#national transmission grid

[nepalenergyforum]

Manang Lights Up with National Transmission Line Connection

Manang — Electricity from the national transmission grid has reached the Tilicho Lake Base Camp, a popular tourist destination in Manang, and Thorong La Pass. With the connection to the national transmission line, the dependency on solar energy has been eliminated. Managing Director of the Authority, Kulman Ghising, informed that electricity supply has started at the base camp located at an…

[batboyblog]

Things the Biden-Harris Administration Did This Week #38

Oct 11-18 2024

President Biden announced that this Administration had forgiven the student loan debt of 1 million public sector workers. The cancellation of the student loan debts of 60,000 teachers, firefighters, EMTs, nurses and other public sector workers brings the total number of people who's debts have been erased by the Biden-Harris Administration using the Public Service Loan Forgiveness to 1 million. the PSLF was passed in 2007 but before President Biden took office only 7,000 people had ever had their debts forgiven through it. The Biden-Harris team have through different programs managed to bring debt relief to 5 million Americans and counting despite on going legal fights against Republican state Attorneys General.

The Federal Trade Commission finalizes its "one-click to cancel" rule. The new rule requires businesses to make it as easy to cancel a subscription as it was to sign up for it. It also requires more up front information to be shared before offering billing information.

The Department of Transportation announced that since the start of the Biden-Harris Administration there are 1.7 million more construction and manufacturing jobs and 700,000 more jobs in the transportation sector. There are now 400,000 more union workers than in 2021. 60,000 Infrastructure projects across the nation have been funded by the Biden-Harris Bipartisan Infrastructure Law. Under this Administration 16 million jobs have been added, including 1.7 construction and manufacturing jobs, construction employment is the highest ever recorded since records started in 1939. 172,000 manufacturing jobs were lost during the Trump administration.

The Department of Energy announced $2 billion to protect the U.S. power grid against growing threats of extreme weather. This money will go to 38 projects across 42 states and Washington DC. It'll upgrade nearly 1,000 miles worth of transmission lines. The upgrades will allow 7.5 gigawatts of new grid capacity while also generating new union jobs across the country.

The EPA announced $125 million to help upgrade older diesel engines to low or zero-emission solutions. The EPA has selected 70 projects to use the funds on. They range from replacing school buses, to port equipment, to construction equipment. More than half of the selected projects will be replacing equipment with zero-emissions, such as all electric school buses.

The Department of The Interior and State of California broke ground on the Salton Sea Species Conservation Habitat Project. The Salton Sea is California's largest lake at over 300 miles of Surface area. An earlier project worked to conserve and restore shallow water habitats in over 4,000 acres on the southern end of the lake, this week over 700 acres were added bring the total to 5,000 acres of protected land. The Biden-Harris Administration is investing $250 million in the project along side California's $500 million. Part of the Administration's effort to restore wild life habitat and protect water resources.

The Department of Energy announced $900 Million in investment in next generation nuclear power. The money will help the development of Generation III+ Light-Water Small Modular Reactors, smaller lighter reactors which in theory should be easier to deploy. DoE estimates the U.S. will need approximately 700-900 GW of additional clean, firm power generation capacity to reach net-zero emissions by 2050. Currently half of America's clean energy comes from nuclear power, so lengthening the life space of current nuclear reactors and exploring the next generation is key to fighting climate change.

The federal government took two big steps to increase the rights of Alaska natives. The Departments of The Interior and Agricultural finalized an agreement to strengthen Alaska Tribal representation on the Federal Subsistence Board. The FSB oversees fish and wildlife resources for subsistence purposes on federal lands and waters in Alaska. The changes add 3 new members to the board appointed by the Alaska Native Tribes, as well as requiring the board's chair to have experience with Alaska rural subsistence. The Department of The Interior also signed 3 landmark co-stewardship agreements with Alaska Native Tribes.

The Department of Energy announced $860 million to help support solar energy in Puerto Rico. The project will remove 2.7 million tons of CO2 per year, or about the same as taking 533,000 cars off the road. It serves as an important step on the path to getting Puerto Rico to 100% renewable by 2050.

The Department of the Interior announced a major step forward in geothermal energy on public lands. The DoI announced it had approved the Fervo Cape Geothermal Power Project in Beaver County, Utah. When finished it'll generate 2 gigawatts of power, enough for 2 million homes. The BLM has now green lit 32 gigawatts of clean energy projects on public lands. A major step toward the Biden-Harris Administration's goal of a carbon pollution-free power sector by 2035.

Bonus: President Biden meets with a Kindergarten Teacher who's student loans were forgiven this week

[partisan-by-default]

A new study published in the journal Renewable Energy uses data from the state of California to demonstrate that no blackouts occurred when wind-water-solar electricity supply exceeded 100% of demand on the state’s main grid for a record 98 of 116 days from late winter to early summer 2024 for an average (maximum) of 4.84 (10.1) hours per day.

