Modeling Storm Outages
New tools for enhancing utility preparedness and response.
Sandy and other major storms have raised the bar for outage management. New modeling systems help utilities predict effects and plan their response.
Law & Lawyers
What Price, Resiliency?
Evaluating the cost effectiveness of grid-hardening investments.
As with any investment, resiliency upgrades can reach a point of diminishing returns. Analyzing the costs and benefits can help guide upgrade strategies.
America’s Energy Future: So Who Are the Good Guys?
Not just ‘all of the above,’ but ‘how much of each?’
For proponents of a clean energy economy, identifying the “good guys” is no easy task.
A Trip to RIIO in Your Future?
Great Britain’s latest innovation in grid regulation.
Great Britain’s electric regulator takes performance-based regulation to a new, more complex level, weighing policy choices against attendant costs.
Taming Distributed Energy
How advanced distribution management systems are key to integrating distributed resources.
Fast growing distributed resources create technical challenges for utilities. Advanced DMS technology promises to help keep local grids balanced.
Digest
ABB energizes 500 MW HVDC line; MISO installs synchrophasors; Xcel plans transmission upgrades in Texas Panhandle; Panda orders power blocks from Siemens for Pennsylvania project; EdF starts operations at 110 MW solar project in Mojave Desert; plus contracts and announcements from Sensus, DTE, Calpine, PSNM, First Solar, NRG, and others.
Transactions (October 2013)
Constellation and EdF transfer nuclear licenses to Exelon for $400 million; NRG closes $244 million acquisition of Gregory cogen plant in Texas; Vivint Solar secures $200 million for rooftop solar leases; Virginia Power floats $585 million in bonds; Southern Company issues $700 million; plus equity deals totaling $844 million and debt issues totaling $3.635 billion.
Sound and Fury
How NIPSCO feels leaned on.
Northern Indiana Public Service, the MISO member sandwiched between PJM’s Ohio territory and its noncontiguous Chicago outpost, feels particularly aggrieved by the failure of the MISO-PJM Joint Operating Agreement, approved by FERC in 2004, to facilitate cross-border grid projects to relieve constraints along the ragged and interlaced seam that separates the two regions.
Disruption on Wall Street
Financial executives contemplate the rise of distributed resources.
In a January 2013 report, EEI said fast-growing distributed energy could undermine the utility business model. Wall Street is paying attention.
Bridging the IT/OT gap: the risks and benefits
The goal for any utility that invests in smart grid technology is to attain higher efficiency and reliable performance. A smart grid platform implies the convergence of Operations Technology (OT) and Information Technology (IT). Schneider Electric’s integrated energy solutions can help your utility become smarter.