Opening the Black Box
A new approach to utility asset management.
Creating a dynamic statistical approach to designing an overall strategy for utility asset management.
Law & Lawyers
Modernization Foundation
Near-term vision for advanced distribution management.
Recent superstorms and other major events have raised the bar for utility reliability and grid planning. By bringing together various advanced systems in an integrated distribution management platform, utilities can make power systems more resilient – and provide better service for customers.
Digest
Danish utility orders 582 MW of Siemens offshore wind turbines; Maui Electric contracts Greenlots and ABB for electric vehicle fast-charging system; U.S. Army Corps of Engineers contracts Eaton for alternative energy and conservation projects at army facilities; Southern Company and Turner Renewable Energy acquire SunEdison project in California; FERC approves Columbia Gas and Williams Partners pipeline expansion projects; plus contracts and announcements from Entergy, ITC Holdings, California ISO, PG&E, MidAmerican Transmission, Citizens Energy, CPS Energy, and others.
Catching Fire
Climate policy heats up after the Great Recession.
GHG rules are coming soon. What happens next will depend on how states react.
People (February 2014)
Nick Akins becomes chairman of AEP board; Dominion names Diane Leopold president of Dominion Energy, and Robert Blue president of Virginia Power; Leila Vespoli becomes chief legal officer at FirstEnergy; PG&E promotes Gregg Lemler to v.p. of electric transmission; plus personnel changes at Consumers Energy, Xcel, Southern Nuclear, ITC, CenterPoint, and others.
Modernizing with Trackers
Time-tested cost recovery mechanisms provide stable funding for infrastructure replacement.
Automatic tracker surcharges provide timely cost recovery for multi-year utility system improvement programs.
Transactions (February 2014)
Fortis acquires UNS Energy for $4.3 billion; EdF sells half of Texas wind project to UBS; SunEdison sells $1.2 billion in bonds and redeems $750 million in debt; plus equity and debt transactions totaling nearly $7 billion.
The Innovator's Dilemma
Assessing the risks and rewards of distributed energy strategies.
To embrace change or fight it? The choice to either act or wait and see is fraught with complexity.
Putting a Price on Carbon
How EPA can establish a U.S. GHG Program for the Electricity Sector.
With the Environmental Protection Agency’s proposed greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions standards expected in June 2014, many states are considering their own approaches to provide flexibility in meeting compliance requirements. Experience in North America to date provides policy guidance.
Complying with 111(d)
Exploring the cap-and-invest option.
EPA is expected to provide states with latitude in meeting Clean Air Act GHG standards. The Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI) demonstrates an effective and economical approach: “cap and invest.”