Compared to the same period in 2023, solar output in California is up 31%, wind power is up 8%, and batteries are up a staggering 105%. Batteries supplied up to 12% of nighttime demand by storing and redistributing excess solar energy.

And here’s the kicker: California’s high electricity prices aren’t because of wind, water, and solar energy. (That issue is primarily caused by utilities recovering the cost of wildfire mitigation, transmission and distribution investments, and net energy metering.)

In fact, researchers from Stanford, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, and the University of California, Berkeley found that states with higher shares of renewable energy tend to see lower electricity prices. The takeaway – and the data backs it up – is that a large grid dominated by wind, water, and solar is not only feasible, it’s also reliable.

[probablyasocialecologist]

Electricity consumption at US data centers alone is poised to triple from 2022 levels, to as much as 390 terawatt hours by the end of the decade, according to Boston Consulting Group. That’s equal to about 7.5% of the nation’s projected electricity demand. “We do need way more energy in the world than we thought we needed before,” Sam Altman, chief executive officer of OpenAI, whose ChatGPT tool has become a global phenomenon, said at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland last week. “We still don’t appreciate the energy needs of this technology.” For decades, US electricity demand rose by less than 1% annually. But utilities and grid operators have doubled their annual forecasts for the next five years to about 1.5%, according to Grid Strategies, a consulting firm that based its analysis on regulatory filings. That’s the highest since the 1990s, before the US stepped up efforts to make homes and businesses more energy efficient. It’s not just the explosion in data centers that has power companies scrambling to revise their projections. The Biden administration’s drive to seed the country with new factories that make electric cars, batteries and semiconductors is straining the nation’s already stressed electricity grid. What’s often referred to as the biggest machine in the world is in reality a patchwork of regional networks with not enough transmission lines in places, complicating the job of bringing in new power from wind and solar farms. To cope with the surge, some power companies are reconsidering plans to mothball plants that burn fossil fuels, while a few have petitioned regulators for permission to build new gas-powered ones. That means President Joe Biden’s push to bolster environmentally friendly industries could end up contributing to an increase in emissions, at least in the near term. Unless utilities start to boost generation and make it easier for independent wind and solar farms to connect to their transmission lines, the situation could get dire, says Ari Peskoe, director of the Electricity Law Initiative at Harvard Law School. “New loads are delayed, factories can’t come online, our economic growth potential is diminished,” he says. “The worst-case scenario is utilities don’t adapt and keep old fossil-fuel capacity online and they don’t evolve past that.”

archive.today article link

[mariacallous]

Lithuania will disconnect and dismantle power lines with Russia and Belarus on Feb. 8, 2025, as part of the synchronization of the Baltic power systems with Western Europe, the LTR media group wrote on Oct. 25, citing the Lithuanian power transmission system operator Litgrid.

The synchronization of the Baltic power grids with continental Europe is expected to take place on Feb. 9.

Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia will conduct a joint isolated operational test before disconnecting from the Russian IPS/UPS system.

"Some power lines with third countries are currently in operation," Litgrid said in its statement.

"All lines will be disconnected on Feb. 8, 2025, when the agreement on the joint power system of Russia, Belarus and the Baltic states (BRELL) expires. Dismantling will begin immediately after that."

The Lithuanian government has already removed seven 330-kilovolt power lines with Russia and Belarus from the list of assets and facilities important for national security. The Baltic transmission system operators had notified Russia and Belarus of their withdrawal from the agreement in July.

In early October, the Lithuanian cabinet also approved the termination of the agreement with Russia on merchant shipping.

On Oct. 8, Lithuanian renewable energy company Ignitis Grupė announced that it would spend EUR 4 million ($4.4 million) on equipment to provide stable electricity supply to 420,000 Ukrainian households.

[dertaglichedan]

‘Three New York Cities’ Worth of Power: AI Is Stressing the Grid

https://www.wsj.com/business/energy-oil/ai-data-center-boom-spurs-race-to-find-power-87cf39dd

Across the nation, utilities are worried about expanding the overburdened power grid, citing high costs and concerns about commitment from data center projects

Tech companies scouring the country for electricity to power artificial intelligence are increasingly finding there is a waiting list.

In many places the nation’s high-voltage electric wires are running out of room, their connection points locked up by data centers for AI, new factories or charging infrastructure for electric vehicles. 

A mad dash to lock up available power has ensued. 

The tech industry is pinballing from one market to the next looking for places with the capacity to connect campuses that would consume up to a gigawatt of power—about as much as San Francisco uses. Some requests are as much as four to five times as large as that.

But wires are getting so crowded that some prospective data center customers—which request far more power than other users—are being told they may have to wait until the next decade to get the power they are seeking. Others are receiving less power than they expected.

In Salt Lake City, the data center industry says there is a moratorium for larger projects, with the market closed to new business. Utility PacifiCorp says “significant levels of transmission and generation” could be needed for the larger projects and it is evaluating requests while avoiding spreading costs to other customers. 

