wind Stories January 30
The world’s soon to be (2020) largest offshore wind farm has begun construction. The project, being developed by the largest offshore wind power developer – Ørsted – is located 74.5 miles off the coast of Yorkshire, UK.
The wind farm is named Hornsea Project One. Hornsea Project Two will follow a few years later, and Hornsea Project Three is in early planning stages.
wind Stories January 12
In 2017, the United States built about 28.5GW of electricity generating infrastructure – 25GW of it utility-scale and about 3.5GW of distributed (<1MW) solar power. Wind and solar were 55.4% of the 28.5GW overall total, and about 49.2% of the utility-scale total (>1MW).
When subtracting the 11.8GW of utility-scale fossil retirements tracked by the EIA, the net new volume of US generation was 16.7GW of generating capacity, with 94.7% of that coming from renewables. expand full story
wind Stories January 8
Xcel Energy, electricity utility of Colorado, received a batch of bids whose medians were 2.1¢/kWh and 3.6¢/kWh for wind and solar power plus energy storage, respectively. The pricing was released in the public version of the ‘2017 All Source Solicitation.’
The world’s previous low for solar plus storage was a 4.5¢/kWh project in Arizona.
wind Stories November 30, 2017
Google is officially off-setting 100% of its energy usage with either wind or solar power. The company signed contracts on three wind power plants in recent days to bring them over 3GW of production capacity.
Google’s energy infrastructure investments have totaled over $3.5 billion globally, with about two-thirds being in the US.
wind Stories November 27, 2017
India has laid out plans to auction off 20.6GW of solar power in their 2017-2018 fiscal year, with an additional plan to auction off 30GW in 2018-19 and the same 2019-20.
This volume is part of a 100GW goal of solar power to be built by 2022 as part of the country’s goal of 175GW of Renewable Energy.
wind Stories November 22, 2017
The US House of Representatives passed a tax-reform bill on Nov. 16 that would change the amount of tax credit each kWh of wind power created gets going forward. The US Senate, disagreeing, has returned a bill without this change.
While being argued, signed projects at various stages of development are on hold – and some estimate $50 billion worth of planned wind projects might not be developed.
wind Stories November 16, 2017
I’ve made a mistake – I’m sorry. In my haste and excitement to see show off solar power – I’ve given it undue credit. Wind Power got these bids and I initially misinterpreted a piece of ambiguous information. While solar power did amazingly get a bid at 1.97¢ – it did not break below the recently set Saudi Record. Anything written in this article hereafter has been updated.
Per a press release from the Centro Nacional de Control de Energía (Cenace) of Mexico, the department received bids for 3TWh of solar wind electricity, with the lowest bids being 1.77¢/kWh coming from Italian multinational ENEL Green Power.
This record low price of green electricity on earth, just beats out the 1.79¢/kWh from Saudi Arabia, and is part of a pattern marching toward 1¢/kWh bids that are coming in 2019 (or sooner).
wind Stories November 5, 2017
The largest wind turbine blade manufactured in Spain to date, 73.5m (241ft), was transported from the factory to the port in Castellón, Spain on October 20th. LM Wind Power, the manufacturer, filmed the 3.5 hour, 45km (28m) trip show off their product – and made an entertaining mini-film to boot.
wind Stories November 2, 2017
German company Max Bögl Wind AG has built the world’s tallest wind turbine. The turbine ‘hub’ is 178m (584ft) tall, and the tower’s total height – to the tips of the upward extended blades – is 246.5m (809ft).
For every meter increase in turbine height, annual energy output is increased 0.5-1% due to lower turbulence and higher wind speeds.
wind Stories November 1, 2017
In Delaware County, Iowa, a local landowner found 15 rabbits, with their neck’s broken, spread at the base of a wind turbine. A local land manager said it is likely they were placed to lure and potentially kill eagles with the wind turbines.
Wind power provided Iowa with more than 36% of its electricity in 2016. More than any other state in the USA, and second only to coal for total electricity within Iowa.
