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 [...]
Archive for the ‘Southern California Edison’ Category
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 »
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 [...]
Report: Californians paying too high a price for green energy
Posted in alternative energy, green policy, PG&E, San Diego Gas & Electric, solar energy, solar power plants, Southern California Edison on February 22, 2011 | Leave a Comment »
I wrote this story for Grist, where it first appeared. Are Californians forking over too much green for green energy? A new report from a ratepayers advocacy group found that the price of electricity in 59 percent of renewable energy contracts signed by the state’s three big utilities exceeded the market price referent, or MPR [...]
Southern California Edison signs another big solar farm deal
Posted in renewable energy, solar energy, solar power plants, Southern California Edison on February 10, 2011 | 1 Comment »
I wrote this story for Grist, where it first appeared. Southern California Edison on Wednesday announced another big photovoltaic power plant deal, this time to buy electricity from a 250-megawatt solar farm to be built by First Solar. Add that contract to 831 megawatts’ worth of photovoltaic power purchase agreements the Los Angeles utility signed [...]
Solar gets big and cheap in California
Posted in Amonix, renewable energy, solar energy, solar power plants, Southern California Edison on February 7, 2011 | Leave a Comment »
I wrote this story for Grist, where it first appeared. Earlier this week, I wrote about the green evolution in California regarding electric cars. Well, when it comes to solar energy, it’s starting to look more like a revolution. This week, utility Southern California Edison asked regulators to approve 20-year contracts to buy 250 megawatts [...]
China moves into U.S. solar power plant market
Posted in solar energy, solar power plants, Southern California Edison, Suntech on February 4, 2011 | Leave a Comment »
In The New York Times on Friday, I write about how Suntech has become the first Chinese solar company to win a major U.S. power plant contract: Suntech, the Chinese solar giant, has won a contract to supply photovoltaic panels for a 150-megawatt project in Arizona, marking China’s entry into a lucrative United States power-plant [...]
Utility makes big bets on solar technology
Posted in alternative energy, Amonix, solar energy, solar power plants, Southern California Edison on November 23, 2010 | Leave a Comment »
photo: Amonix I wrote this story for Reuters, where it first appeared: As solar panel prices have plummeted over the past year, photovoltaic power plants have become a more attractive option for utilities under pressure to meet renewable energy targets. Case in point: Late last week utility Southern California Edison announced it had signed contracts [...]
The smart grid, your house, your electric car and you
Posted in smart grid, smart meters, solar energy, Southern California Edison on November 10, 2010 | Leave a Comment »
photo: Todd Woody I wrote this story for Grist, where it first appeared. When experts try to describe the smart grid, their favorite analogy is the internet. Just as the internet enabled interactive, two-way communication, the smart grid, we’re told, will deploy sensors and software to digitize a century-old analog electricity distribution system, transforming it [...]
Why the green energy revolution needs the smart grid
Posted in alternative energy, environment, green policy, green tech, renewable energy, solar energy, solar power plants, Southern California Edison, tagged Sacramento Municipal Utility District on November 8, 2010 | Leave a Comment »
photo: Todd Woody I wrote this story for Grist, where it first appeared. If you want a birds-eye view of the future of power, scramble up to the roof of a 562,089-square-foot warehouse in Ontario, a city that sits in the smoggy heart of Southern California’s Inland Empire east of Los Angeles. On a roof [...]
California’s photovoltaic push
Posted in alternative energy, energy, environment, green policy, PG&E, renewable energy, solar energy, solar power plants, Southern California Edison, tagged distributed generation, PG&E, photovoltaics, Sacramento Municipal Utility District, SMUD, solar energy, Southern California Edison on July 8, 2010 | 1 Comment »
photo: PG&E I wrote this post for Grist, where it first appeared. Amid the hullabaloo over government-chartered mortgage giants derailing the green financing program known as Property Assessed Clean Energy, or PACE, the march toward distributed generation of renewable energy – that is, generating electricity from decentralized sources such as rooftop solar panels or backyard [...]