*** Yeah, all data centers. Nothing to do with removing dams and hydro power, or killing natural gas off across the nation.. Nope, it's all data centers..

Stupid data centers..

[rjzimmerman]

Excerpt from this press release from the Department of the Interior:

Today, the Biden-Harris Administration announced that NOAA is designating 4,543 square miles of coastal and offshore waters along 116 miles of California’s central coast as America’s 17th national marine sanctuary. Chumash Heritage National Marine Sanctuary will conserve the area’s diverse range of marine life and celebrate Indigenous peoples’ connections to the region. It is the third largest sanctuary in the National Marine Sanctuary System.

The sanctuary designation advances President Biden’s ocean conservation legacy and his America the Beautiful Initiative, which supports locally-led collaborative conservation efforts across the country and sets a national goal of protecting, conserving and restoring at least 30% of U.S. lands and waters by 2030. With this designation, the Biden-Harris Administration has now conserved more than 45 million acres of lands and waters.

Stretching from just south of Diablo Canyon Power Plant in San Luis Obispo County to the Gaviota Coast in Santa Barbara County, the sanctuary will bring comprehensive community- and ecosystem-based management to nationally significant natural, historical, archeological and cultural resources — including kelp forests, rocky reefs, sandy beaches, underwater mountains and more than 200 NOAA-documented shipwrecks.

The sanctuary’s boundaries exclude areas where future subsea electrical transmission cables and floating offshore substations could be installed outside the sanctuary to connect the Morro Bay Wind Energy Area to the electrical power grid at Morro Bay and Diablo Canyon Power Plant, ensuring that the sanctuary meets both conservation and clean energy goals. NOAA will consider a potential expansion of the sanctuary in the coming years, after transmission cables have been laid. 

This sanctuary designation is the result of a decade of work by Tribes, Indigenous Peoples, community leaders, organizations, businesses, state and local officials, and members of Congress — including then-Senator and now Vice President Kamala Harris — to develop and advance the vision for the Chumash Heritage National Marine Sanctuary.

[beardedmrbean]

Hawaiian officials attributed the cause of catastrophic wildfires to alleged failures from the state's main power utility company and downed power lines this week after Democrats blamed the disaster on global warming.

In a lawsuit filed Thursday, the government of Maui County, Hawaii, alleged Hawaiian Electric Company (HECO) and its subsidiaries failed to properly power down live electrical equipment amid a red flag windstorm earlier this month. Due to this failure, downed power lines operated by the utility company sparked a series of deadly fires on the island, the lawsuit claimed.

"The lawsuit alleges that the Defendants acted negligently by failing to power down their electrical equipment despite a National Weather Service Red Flag Warning on August 7th," Maui County said in a release announcing its lawsuit. 

"The lawsuit further alleges HECO’s energized and downed power lines ignited dry fuel such as grass and brush, causing the fires," the announcement added. "The lawsuit also alleges failure to maintain the system and power grid, which caused the systemic failures starting three different fires on August 8th."

EXPERTS THROW COLD WATER ON DEM CLAIMS THAT HAWAII WILDFIRES CAUSED BY CLIMATE CHANGE

Maui County argued in the lawsuit that HECO has a duty "to properly maintain and repair the electric transmission lines, and other equipment including utility poles associated with their transmission of electricity, and to keep vegetation properly trimmed and maintained so as to prevent contact with overhead power lines and other electric equipment."

However, Democratic lawmakers, a top White House official and Hawaii Gov. Josh Green have all blamed the event, which has claimed the lives of at least 115 people, on human-caused global warming.

ENVIRONMENTALISTS ARE BLOCKING FOREST MANAGEMENT METHODS SAVING ICONIC SEQUOIAS AMID YOSEMITE WILDFIRE

"This is devastating. This is a climate emergency," Sen. Ed Markey, D-Mass., an original sponsor of the Green New Deal, wrote in a post on X on Aug. 10. "I stand in solidarity with my friends and colleagues from Hawai’i — we must act fast, provide aid, and invest in a resilient and safe future."

"Heartbreaking fires in Hawaii! Scientists are clear that climate chaos wreaking havoc on ecosystems everywhere is the new norm," Sen. Jeff Merkley, D-Ore., said in a separate post. "We need to take action immediately or else it will get even worse."

Rep. Ro Khanna, D-Calif., who spearheaded a recent congressional investigation into Big Oil, called on President Biden to declare a "climate emergency" in response to the fires.

"My heart breaks hearing of the devastation in Maui," Rep. Cori Bush, D-Mo., added. "The climate crisis is here and it's killing people. It’s time for [Biden] to declare a climate emergency."

Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., joined in, saying the wildfires were a "devastating view of our planet as we fail to adequately address the climate crisis."

And White House clean energy czar John Podesta called for policies to reduce carbon emissions to fight future natural disasters like the Maui wildfires which he said were "fueled by climate change."

