Recent ArticlesAs New York struggles with the country’s worst outbreak of the coronavirus pandemic, the state’s grid operator has taken an extreme step that other parts of the country may have to consider in the weeks ahead: asking critical employees to live and work at the control centers that keep the power grid operating, leaving them unsure when they’ll be able to come home. Last week, 37 employees of state grid operator NYISO — 33 grid operators and managers, plus two facilities workers and two food se...
For all their momentum, the clean-energy sectors — solar, wind, energy storage, and companies transforming the power grid — will not escape the COVID-19 downdraft. These industries face daunting questions about every aspect of their business, from supply chains to potential workforce shortages, to broader questions about the economy, demand for energy and the availability of finance. Over the coming weeks, Greentech Media will devote much of its journalistic efforts to the impacts of COVID-19....
Rarely has such a crucial enterprise for the future of human civilization led to such little commercial success. Long-duration energy storage holds great potential for a world in which wind and solar power dominate new power plant additions and gradually overtake other sources of electricity. Wind and solar only produce at certain times, so they need a complementary technology to help fill the gaps. And the lithium-ion batteries that supply 99 percent of new storage capacity today get very exp...
Northland Power, the Canadian renewables operator, announced the acquisition of the long-gestating but still early-stage NaiKun offshore wind project off the west coast of Canada — giving a dash of vitality to the otherwise somnolent Canadian offshore wind market. Northland owns a range of generating assets across Canada but has made its biggest mark in recent years by investing in offshore wind projects in Europe and East Asia. On Monday, as part of a COVID-19-related update to investors, the...
The growing mismatch between Germany’s renewables capacity and the strength of its electricity network is leading to curtailment, crazy pricing and challenges for neighboring nations. Although Germany is generating record amounts of clean energy in the north, its grid is too weak to transport all the power down to load centers in the south — a longstanding challenge for the country that is only getting worse. One of the most visible effects of this renewable energy saturation on the German gr...
