Inside the next generation of nuclear energy
Een nieuw type kerncentrale in ontwikkeling:
Oregon-based NuScale is expecting a key technical review to be complete by year’s end and final design approval from the government by the second half of next year. If all goes as planned, it aims to be operating by 2026 a new kind of reactor that’s far smaller than today’s technology.
Kenya launches Africa's largest wind farm
Het grootste windpark van Afrika krijgt een lening van $200 mln van de EU:
Kenya officially launched Africa’s largest wind power plant on Friday. The project is located in Kenya’s north and already provides nearly a fifth of the country’s energy needs.
With a 365-turbine sprawling wind farm on the eastern shore of Lake Turkana, the project provides 310 megawatts of renewable energy to the national grid of East Africa’s most dynamic economy.
It is the largest private investment in Kenya’s history.
Chevron plans to turn Kitimat LNG plant all-electric
Amerikaans olieconcern wil LNG-fabriek op waterkracht laten draaien:
LNG is created by cooling gas in an energy-intensive process typically powered by burning natural gas. Kitimat LNG instead proposes a 700-megawatt electric motor to run all liquefaction, utility compressors, pumps, and fans with hydropower bought from the local utility. It will have backup diesel power generators onsite for emergencies.
If the project proposal is approved, Kitimat LNG will produce less than 0.1 ton of carbon dioxide equivalent for every ton of LNG compared with a global average of more than 0.3 ton of CO2 equivalent.
Chevron and Woodside expect to make a final investment decision for the project in 2022 to 2023 with the production start scheduled for 2029.
Does renewables pioneer Germany risk running out of power?
Zorgen over de leveringszekerheid in Duitsland:
In the next three years alone conventional energy capacity is expected to fall by a fifth, leaving it short of the country’s peak power demand. There is disagreement over whether there will be sufficient reliable capacity to preclude the possibility of outages, which could hammer the operations of industrial companies.
The Berlin government, in a report issued this month, said the situation was secure, and shortfalls could be offset by better energy efficiency, a steadily rising supply of solar and wind power as well as electricity imports.
Others are not as confident, including many utilities, network operators, manufacturing companies and analysts.
So You Think We're Reducing Fossil Fuel Use? Think Again.
De groei van renewables is veel te klein om echt een impact te hebben op het terugdringen van fossiel:
Renewables have grown rapidly relative to themselves, but are still small with respect to fossil fuel growth. In fact, just the growth in fossil fuel last year exceeded the growth in renewables over the same time period. China emplaced over 6x the amount of renewable energy than the United States did, but that didn’t make a dent in their emissions since they emplaced a lot more coal and gas, and produced even more oil.
Nuclear and hydro are level worldwide, and are predicted to grow only moderately in the next few decades.
More than 2,000 new wind power turbines in Germany on hold due to licensing issues
Luchtverkeersleideres zijn bezorgd over de impact van windturbines op het communicatiesysteem van de luchtvaart
Objections from air-traffic controllers, who fear interference with radio beacons needed for navigation, have halted construction of around 1,000 turbines. The German army (Bundeswehr) has criticised another 900 turbines because they could get obstruct low-flying jets or interfere with radar systems. A further 300 turbines face court challenges, many by environmental organisations concerned they might damage bird or bat habitats.
Coal's Demise Quickens in Europe as Market Shift Idles Plants
Het einde van het kolentijdperk komt steeds dichterbij:
Commodity markets are stripping away the case for coal in Europe, moving quicker than government efforts to close the most polluting power plants.
A plunge in natural gas prices along with an increase in the cost of releasing carbon dioxide emissions shifted the profitability of generating electricity away from burning coal, according to data compiled by BloombergNEF.
Why setting a climate deadline is dangerous
Klimaatalarmisme in de vorm van apocalyptische deadlines is niet de beste manier om het probleem aan te pakken:
Of course, this does not mean that climate change is not a serious challenge. The risks of unfolding climate change need to be taken seriously, but it would be a mistake to take the claims of a climate deadline literally.
Nevertheless, the scarcity mindset created by countdown clocks narrows measures of policy success to the single metric of meeting a deadline. Climate policies that merely ‘hit the numbers’ are created and given value. Other considerations such as the justice or sustainability of policies get overlooked.
Your oil major needs you
Interessante long read over het dilemma bij Shell:
Renewables investors would no doubt counter that there are already attractive returns on offer across the clean energy industry. But Van Beurden argued the pay back is not typically at the level oil industry shareholders have, rightly or wrongly, grown used to.
Moreover, the renewables sector will face new and complex technical challenges as it scales up.
"[Investing] into more renewables in countries like the UK or in the Netherlands or where there is an open market at this point in time still comes with a lot of challenges, [because] nobody knows what is going to happen to the wholesale price,"
Van Beurden argued. "As a matter of fact, the more renewables you stick into the system, the lower the prices. So at some point in time, regulators, governments will have to do something about it to make the missing money come forward.
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