HAWAII WINDS TO LESSEN AS FIREFIGHTERS ATTEMPT TO CONTAIN WILDFIRES; CONDITIONS REMAIN DRY AND BREEZY

"This summer has brought one climate disaster after another, from extreme heat in Arizona and Texas and across the Southeast, to floods in Vermont and upstate New York, to thick smoke from Canadian wildfires," Podesta told reporters on Aug. 16. "And all of us have watched in horror as the Maui fires have claimed over 100 lives — the largest loss of life of a fire in the last 100 years in America."

"To stop these disasters from getting even worse, we have to cut the carbon pollution that’s driving the climate crisis, and that’s what the Inflation Reduction Act is all about," he continued.

Experts, though, have thrown cold water on claims that climate change triggered the Maui fires.  Instead, they said the event was largely a result of years of poor forest and brush management, in addition to declining agriculture. Such conditions, they said, allow fires to spread rapidly and make fires harder to contain. "Blaming this on weather and climate is misleading," said Clay Trauernicht, a University of Hawaii at Manoa professor and environmental management expert. "Hawai'i's fire problem is due to the vast areas of unmanaged, nonnative grasslands from decades of declining agriculture."

"These savannas now cover about a million acres across the main Hawaiian Islands, mostly the legacy of land clearing for plantation agriculture and ranching in the late 1800s/early 1900s," he continued. "The transformation to savanna makes the landscape way more sensitive to bad 'fire weather' — hot, dry, windy conditions. It also means we get huge buildups of fuels during rainy periods."

[theflatbrokeoldguy]

Here in England our new communist government is proposing setting up a ridiculous quango called Great British Energy to manage a massive increase in renewable energy. The stupid cretin Ed Milliband who is in charge of this insanity isn’t being honest with the people of the nation, he’s claiming that his ideas will lower the people’s energy bills, whilst not admitting that they are doubling the subsidies that they are paying to private corporations who will build the new wind and solar infrastructure, those subsidies will be funded by increasing citizens bills.

As totally mad as his ideas are, the imbecile is not telling us that the national transmission grid is hugely incapable of delivering the future new energy becoming available across the country without massive upgrades.

The government is of course not admitting that the monumentally massive costs of the power grid upgrades will automatically be levied on customers bills.

The people of England have to wonder whether Milliband, and indeed our whole government are just plain stupid or liars or both.

[nepalenergyforum]

KATHMANDU, July 7: About 65 percent work of the 220 kV  Transmission Line Project along the Marsyangdi Corridor has been completed so far. The project which started in 2018 was supposed to be completed in 2021. However, the construction has not been completed so far. The deadline for the completion of the project has been extended four times. As per the latest agreement, the project should be…

[allthebrazilianpolitics]

Brazil Pursues Energy Integration with Venezuela Despite Political Tensions

Brazil’s Minister of Mines and Energy, Alexandre Silveira, has authorized tests to evaluate the feasibility of importing energy from Venezuela. This move aims to supply Roraima, Brazil’s only state not connected to the National Interconnected System.

Silveira emphasized the importance of South American energy integration, citing existing connections with Paraguay, Uruguay, and Argentina. Roraima currently relies on diesel and fuel oil thermoelectric plants, an expensive and environmentally harmful solution.

The Manaus-Boa Vista transmission line, set to operate by late 2025, will connect Roraima to the national grid. Despite this upcoming integration, Silveira advocates for interconnection with neighboring countries for emergencies and complementarity.

The Ministry of Mines and Energy has approved three-day tests to assess Venezuelan energy imports. This decision underscores the significance of energy integration in the Southern Cone.

Continue reading.

[thepastisalreadywritten]

By Marcia Dunn

Updated 9:45 PM, 11 May 2024

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) — An unusually strong solar storm hitting Earth produced stunning displays of color in the skies across the Northern Hemisphere early Saturday, with no immediate reports of disruptions to power and communications.

The U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration issued a rare severe geomagnetic storm warning when a solar outburst reached Earth on Friday afternoon, hours sooner than anticipated.

The effects of the Northern Lights, which were prominently on display in Britain, were due to last through the weekend and possibly into next week.

Many in the U.K. shared phone snaps of the lights on social media early Saturday, with the phenomenon seen as far south as London and southern England.

"There were sightings from top to tail across the country,” said Chris Snell, a meteorologist at the Met Office, Britain’s weather agency.

He added that the office received photos and information from other European locations including Prague and Barcelona.

NOAA alerted operators of power plants and spacecraft in orbit, as well as the Federal Emergency Management Agency, to take precautions.

“For most people here on planet Earth, they won’t have to do anything,” said Rob Steenburgh, a scientist with NOAA’s Space Weather Prediction Center.

The storm could produce northern lights as far south in the U.S. as Alabama and Northern California, NOAA said.

But it was hard to predict and experts stressed it would not be the dramatic curtains of color normally associated with the northern lights, but more like splashes of greenish hues.

“That’s really the gift from space weather: the aurora,” Steenburgh said.

He and his colleagues said the best aurora views may come from phone cameras, which are better at capturing light than the naked eye.

