Transmission

The Fortnightly 40 Best Energy Companies

The industry’s transformation has begun. Should the F40 transform too?

(September 2014) Our annual ranking of shareholder performance tracks the long-term returns of leading utilities. But can it predict success in a transformed energy market?
Byline: 

Michael Burr

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Her Next Hurdle

ITC’s Linda Blair on where to build tomorrow’s grid.

Linda Blair, executive v.p. and chief business officer for grid giant ITC, discusses how ITC plans to navigate the new transmission landscape and where ITC might turn for its next major transmission project.
Byline: 

Bruce W. Radford

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Threat Level Red

Integrating weather and GIS data for more accurate threat assessments.

Weather and GIS are being combined in new ways to provide better storm threat assessments - helping utilities create increasingly effective battle plans to defend against approaching storms.
Byline: 

Matt Zimmerman and Don Leick

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Reliable But Costly

Recent trends in distribution line undergrounding.

Utility distribution lines increasingly are going underground, but costs are still prohibitive for replacing existing overhead lines.
Byline: 

William Atkinson

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Utility System Hardening

Taking Resiliency One Step Further

An independent system operator for the distribution network could allow utilities to invest in rooftop solar behind the meter and within territory.
Byline: 

Mike Hervey

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Wireless Sensor Technology

Equipment health monitoring for the modern utility.

Wireless sensors open new, novel applications for utilities, replacing expensive cabling network options to sense incipient equipment failures.
Byline: 

Ramesh (“Rudy”) Shankar

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In the Crosshairs

Protecting substations and transformers after the PG&E Metcalf attack.

The latest fallout from the April 2013 Metcalf incident: the unprecedented assault with high-powered rifles on PG&E’s Metcalf substation, in Silicon Valley, which disabled 17 of 20 large transformers.
Byline: 

William Atkinson

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Future Shock

ERCOT load growth: patterns, possibilities, and second thoughts.

Data from ERCOT indicates that energy intensity is falling markedly, as measured in terms of kWh usage per number of nonfarm jobs. That suggests much less future load growth, yet EIA data based on nationwide scenarios do not seem to agree.
Byline: 

Ken Monts

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Big Wind in the Big Oil State

ERCOT readies for renewable market integration.

ERCOT readies to integrate a large future influx of wind generation and finds need for new, more flexible resources to provide ancillary services – preferably a zero-to-five-minute ramping resource which, unfortunately, does not correspond to any currently existing technology or market product.
Byline: 

Julia Matevosyan

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Scare Tactics

New England’s proposed capacity market reform would force generators to ‘Be There or Else.’

Facing worries about resource adequacy, ISO New England proposes changes that would penalize generators that fail to perform when needed -- for any reason. Market players say it can only work if the system operator allows for reasonable exceptions.
Byline: 

Bruce W. Radford

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