Obama administration approves giant renewables projects

Department of Interior rubber-stamps 500MW of wind and solar projects

The Obama administration has this week approved two major renewable energy projects on public land, and taken a significant step towards delivering a new generation of US offshore wind farms.

Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar granted approval to the 300MW Sonoran Solar PV Project in Arizona, which is being planned by a subsidiary of NextEra Energy Resources, and the 186MW Tule Wind Project, proposed for a site 70 miles east of San Diego by a subsidiary of Spanish energy giant Iberdrola Renewables. … Continue Reading

KKR’s Green Portfolio Program Shows How Smart Investments See Green

Green real estate portfolios are making 'green' returns

By Audrey Davenport – Today, private equity giant Kohlberg, Kravis & Roberts (KKR) announced the third year of results for its Green Portfolio Program, a project we launched together in 2008. We piloted the program with only a handful of KKR companies and our goal was to demonstrate that private equity firms are well-positioned to take advantage of environmental management at the portfolio level. … Continue Reading

Living the Green way – Phillipines

 CONSTRUCTION firm Megawide Construction Corp. is committed to live the “green” way in a community where the concept is relatively new.

Edgar Saavedra, president of Megawide, said the company wants “to practice what we profess” in advocating green buildings in the Philippines.

Qualifying for a “gold standard” under the US Green Building Council’s (USGBC) Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED), the company’s 10 storey, 2,000-square meter, Megawide’s headquarters in San Juan, Manila joins the list of just three LEED-certified buildings in the Philippines, together with the Asian Development Bank’s headquarters in Mandaluyong and Texas Instrument’s Clark facility in Pampanga. … Continue Reading

Germany Abandons Coal… Slowly

An employee walks past a giant wall of mined lignite, or brown coal, at Vattenfall AB's Jaenschwalde open coal mine in Cottbus, Germany. Source: Photographer by Michele Tantussi/Bloomberg

Renewable energy now makes up 20 percent of Germany’s energy mix, exceeding nuclear, natural gas and hard coal, an industry group reported last week.

It’s enough to encourage clean tech fans everywhere, particularly those who miss the rest of the picture: clean energy doesn’t come in first overall.

First-place distinction goes to high-carbon brown coal, which makes up 25 percent of the overall energy mix. Brown coal is an old part of Europe’s energy mix, and it’s not exactly fleeing the portfolio — not in the short term. Also known as lignite, brown coal is abundant, accessible, and burns in traditional power plants that operate for decades. … Continue Reading

Offshore Wind Debate Set to Continue

The Power of Offshore Wind

 By GREG MASTERS
Capital News Service

ANNAPOLIS – Maryland lawmakers are preparing to resume debate on one of Gov. Martin O’Malley’s major green initiatives, an offshore wind energy bill that stalled during the last legislative session amid concerns about the cost to utility companies and their customers.

The bill would have subsidized the construction of between 80 and 200 wind turbines 12 miles off the coast of Ocean City by obligating the state’s four investor-owned utilities — Baltimore Gas and Electric Co., Allegheny Power, Delmarva Power and Pepco — to buy offshore wind energy for 25 years. … Continue Reading

A Renewable Energy Revolution’: DOI Approves New Projects

Capping three years of efforts to develop renewable energy resources on public lands, U.S. Department of the Interior (DOI) Secretary Ken Salazar has announced the approval of utility-scale renewable energy projects – one wind and one solar – that, when built, will generate nearly 500 MW of electricity.

Salazar’s announcement also represented a major step forward developing an offshore wind transmission line on the Atlantic Outer Continental Shelf, particularly for the Atlantic Wind Connection (AWC) offshore backbone, a proposal from Atlantic Grid Holdings that would stretch 350 miles off the coast from New Jersey to Virginia and to connect 7 GW of offshore wind power to the grid. … Continue Reading

Google invests in California solar project

Investors have raised questions about investments that have little to do with Google’s main Internet businesses and that may be potentially risky.

By Andrew Restuccia – Google announced Tuesday that it is investing $94 million in four solar projects in Sacramento, Calif., the tech giant’s latest renewable energy investment.

The company is partnering with investment firm KKR, which launched a new venture Tuesday to provide additional equity investment in the project. KKR said it was the firm’s first investment in renewable energy in the United States. … Continue Reading

Obama Admin Pushes Renewable Energy on 2 Coasts

The Obama administration wants an electric “smart meter” installed in every American home so it can be connected to energy from the sun or the wind.

WASHINGTON  (AP) The Obama administration moved Tuesday to boost renewable energy on both coasts, approving onshore solar and wind farms in the West and pushing for offshore wind power in the Atlantic Ocean.

Interior Secretary Ken Salazar said his department has approved a 300-megawatt solar farm on public land in Arizona and a 200-megawatt wind farm in Southern California. The wind farm includes 186 megawatts that would be produced on federal lands.

The projects, southwest of Phoenix and east of San Diego, respectively, are the 24th and 25th renewable energy projects approved on public lands in the past two years, Salazar said, and demonstrate that the administration’s commitment to renewable energy is paying dividends. … Continue Reading