"Snap a picture of the sky and there might be actually a nice little treat there for you,” said Mike Bettwy, operations chief for the prediction center.

The most intense solar storm in recorded history — in 1859 — prompted auroras in central America and possibly even Hawaii.

“We are not anticipating that but it could come close," NOAA space weather forecaster Shawn Dahl said.

This storm poses a risk for high-voltage transmission lines for power grids, not the electrical lines ordinarily found in people’s homes, Dahl told reporters.

Satellites also could be affected, which in turn could disrupt navigation and communication services here on Earth.

An extreme geomagnetic storm in 2003, for example, took out power in Sweden and damaged power transformers in South Africa.

Even when the storm is over, signals between GPS satellites and ground receivers could be scrambled or lost, according to NOAA.

But there are so many navigation satellites that any outages should not last long, Steenburgh noted.

The sun has produced strong solar flares since Wednesday, resulting in at least seven outbursts of plasma.

Each eruption, known as a coronal mass ejection, can contain billions of tons of plasma and magnetic field from the sun’s outer atmosphere, or corona.

The flares seem to be associated with a sunspot that’s 16 times the diameter of Earth, NOAA said.

It is all part of the solar activity ramping up as the sun approaches the peak of its 11-year cycle.

NASA said the storm posed no serious threat to the seven astronauts aboard the International Space Station.

The biggest concern is the increased radiation levels, and the crew could move to a better shielded part of the station if necessary, according to Steenburgh.

Increased radiation also could threaten some of NASA’s science satellites.

Extremely sensitive instruments will be turned off, if necessary, to avoid damage, said Antti Pulkkinen, director of the space agency’s heliophysics science division.

Several sun-focused spacecraft are monitoring all the action.

“This is exactly the kinds of things we want to observe,” Pulkkinen said.

[batboyblog]

Things the Biden-Harris Administration Did This Week #30

August 2-9 2024

The Department of Interior announced the largest investment since 1979 in outdoor recreation and conservation projects. The $325 million will go to support State, territorial, DC, and tribal governments in buying new land for parks and outdoor recreation sites. It also supports expansion and refurbishment of existing sites.

The EPA announced that Birmingham Alabama will get $171 million to update and replace its water system. The city of Birmingham is 70% black and like many black majority cities as struggled with aging water systems and lead pipes causing dangerous drinking water conditions. This investment is part of the Biden-Harris administrations plan to replace all of the nation's lead pipes.

The Department of Energy announced $2.2 billion in investments in the national power grid to help boost resiliency in the face of extreme weather. The projects will add 13 gigawatts of capacity, support 5,000 new jobs and upgrade 1,000 miles of transmission. Major projects will cut power outages in the west, drive down energy prices in New England, add off shore wind, and enable the development of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe’s wind resources.

The Justice Department won its massive anti-trust case against Google. A federal judge ruled that Google was an illegal monopoly. The DOJ has an ongoing antitrust suit against Apple, while the Federal Trade Commission is suing Facebook and Amazon for their monopolist practices

The US Government announced $3.9 billion in direct aid to Ukraine. The money will help the Government of Ukraine make up for massive budget short falls caused by the war with Russia. It'll help pay the salaries of teachers, emergency workers, and other public employees, as well helping displaced persons, low-income families and people with disabilities.

The Department of Energy announced $190 million to improve air quality and energy upgrades in K-12 schools. The grants to 320 schools across 25 states will impact 123,000 students, 94% of these schools service student bodies where over half the students qualify for free and reduced lunch. In the face of climate change more schools have been forced to close for extreme heat. These grants will help schools with everything from air filtration, to AC, to more robust energy systems, to replacing lighting.

USAID announced $424 million in additional humanitarian aid to the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Due to ongoing conflict and food insecurity, 25 million Congolese are in need of humanitarian aid. This year alone the US has sent close to a billion dollars in aid to the DRC, making it the single largest donor to the crisis.

The Senate approved President Biden's appointment of Stacey Neumann of Maine, Meredith Vacca of New York, and Joseph Saporito Jr. of Pennsylvania to life time federal Judgeships. This brings the total of judges appointed by President Biden to 205. President Biden is the first President who's judicial nominations have not been majority white men, Judge Vacca is the first Asian American to serve in her district court. President Biden has also focused on former public defenders, like Judge Saporito, and former labor lawyers like Judge Neumann, as well as civil rights lawyers.

[learnwithmearticles]

Renewable Energy - T & SD

One browser search will provide multiple sources with conflicting claims about which U.S. state is leading in the clean energy industry. Two that have made exceptional changes are Texas and South Dakota.

Texas

The Energy Information Administration (EIA) reports that Texas has become a leader in wind energy, accounting for ~16% of the nation’s renewable electricity production in 2023. It’s only behind California in wind production, according to the EIA.

