Weekly Clean Energy Roundup:September 21, 2005

News and Events

• USDA Awards $21 Million for Efficiency and Renewable Energy
• FPL Energy and PPM Energy Buy 900 Megawatts of Wind Turbines
• Pennsylvania Utility to Fund Efficiency, Renewable Energy
• California Approves Greenhouse Gas Regulations for Vehicles
• U.S. and Canada Work Together to Save Fuel for Freight Industry
• European Automakers Pursue Hybrid Vehicles

Site News

• SolarPACES

Energy Connections

• Hydropower Downturn Masks Renewable Energy Growth in 2004

News and Events

USDA Awards $21 Million for Efficiency and Renewable Energy

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) awarded $21 million in grants last week to 150 energy efficiency and renewable energy projects. The projects, located in 32 states, include a large number of wind energy projects, as well as projects relating to energy efficiency and solar, biomass, and geothermal energy.

For example, Wasatch Wind, LLC will receive $500,000 to build a 1.5-megawatt wind turbine in Spanish Fork Canyon, Utah, the first of 10 towers planned for the site. Synthetic Energy, Inc., of Ketchum, Idaho, will use its grant of $199,863 to purchase wind turbines to power a commercial hydrogen generator. See the USDA press release and the full list of recipients (PDF 22 KB).

FPL Energy and PPM Energy Buy 900 Megawatts of Wind Turbines

Two of the largest wind energy developers in the United States?FPL Energy and PPM Energy?are making plans to install large wind energy projects over the next year, as they have purchased wind turbines with a total capacity of 900 megawatts.

Siemens Power Generation announced last week an agreement to sell 600 megawatts of wind turbines to FPL Energy, with delivery beginning in 2006. Siemens will manufacture, install, and commission its 2.3-megawatt Mk II turbines for FPL Energy, marking the first sale of Siemens wind turbines within the United States. See the Siemens press release.

PPM Energy announced last week that it has agreed to buy 300 megawatts of wind turbines from GE Energy for use in 2006. In August, PPM Energy completed construction on its 75-megawatt Klondike II Wind Power Plant near Wasco, Oregon, and the company expects to complete four other wind power projects this year: the 100-megawatt Trimont project in Minnesota, the 150-megawatt Elk River project in Kansas, the 150-megawatt Shiloh project in California, and the 198-megawatt Maple Ridge project in New York. See the PPM Energy press release.

Pennsylvania Utility to Fund Efficiency, Renewable Energy

A settlement reached last week regarding the proposed merger of Exelon Corporation, the parent company to Philadelphia-based PECO Energy, with New Jersey’s Public Service Enterprise Group Inc. will result in new funding and incentives for renewable energy and energy efficiency in Pennsylvania. Under the settlement, PECO must provide $12 million to the Pennsylvania Energy Development Authority and $7.2 million to the Sustainable Development Fund over the next four years to promote renewable energy and energy efficiency. According to the Citizens for Pennsylvania’s Future (PennFuture), the combination of those funds and other state incentives could lead to “thousands of megawatts of new wind, solar, biomass, methane and energy conservation projects.”

According to PennFuture, the agreement also requires PECO to allow customers that produce their own power to sell excess power back to the utility, a concept known as net metering. That makes it more cost-effective for consumers to install solar panels or a wind turbine. See the press releases from Pennsylvania Governor Edward Rendell, PennFuture, and Exelon.

California Approves Greenhouse Gas Regulations for Vehicles

The California Air Resources Board (CARB) announced Monday that the state’s greenhouse gas regulations for vehicles were approved by the California Office of Administrative Law last week and filed with the Secretary of the State. Beginning with Model Year 2009, the new rules set limits for the total greenhouse gas emissions that new vehicles can emit per mile. The limits tighten each year after that, and by 2016, greenhouse gas emissions from lighter vehicles will be cut by one-third, while greenhouse gas emissions from heavier vehicles will be cut by about one-quarter.

