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Dec 31, 2024 | 
reneweconomy.com.au | Fereidoon Sioshansi
The benefits of microgrids operating synergistically with the macro-grid have been well documented. In the meantime, an increasing number of solar and wind projects are now built as hybrid plants with storage while many completed renewable projects await to be connected to the transmission network.
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Dec 3, 2024 | 
energycentral.com | Fereidoon Sioshansi
Recently a new building at the University of Waterloo in Ontario, Canada was certified as zero-carbon by the Canadian Green Building Council (photo). The building which has 768 kW of solar panels on the roof and in the parking lot is expected to generate 105% of the facility’s energy use over a 3-year period while saving $360,000 in energy costs.
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Nov 18, 2024 | 
reneweconomy.com.au | Fereidoon Sioshansi
In a speech delivered to the National Association of Science Writers in New York City in September 1954 Lewis Strauss, the then-Chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission under President Eisenhower used the phrase “too cheap to meter.” At the time, there were no commercial nuclear power plants operating anywhere and there was no empirical data on the cost of nuclear power.
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Nov 13, 2024 | 
reneweconomy.com.au | Fereidoon Sioshansi
At times in the past, there has a debate about large versus small, with many preferring the latter, as in “small is beautiful.” Many are now asking the same when it comes to the form and function of the electricity infrastructure, sometimes referred to as the bulk power system. It evolved as a heavily centralised system and for over a century bigger was believed to be better, cheaper, more efficient, more reliable and more dependable.
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Nov 12, 2024 | 
reneweconomy.com.au | Fereidoon Sioshansi
Batteries used to be viewed as an exotic and expensive afterthought because that is what they were. Not anymore. They are now considered a generation source, even though they are not net generators of electricity. Moreover, as technology improves and the costs continue to fall, they are no longer exotic or expensive, especially given what they can do.
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Nov 1, 2024 | 
energycentral.com | Fereidoon Sioshansi
In 1998 false reports began circulating in the media about Bob Hope’s death prompting him to say that "rumors of my death are greatly exaggerated." Perhaps the same applies to some – not all – of the projections of the exponential growth of electricity demand from data centers and artificial intelligence (AI). Everybody, it seems, is analyzing and forecasting how big is the growth of data centers and how much extra electricity will be needed to keep them functioning.
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Oct 1, 2024 | 
energycentral.com | Fereidoon Sioshansi
Nobody likes it when prices rise, especially if they are already high. Which is precisely why many customers want to know what is behind recent rises in electricity prices. One explanation is that in many countries in Europe as well as states in the US, utilities are adding surcharges to rates that are called general service charges or levies in Europe and public purpose or public benefit charges in America.
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Sep 3, 2024 | 
energycentral.com | Fereidoon Sioshansi
There are growing evidence that virtual power plants (VPPs) can deliver a number of valuable services reliably and at lower cost than the physical power plants which traditionally delivered these same or similar services. Moreover successful initial pilot projects are paving the way for larger commercial scale schemes. Everyone is testing and experimenting while deploying larger schemes with more participants.
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Aug 1, 2024 | 
energycentral.com | Fereidoon Sioshansi
In June 2024, the market value of Nvidia exceeded $3 trillion, beating Microsoft and Apple to become the most valuable company in the US. As a point of comparison Nvidia’s market cap exceeds that of the top 100 largest utilities in the US and Europe combined. What explains this phenomenal rise? Its chips are used by the 5 hyperscalers: Apple, Google, Meta, Amazon, Microsoft and Elon Musk’s xAI.
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Jul 1, 2024 | 
energycentral.com | Fereidoon Sioshansi
The trade press is full of stories about rapid electricity demand growth virtually everywhere. Increasing populations in parts of the world, rising standards of living and a warming climate are frequently mentioned for the global south. In some developing countries the rise of manufacturing, increased use of the Internet, data centers and applications of artificial intelligence (AI) are among the drivers of demand growth.
