FEATURES AND NEWS
Though they use it in different ways, wireless, telephone and cable providers consume a tremendous amount of energy. It’s acknowledged across the board that demand will continue to accelerate, and they are taking steps to become more efficient. Cable industry multiple systems operators (MSOs) have been vocal and proactive in their efforts ... Read more »
Fire stations are voracious users of energy. At Firehouse.com, Bob Mitchell, the principal of Mitchell Associates Architects, offered a framework for reducing energy use in these structures. The most important step, he writes, is to have the proper level of insulation. The next step is to incorporate energy efficient equipment ... Read more »
Revolution Lighting Technologies has signed agreements to supply lighting for the Parsippany-Troy Hills School District in New Jersey and the New Rochelle Public School System in New York. The $1.2 million Parsippany-Troy Hills School District contract is for the purchase of G3 LED tubes for 14 buildings in the school ... Read more »
We see a number of signs pointing in the right direction. The challenge for the climate negotiators who will gather in Paris this month is to capitalize on that momentum – and start to make the turn toward climate safety. Nathaniel Keohane is vice president for international climate at the Environmental Defense ... Read more »
To understand what a significant economic impact green buildings have on our economy today, consider this: Over the next three years, new LEED-certified construction will contribute more than $303 billion to the United States’ economy, a recent study concluded. This year alone, the industry will generate 2.3 million jobs. By 2018, this ... Read more »
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New details in the Volkswagen emissions scandal emerge almost daily as the scope of the investigations — and the number of cars involved — continues to grow. Last week Volkswagen admitted that some 800,000 vehicles from the VW Group, including gasoline cars and additional model years of VW and Audi ... Read more »
MetLife will achieve carbon neutrality by the end of 2016, becoming the first US-based insurer to do so. To achieve carbon neutrality in 2016 and beyond, MetLife announced the following commitments: Reduce location-based greenhouse gas emissions by 10 percent by 2020 against a 2012 baseline. This 10 percent reduction applies to ... Read more »
The emergence of the Internet of Things (IoT) almost certainly is the most important single development in the long evolution of energy management. The premise of energy management is controlling elements at a fundamental and granular level. The deeper and tighter the control the better. In a world that is ... Read more »
Biogas plant manufacturer Weltec Biopower and Aquatec Maxcon are building a plant in the suburbs of Melbourne, Australia. PennEnergy reports that the 1 MW biogas plant will be one of the first in the nation. The goal is to make Yarra Valley Water’s Aurora plant energy self-sufficient. Two stainless steel ... Read more »
Kroger is retrofitting 1,000 gas stations with LEDs from LSI Industries, according to Cincinnati.com. The story says that the financial details of the deal were not disclosed. The agreement covers all but about 300 of the grocer’s fuel centers. The story highlights Kroger’s attention to energy efficiency: The chain has ... Read more »
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Using intelligent processes and smart chemistry can reduce water consumption in the textile industry by 50 percent, energy use by 30 percent and chemicals use by 15 percent, according to bluesign technologies. Bluesign will unveil its blueXpert resource productivity calculator at the ITMA 2015 textile and garment machinery exhibition, which ... Read more »
The city of Oakland, California, is the latest city suing Monsanto to force the company to pay to clean up harmful chemicals in storm drain runoff. The lawsuit, filed yesterday in US District Court in San Francisco, seeks to hold Monsanto accountable for its long-standing contamination of Oakland’s storm water ... Read more »
General Electric researchers at GE’s Global Research Center in Upstate New York are working with the Department of Energy to test a water desalination system that produces fresh water at low cost by using a salt and ice mixture. If successful, the water treatment technology could reduce the cost of ... Read more »
We kept the heat on, and over time, things shifted. More people sensed the urgent need to act on climate change; now more than two-thirds of Americans favor government limits on carbon pollution. Oil and coal companies have lost their social license to operate as they once did — unfettered ... Read more »
Short-Term Price Benchmark Trends For the second week in a row, the ERC benchmark price for retail electricity has dropped -1.11 percent to a new low of $0.0747 per kilowatt hour. The biggest declines were in New England, notably Rhode Island (-2.30 percent), Connecticut (-1.94 percent), Massachusetts (-1.47 percent), and ... Read more »
Some 22 carbon capture and storage (CCS) projects are operating or under construction worldwide — double the number at the beginning of the decade — according to the Global CCS Institute’s annual report, Global Status of CCS: 2015. “The CCS industry is poised to move through its most active construction ... Read more »
Industrial Energy Users-Ohio – a group of Buckeye State energy consumers that spend over $3 billion per year collectively on electricity and natural gas for their plants and facilities – filed a complaint (Docket No. EL16-10-000) at the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) on November 6 alleging that AEP-Ohio had ... Read more »
FirstEnergy – the operator of 10 investor-owned electric systems in the Midwest and Mid-Atlantic regions, including four in Pennsylvania – has filed plans with the Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission (PPUC) to procure electric generation supply for Metropolitan Edison (Met-Ed), Pennsylvania Electric (Penelec), Pennsylvania Power (Penn Power), and West Penn Power ... Read more »
Houston-based CenterPoint Energy is decreasing the gas supply rate (GSR) portion of bills received by its Arkansas and Oklahoma customers beginning this month, due to falling natural gas prices. The adjustment will lower by about 19 percent, compared to last year, the invoice of an Arkansas resident who uses an ... Read more »
The Massachusetts Department of Public Utilities (DPU) has approved (D.P.U. 15-152) lower Basic Service electricity rates, effective January 1, for EverSource’s retail energy customers in Western Massachusetts, the utility announced on November 5. Eversource transmits and delivers electricity and natural gas to 1.7 million customers throughout Massachusetts, including about 1.4 ... Read more »
Tucson Electric Power (TEP) filed with the Arizona Corporation Commission (ACC) on November 5 for “significant updates” to its rate design and revenue requirement, which would raise the current average residential monthly bill – based on 1,150 kilowatt-hours (kWh) of consumption in the summer and 785 kWh of consumption in ... Read more »
Washington, D.C.-based Advanced Energy Economy (AEE) – a national association of business leaders dedicated to making the global energy system more secure, clean, and affordable – released a policy brief on November 5 that suggests that opening the market to third-party energy suppliers would significantly expand private investment in Missouri. ... Read more »
National Grid – which just finished announcing that ratepayers in Massachusetts would pay 9 percent more on their bills this winter than last winter – released word on November 6 that, in order “to continue investing in the electricity distribution system and improving service to its 1.3 million residential and ... Read more »
Baltimore Gas and Electric (BGE) announced the completion of its five-year smart grid initiative on November 6, which involved upgrading more than 1.7 million electric and gas meters, and activating new customer savings programs. Now, BGE has filed with the Maryland Public Service Commission (PSC) to recover the costs of ... Read more »
Last month, the Industrial Energy Consumers of America (IECA) – an organization that advocates on behalf of U.S. manufacturers – sent a letter to the U.S. Congress, asking legislators to renew tax provisions that expired nearly a year ago, at the end of 2014. The letter was signed by 218 IECA ... Read more »