Texas has large expanses of clear land, with a portion of the 360-mile long Gulf Coastal Plains taking up about ⅓ of the state. Wind speeds reach up to 12 mph and transmission lines already span the state to deliver energy produced from the wind farms. This industry, as well as solar, has already supported more than 25,000 jobs in the state, with 73% not requiring a college degree.

Unfortunately, the use of the produced energy is limited. In 2022, the Texas Tribune discussed the fact that the Texas transmission network cannot deliver energy outside of the state. This has caused issues with energy production, storing, and accessibility to consumers.

But there are also distribution issues within the state itself, which in recent years have become apparent multiple times from outages and lack of electricity availability to certain regions. Since a major blackout event in 2021, there have been improvements to make the Texas energy grid more resistant to weather damage. Still, the Austin-American Statesman newspaper emphasizes the need to drastically upgrade the Texas power grid, though they will likely have to fund it without federal help.

South Dakota

South Dakota is also a leader in renewable energy initiatives. The EIA reports that 77% of the state’s electricity production was from renewable sources in 2023. Wind energy makes up 55% of this, while hydropower makes up 21%. South Dakota has slightly less percentage of flat land than Texas, but with wind speeds similarly reaching up to around 12 mph.

In 2022, clean energy jobs accounted for about 12,000 jobs in the state, and that is expected to continue growing. While the South Dakota energy plan is difficult to find, if it exists in solid terms, the federal government is improving policies around renewable energy across the nation.

Additionally, solar energy production is especially expected to increase in South Dakota. This is fortunate because, according to the Clean Grid Alliance, solar prices have dropped 53% since 2012.

South Dakota also produces bioethanol as another renewable product, accounting for 9% of the nation’s production.

Coal, natural gas, and oil now make up less than 20% of the state’s energy production. These will likely take time to completely phase out, as many concerns exist around limiting energy dependency during weather crises. South Dakota has a more reliable electricity infrastructure, but there have been risks of rolling blackouts in recent years.

This page has focused on the progress in New Jersey towards clean energy, but it is far from the most changed state in terms of production. Many other states like Texas and South Dakota have seen benefits of moving towards renewable energy. It has permitted Texas to turn away from natural gas and coal, for example. It has created new jobs, and drawn more attention to the need for improved energy infrastructure.

The move toward renewable energy has been a long fight. It has come with challenges and seen a lot of resistance. Fortunately, it is happening, anyway. The Inflation Reduction Act that provided billions of dollars in tax credits for clean energy initiatives has made a difference. The clean energy goals of the federal government and the states are decreasing our dependence on pollution-producing resources. As much as we hope for swift, effective change, even these spread out changes are measurable and important to recognize.

Additional Resources

1. Texas Energy Production

2. Texas Clean Energy Jobs

3. Texas Transmission Issues

4. Austin-American Statesman

5. South Dakota Energy Production

6. South Dakota Clean Energy Projections

7. South Dakota Production Details

[cautiousslug]

I sat in the laboratory with a 3000w inverter in my hands, silently chanting: "Three-phase output power control…" Suddenly, there was an exclamation next to me:

"What? Three-phase output control!"

The laboratory was in an uproar. Researchers looked at each other in astonishment, as if I had just said some shocking secret. An elderly engineer with white hair and wearing a lab coat stared at me in disbelief: "Isn't this the new energy technology concept proposed recently? Even experts are still discussing how to optimize the power control of inverters. You have actually mastered the actual operation?" The laboratory director came over with a solemn expression, apparently reporting up through the communication equipment. Soon, experts from the Energy Technology Research Institute, representatives of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology and industry leaders rushed over. The experts brought thick technical documents, seemingly to witness this "unworldly talent" with their own eyes.

"Young man," the head of the technical group pushed his glasses, his expression solemn, "you don't need to continue testing. We have decided to hire you exceptionally. Talents like you should not be researchers, but should stand at the forefront of technology and lead the direction for the entire energy industry." The representative of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology also praised: "Your contribution to the future energy field can be described as a milestone in technological revolution! If you are not satisfied with the position of the research institute, my director position can be given to you!" The surrounding engineers and researchers have long cast envious eyes. Some even whispered, guessing whether I was a direct disciple of some hidden scientist. I just shook my head calmly and shrugged, with a slight smile on my lips: "Well, it's rare to see."

Should the story end here? Of course not! Things are far from that simple. A few days later, I stood in the control room of the National Energy Research Center, surrounded by unsolved energy allocation problems and power grid scheduling algorithms waiting to be optimized. I originally thought that sitting in the high position of technology leader, I could easily use inverter technology to conquer all energy management problems. However, when I really began to face these complex power demands and energy transmission problems, I found that things were not as simple as I imagined. "The stability of multi-energy grid connection… intelligent load balancing of smart grids…" I looked at the complex power flow diagrams on the screen with my brows furrowed. Suddenly, a familiar voice sounded behind me: "Do you really think that 3000w inverter is the ultimate weapon?" I turned around abruptly and saw an elegant middle-aged scientist. He walked towards me with a smile, holding a technical manual annotated with complex circuit diagrams in his hands. "Inverter technology," he said softly, "is just the beginning."