Specifically, the rules set limits on the amount of carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, and hydrofluorocarbons (typically used as refrigerants in air conditioning systems) emitted per mile by the entire fleet of vehicles produced by an automaker. The manufacturers can earn credits for early compliance or for exceeding the requirements, and they can trade the credits with other manufacturers. Manufacturers earn debits f
or falling short of the requirements, and have up to five years to earn enough credits to erase the debit, after which they will be subject to civil penalties. The new rules will take effect on January 1st, 2006. See the CARB Web site.

U.S. and Canada Work Together to Save Fuel for Freight Industry

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced last week a new partnership with Natural Resources Canada (NRCan)?its equivalent to the north?that could save up to 440 million gallons of fuels and avoid emissions of about 5 million tons of carbon dioxide per year. To achieve that goal, EPA and NRCan will coordinate voluntary cross-border projects with the freight industry focusing on idle reduction, deployment of clean technologies, and driver training and awareness. The collaboration brings together the complementary strengths of EPA’s SmartWay Transport Partnership, which emphasized innovative technologies, and NRCan’s FleetSmart, which specializes in driver education and training. See the EPA press release and the Web sites for the EPA SmartWay Transport Partnership and the NRCan FleetSmart program.

According to DOE’s Clean Cities program, U.S. trucks consume more than 800 million gallons of diesel fuel each year while left idling. Among the approaches to reduce idling are auxiliary power units that allow truckers to shut down their engines without losing power to their cabins. A similar approach allows truckers to hook up to power systems at truck stops. See the Clean Cities program’s Idle Reduction Web page.

European Automakers Pursue Hybrid Vehicles

European automakers have discovered the hybrid vehicle: At Europe’s largest auto show, now underway in Frankfurt, automakers unveiled new hybrid vehicle prototypes and plans to build future hybrid vehicles. Audi introduced its new sport utility vehicle (SUV), the Q7, at the Frankfurt Auto Show and brought along a hybrid concept version that combines a 32-kilowatt electric motor with a 4.2-liter V8 engine. The vehicle can run on electric power only when coasting with no pressure on the gas pedal. Porsche announced plans to build its own hybrid SUV, a hybrid version of the Cayenne, by the end of the decade. The Cayenne hybrid will also be able to run in all-electric mode, and will achieve a fuel economy of about 20 miles per gallon, an improvement of about 17 percent over the standard Cayenne. And Volkswagen announced prior to the show that it will build a hybrid version of its minivan, the Touran, in China. Teams in both Germany and China will develop the hybrid minivan, which will be ready in time for the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing. See the Audi Q7 Web site and the press releases from Porsche and Volkswagen (PDF 71 KB).

Site News

SolarPACES

SolarPACES is an international cooperative of experts that focuses on the development and marketing of concentrating solar power (CSP) systems. It is a collaborative program managed under the International Energy Agency (IEA) to help find solutions to worldwide energy problems. The Web site provides descriptions of CSP technologies, lists of current CSP projects, CSP news, a library of documents, and summaries of the IEA tasks related to solar thermal energy.

Energy Connections

Hydropower Downturn Masks Renewable Energy Growth in 2004

The U.S. use of renewable energy grew by only 1 percent in 2004, according to a report released in August by DOE’s Energy Information Administration (EIA). Why so little? The EIA’s report includes power produced from conventional hydropower, which dropped by 3.5 percent in 2004. Excluding hydropower, renewable energy production increased by 4 percent, including a 3.8 percent growth in biomass energy and a 24 percent growth in wind energy, according to EIA’s preliminary data. The rapid growth in wind energy was matched by only one other renewable energy source: ethanol, which is growing quickly as use of the fuel additive MTBE is declining. Unfortunately, the available data for some energy resources, such as solar power, are lacking. The EIA data for 2003 only lists solar power production in two states: California and Arizona. See “Renewable Energy Trends 2004” (PDF 838 KB).

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