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Hiring engineers via the H1B immigration process would make implementing Biden’s infrastructure plan more efficient. In part 1, we focused on the need for transmission planning engineers. In part 2, the focus is on the need for additional market systems and distribution planning engineers. Engineers should have the flexibility to move within an organization Engineers…

Southern Power has awarded a combined 640-MWh energy storage project to Mitsubishi Power Americas and Powin LLC. The two-site utility-scale battery project is designed to enhance California’s grid reliability with additional and flexible resource capacity paired with renewable energies. Southern Power is the wholesale energy wing of Atlanta-based utility owner Southern Co. The battery energy storage…

Yesterday, the U.S. Interior Department (DOI) announced that the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) has given final approval to a new solar energy project on public lands in California. The approval gives developer Sonoran West a green light to go forward with the construction of the Crimson Solar Project, a 350-megawatt (MW) solar photovoltaic facility…

On April 26, the 160-kW Valatie Falls Hydro plant in New York began generating power for the first time since June 2018. Valatie Falls will provide direct energy to the Village of Valatie, as well as charge the electric vehicles of local business PlugIn Stations Online. Built along the shores of Kinderhook Creek in Valatie,…

Arizona Public Service Co. (APS) said yesterday that it will soon serve customers with even more solar power after expanding the all-source request for proposals (RFP) originally issued in December 2020. The original RFP sought approximately 600-800 megawatts (MW) of renewable resources and about 400-600 MW of capacity resources. These resources are expected to be in service…

By Roger Bales, University of California, Merced and Brandi McKuin, University of California, Santa Cruz Climate change and water scarcity are front and center in the western U.S. The region’s climate is warming, a severe multi-year drought is underway and groundwater supplies are being overpumped in many locations. Western states are pursuing many strategies to…

By Josh Lariscy, Blue Wave Solar The rapid expansion of community solar continues to be both the most exciting, and at times, most complex form of solar development happening today. The advent of community solar in states like Massachusetts is a critical component in the fight against climate change; however, the location and impact of…

Originally published at ILSR.org In late 2020, the Minnesota Public Utilities Commission asked the state’s electric and gas utilities to discuss what infrastructure projects they had in queue that could be accelerated to support the COVID-battered economy. Tucked into a proposal from Xcel Energy, the state’s largest electric company, was a comparison of two proposed…

MISO planning resource auction prices for the 2021 planning year did not live up to their expectations from 2020 auction results. In the 2020 auction, the Michigan zone cleared at a cost of new entry of $250-per-MW-day. But in the latest auction results from April, MISO capacity prices were mostly in the $5-per-MW-day range, and…

This week Wiki-solar released its latest ranking of the top 32 utility-scale solar EPCs. The company ranks the developers by number of projects developed and cumulative capacity brought online.  This year, a new company tops that list. China’s State Power Investment Corporation (SPIC) rose to number one thanks to the 2.2-GWAC project its subsidiary Huanghe Hydropower…