I was stunned. What's the situation? Is the peak of the energy revolution still far from coming?

From that day on, I began to study the mysterious technical manual day and night. However, as time went by, I found that these so-called "ultimate solutions" were nothing. Those complex circuit diagrams and algorithms became clear to me, as if I was born to understand them. The pen in my hand was almost automatically flying on the whiteboard, and the derivation steps kept pouring out, as if with divine help.

In less than a week, I completely mastered the entire manual, and every design and every innovative idea was clear to me. Then, on a sunny afternoon, I stood in front of the laboratory, and the last technical difficulty had been solved. I leisurely stretched and felt that the research and development during this period was really too easy.

"Well, is this the so-called ultimate optimization of energy transmission?" I said to myself, with a confident smile on the corner of my mouth, "It's really unsatisfactory."

Just as I was about to throw away my pen and leave casually, the laboratory suddenly began to vibrate slightly, and all the data streams on the display stopped. In an instant, a light burst out of the experimental equipment, enveloping the entire room in a strange atmosphere.

"What's the situation?" I frowned, although the scene in front of me was shocking, I was still calm. At this moment, the mysterious scientist appeared again. He looked at me in disbelief: "You…have you solved all the core problems of energy management?"

I shrugged indifferently: "Yes, it's nothing special. It just feels like ordinary practice."

The scientist stared at me in shock: "Impossible! These problems cannot be completely solved even by top scientific research teams. You actually solved them all in just a few days!"

"Oh, I see," I smiled indifferently, "I probably have a unique understanding of energy technology."

At this moment, the entire laboratory was wrapped in a powerful electromagnetic energy, and I was once again drawn into the light. When I regained consciousness, I found myself standing in a magnificent energy technology space, surrounded by complex circuits, sensors and energy flows, as if in the universe of energy science and technology. The scientist was still following me, excited beyond words: "This is the ultimate world of energy technology! Only the top geniuses can enter, and you…you will become the master of this field!"

I shook my head gently, completely at ease: "Is this the ultimate field of energy technology? It's nothing." I looked up at the countless floating circuit diagrams and energy flows, as if they were all waiting for me to dominate. I smiled lightly and waved my hand, all the difficulties were instantly straightened out, and the whole space was surrendered to me.

"From now on, this is my world," I said softly, with a firm gaze full of infinite confidence. The scientist could no longer speak, he could only look up at me, his eyes full of awe. Thus, I stood at the pinnacle of energy technology, overlooking everything. And the initial inverter experiment was just a trivial episode I casually described.

[mariacallous]

Russia’s renewed and much broader assault on Ukraine’s energy sector this spring, which has now destroyed roughly half of the country’s electricity generation capacity, represents an explosive blow to Kyiv’s resilience, civilian morale, and industrial production. What’s worse, the ongoing Russian attacks on the vulnerable energy system offer few prospects of a quick fix that could right the situation before Ukraine enters its third winter of the war.

Since early this year, Russia has set out to finish the job it failed to complete in early 2023—the destruction of Ukraine’s civilian energy sector, especially the power plants that provide light and heat for millions of Ukrainians.

Beginning in March, Russia has specifically targeted Ukraine’s biggest power plants in six massive waves of missile and drone strikes, wiping out about 9 gigawatts of electricity generation, or half the country’s total. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky told a reconstruction conference in Berlin on Tuesday that Russian strikes have wiped out 80 percent of Ukraine’s big coal- and gas-fired power plants and one-third of its hydroelectric facilities.

Especially as a result of the last two big attacks, in early May and early June, Ukraine has had to ration electricity for industrial and residential consumers, leaving many with power for only short periods of time; some cities, such as Kharkiv, on the country’s eastern front line are virtually powerless. Russia’s assaults, which the U.K. ambassador to the United Nations has argued are in part an attempt to terrorize civilians, are even a subject for the U.N. Security Council.

As bad as Russia’s attacks have been so far, they could get worse. Russia has already hit some of Ukraine’s natural gas storage facilities—underground bunkers that are used to store fuel both for domestic needs and to backstop European consumption. Further Russian strikes there could expand the pain of energy attacks beyond Ukraine’s borders, right at a time when Europe is scrambling to find a solution for gas transit flows across Ukraine into landlocked Eastern European countries, especially Austria. 

The other big worry is that Russia, after having already destroyed Ukraine’s main sources of baseload power generation, will finally knock its remaining three nuclear power plants off the grid. (Russia has since the early days of the war occupied Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia nuclear power station, using it as a shield for its occupation of south-central Ukraine, but the station—Europe’s largest nuclear facility—is in shutdown and not generating power.)

“It sounds mad to attack the nuclear power stations, but Russia could hit the transformers near the nuclear plants. If they did this, the power system will lose its unity, and the country will be split into different energy islands, some with spotty power and some entirely without,” said Andrian Prokip, an energy expert at the Wilson Center’s Kennan Institute in Kyiv.

