image: General Electric In Thursday’s New York Times, I write about General Electric’s bid to to become a major player in the U.S. solar industry: SAN FRANCISCO — In a move that could shake up the American solar industry, General Electric plans to announce on Thursday that it will build the nation’s largest photovoltaic panel [...]
Archive for the ‘energy’ Category
GE to build U.S.’ largest solar factory, shake up market
Posted in energy, renewable energy, solar energy, tagged General Electric, PrimeStar Solar on April 6, 2011 | 2 Comments »
Prop 23 coalition revives campaign for green policies
Posted in energy, environment, green policy, Proposition 23, renewable energy, tagged Thomas Steyer on March 28, 2011 | Leave a Comment »
In The New York Times on Friday, I wrote about the organizers of California’s No on Proposition 23 campaign resurrecting their coalition to press for green energy policies in the Golden State and Washington: George P. Shultz, the Republican former secretary of state, and Thomas F. Steyer, the Democratic hedge fund billionaire, are reviving the [...]
San Francisco mayor calls for city to go 100% renewable
Posted in energy, renewable energy, solar energy, tagged Vote Solar on March 28, 2011 | Leave a Comment »
photo: jfraser I wrote this story for Grist, where it first appeared. Where could you get 797 people to stand in line outside a nightclub to attend a $100-a-ticket fundraiser for a nonprofit that advocates for solar energy? Not-so-sunny San Francisco, of course. The queue to get into the Vote Solar Initiative annual spring equinox [...]
California billionaire Tom Steyer takes on the Koch brothers
Posted in climate change, energy, global warming, green policy, Proposition 23, renewable energy, tagged Thomas F. Steyer on March 16, 2011 | Leave a Comment »
In The New York Times on Tuesday, I wrote about the strategy of San Francisco billionaire Tom Steyer, the leader of the campaign against Proposition 23 last year, to fight efforts to restrict the EPA’s ability to regulate greenhouse gas emissions: Is Thomas F. Steyer the anti-Koch? For years, Mr. Steyer, a billionaire San Francisco [...]
California utilities (just) miss renewable energy deadline
Posted in energy, PG&E, renewable energy, San Diego Gas & Electric, solar energy, solar power plants, Southern California Edison on March 11, 2011 | 1 Comment »
photo: Todd Woody I wrote this story for Grist, where it first appeared. The California Legislature is moving to put into law a regulation requiring the state’s utilities to obtain a third of their electricity from renewable energy by 2020. But how did California’s three big investor-owned utilities do in meeting a previous mandate to [...]
Short-circuiting California’s solar thermal power plant boom
Posted in BrightSource Energy, energy, environment, NextEra Energy Resources, renewable energy, Sierra Club, solar energy, Solar Millennium, solar power plants, Southern California Edison, Tessera Solar on February 24, 2011 | Leave a Comment »
photo: Todd Woody In Thursday’s New York Times, I write about how the nascent solar thermal boom in California’s Mojave Desert is being derailed by lawsuits from environmental, union and Native American groups: SAN FRANCISCO — Just weeks after regulators approved the last of nine multibillion-dollar solar thermal power plants to be built in the [...]
California greens its grid with energy storage
Posted in energy, green policy, smart grid, tagged Cal ISO, energy storage on February 15, 2011 | Leave a Comment »
I wrote this story for Grist, where it first appeared. In just about every story on renewable energy, there’s a familiar cast of characters: green power developers, utilities, and sundry state and federal regulators. But there’s one key player that often lurks in the background – the grid operator. In the Golden State, most of [...]
Saving the desert tortoise from solar power plants
Posted in BrightSource Energy, endangered species, energy, environment, renewable energy, solar energy, solar power plants, tagged desert tortoise, Ivanpah, Mercy Vaughn, Peter Woodman on November 22, 2010 | Leave a Comment »
photo: Todd Woody In the New York Times on Wednesday, I follow up my story on solar power plants and desert tortoises: In an article in The New York Times on Wednesday, I write about how the fortunes of big solar power plants in the desert Southwest can hinge on the way developers handle imperiled [...]
Desert tortoise sets pace for solar power projects
Posted in BrightSource Energy, endangered species, energy, solar energy, solar power plants, tagged desert tortoise, Ivanpah on November 22, 2010 | Leave a Comment »
photo: Todd Woody In The New York Times special Energy report, I write about how the success of large-scale solar power plants being built in the desert Southwest depends on how developers deal with the imperiled desert tortoise and other wildlife: NIPTON, Calif. — On the construction site of the $2 billion Ivanpah solar power [...]
