Ken Gerling, vice president of transmission projects at Burns & McDonnell.

During his twenty-five-years at Burns & McDonnell, Ken Gerling has managed transmission projects with capital costs of nearly two billion dollars, and led teams with as many as three hundred and fifty members.
Byline: 

Ken Gerling, with Steve Mitnick

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Here Comes the Sun

Growing Impacts of Residential Solar on Utility Customer Service

What does PV mean for utilities’ residential customer service operations? From helping customers with supplier selection, through installation and maintenance issues? And with billing? To begin to address this question, we conducted two sets of surveys of residential electricity customers in the second quarter of 2016.
Byline: 

Daniel Gabaldon, Matt Guarini and Jamie Wimberly

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Geomagnetic Disturbances and the Grid

Harmonics Studies Needed to Assess Vulnerabilities

NERC recently issued reliability standards in response to the potential for geomagnetic disturbances to disrupt operations and possibly damage assets. The power industry appears to have placed undue emphasis on GMD’s threat to transformers. Our studies and those by others have underscored the value to transmission organizations in assessing their vulnerability to harmonics.
Byline: 

David Mueller

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Giving Credit Where Credit is Due

Ensuring State Emission Reduction in Clean Power Plan

Strong public policy favors giving states credit for the carbon reductions they make while the Plan’s legality is pending.
Byline: 

Joshua Epel, James Tarpey, Nicholas Eaton and Jacob Rey

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EPRI Explores Augmented Reality to Improve Grid Reliability

Innovating Like Edison: Utility workers with superpowers?

Smart meters are a reality but are smart poles and smart helmets right behind them? Often in the form of wearable computers or “wearables,” devices are potentially able to communicate from an endless variety of devices in the form of visual cues and data, sound, and even information based on touch.
Byline: 

John Simmins

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