The undeniable success of this year’s Russian assault is a sharp contrast to its ultimately failed bid in the first winter of the war to freeze Ukraine into submission. Russia has thrown more ordnance at more vulnerable targets this time around, leading to longer-lasting damage that will be far costlier to repair. Only after the big strikes in early May did Ukraine have to start rationing power to residential and industrial consumers. There is concern among big industry, such as the country’s once-vaunted steel and iron industry, that the power outages could kneecap what appeared to be a miraculous wartime recovery of industrial output.

“The difference is that before they mainly targeted transmission lines and substations and now they are destroying power generation plants,” said Slawomir Matuszak, a Ukraine specialist at the Centre for Eastern Studies in Warsaw. “The previous attacks were relatively easy to recover from—a question of days or weeks. But you’re looking at one to two years now for a real rebuild, if that even makes sense, because they can simply be attacked again.”

For Ukraine’s leaders, the renewed Russian strikes pose a threat to the country’s already strained ability to sustain years of unremitting bombing assaults, social and economic disruption, and the increased mobilization of service members. The new campaign has redoubled Ukraine’s desperation to bolster its air defenses in order to protect what’s left of its energy system. 

“Russia’s goal hasn’t changed—they seek to destroy our energy system and use it as a weapon against our citizens,” said Kira Rudik, a Ukrainian parliamentarian who leads the pro-European party Holos and who described the constant disruptions to daily life from the power outages that come atop Russia’s ceaseless use of stand-off weapons to batter civilian residences across the country, including her own. (Zelensky said Tuesday that Russia had launched 135 glide bombs in just the last day.)

“So we are saying, get us the F-16s, get us the Mirages, get us to this luxury point where we can go to bed and know that we will wake up in the morning,” Rudik said, referring to U.S.- and French-made fighter jets. “In Ukraine, we do not have this luxury.”

The increased pace of Russian attacks on Ukraine’s infrastructure has also injected fresh urgency into the question of how and when to leverage Moscow’s frozen assets for Ukraine’s assistance. U.S. and European leaders are working on a plan to turn the proceeds of frozen Russian cash into a large loan for Ukraine. For those on the receiving end of Russian attacks, even discussions such as those at the reconstruction conference in Berlin seem too focused on rebuilding Ukraine after the war, rather than reinforcing Ukrainians’ will to resist now.

“We need the money now,” Rudik said. “We have a simple task before us: to survive the summer and get through the winter somehow.”

Some Western countries are heeding Ukraine’s pleas for more air defense, which could help protect both cities and critical infrastructure from Russian attacks, especially after the devastation unleashed in the May and June strikes. Germany is now mulling the dispatch of a fourth Patriot air defense battery, with Chancellor Olaf Scholz urging allies to do more; Italy is preparing to send more air defense systems of its own, while even recalcitrant countries such as Spain are sending more air defense ammunition. Late last week, the Biden administration included more air defense missiles in its latest aid package for Ukraine.

Getting more air defense is a necessary but hardly sufficient condition to begin rebuilding Ukraine’s battered electricity sector. Even at big plants that had an air defense umbrella, such as Kyiv’s critical Trypilla generating station, Ukrainian forces simply ran out of ammo under Russia’s big assault in April; the plant was demolished. But even with better air defenses, energy experts doubt more than 2 to 3 gigawatts of power generation capacity could be rebuilt before winter. That would still leave a big shortfall in power generation, not to mention the ongoing damage to combined heat-and-power plants that provide central heating during Ukraine’s brutal winters.

One short-term, but expensive, fix would be to rely on more electricity imports from Europe. Just before this year’s Russian assault began, Ukraine was actually exporting excess electricity production to Europe—but that was soon reversed. Today, Ukraine can import about 1.7 gigawatts of electricity from Europe and in a pinch can even get more than 2 gigawatts of power. The problem is that imported electricity is more expensive than the subsidized power Ukraine generated at home, exacerbating the country’s already strained finances. 

The other solution, long broached in Ukraine, is to build more small, decentralized power plants, including small gas-fired turbines and renewable sources such as solar and wind power. The push for more renewables has actually increased during the war, and especially in the wake of this spring’s Russian onslaught, as Ukraine seeks new sources of power generation. 

On Tuesday, members of the G-7+ Energy Coordination Group and Ukraine’s government outlined plans to make the electricity sector more resilient, including through more distributed generation. European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said Tuesday at the Berlin conference that Brussels is raising money for urgent power sector repairs as well as a host of small-scale generators. “The aim is to help decentralize the power system and thus increase resilience,” she said.

The biggest advantage of replacing hulking, centralized power plants with a lot of smaller, widely scattered sources of power is that they are a lot harder to blow up with scarce Russian missiles.

“If you have sources of microgeneration, and lots of them, then Russia will not have enough missiles to hit all of them, even if they knew where they were,” Prokip said. “So distributed generation is the right way to go, but the government didn’t take enough steps to do this when it could.”