Stuffed into the envelope with the electricity bill is sometimes a little pamphlet telling you where that energy comes from. Sometimes, it’s pretty detailed; other times, not so much. But the percentage of energy coming from renewable sources often isn’t that high, and part of the reason for that is that renewable energy is generated in bursts and is then hard to store. Energy storage on a large scale would help even out the intermittent nature of renewable energy; in fact, techniques such as batteries and fuel cells are used on smaller scales right now to manage grids with high percentages of renewable sources. The problem with wide-scale use is that energy storage systems are not cheap. The Falling Cost of Technology While energy storage tech is expensive now, any consumer will note that the price of technology (whether that’s computers, ...

Principle Power is a Seattle, Washington-based renewable energy technology company that developed WindFloat, an offshore wind power turbine and platform. The platform can be assembled on shore and then towed to a site offshore where it is moored and connected to a power station. Principle Power recently deployed its first WindFloat system off the coast of Portugal, the first offshore turbine to be located in open Atlantic waters (read more about the first deployment here and here). The WindFloat technology is described in U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2011/0037264, entitled “Column-stabilized offshore platform with water-entrapment plates and asymmetric mooring system for support of offshore wind turbines” (’264 Application). The platform comprises columns (102, 103) interconnected with a truss structure composed of main beams (115), bracing beams (116), and cross beams (117). A wind tower (111) is ...

 

Middelgrunden Wind Farm off Copenhagen.

Under Europe’s Upwind project, a feasibility study was conducted and it concluded that 20-MW (20,000-kW) wind turbines are likely by 2020. If you’re not familiar with wind turbine sizes, this is HUGE. The standard wind turbine these days is probably 3 to 5 MW, and the ‘tremendously large’ wind turbines companies like GE, Siemens, and Vestas are working on or offering are 6 to 10 MW.

Large-scale wind turbines produce electricity far more economically than small, residential turbines for multiple reasons, but the main one is the fact that the average wind speed at a given location usually increases with altitude.

While larger turbines are more expensive to build, transport, and install, the altitude-related benefits make the trouble and expense of installing large-scale turbines worth it, because they generate ...

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Fuel cells offer a highly efficient, reliable and increasingly durable means of generating clean electrical energy independent of the grid or integrated with grid power. Installations are growing across a wide range of applications, from combined heat and power (CHP) generation at commercial, industrial, government and educational facilities to hybrid electric vehicles and consumer electronics.

They’re also being evaluated as a means of storing intermittent electricity production from wind power farms and wastewater-to-energy treatment plants, as well as capturing CO2 and NOX emissions from coal-fired power plants.

Fuel cells’ “green” credentials continue to be questioned, however, especially when the fuel used to produce the hydrogen used by alkaline fuel cells is methane in the form of natural or biogas. According to the infographic above, ...

These containers hold 1.3 million batteries

One of the biggest challenges facing wind energy is intermittency. Wind often blows strongest when power demand is lowest, and weakest when electricity is needed the most. Because today’s power grid needs electricity to be consumed the moment it’s generated, that means wind turbines send energy to the grid half as often as an average coal plant.

But what if wind farms could store the power that isn’t needed right away and sell it later when demand is high? energyNOW! correspondent Patty Kim recently visited a monumental new energy storage system recently built alongside a wind farm in the heart of coal country. The full video is available below:

Wind energy has come a long way in the United States. ...

This post originally appeared on Energy Self-Reliant States, a resource of the Institute for Local Self-Reliance’s New Rules Project.

While Americans transition their electricity system to the 21st century, they should ask this question: Does it make sense to pursue strategies such as accelerating the development of new high-voltage power lines that reinforce an outdated paradigm of electricity delivery, or should scarce energy dollars be spent on adding new, clean, local energy to the grid in the most cost-effective manner?

Fossil fuel power lends itself to centralized power systems, requiring long supply lines (rail or pipeline) to provide a constant supply of fuel and significant economies of scale in thermal energy production. These supply lines and huge power plants require enormous concentrations of capital, concentrating not only power generation but control of the grid. This explains the 20th century electricity system.

Renewable energy is fundamentally different. Wind, solar, and geothermal ...

Photo courtesy Mining Artifacts

The potential is there to re-purpose abandoned open pit iron ore mines in northeastern Minnesota’s Mesabi Iron Range to store energy from wind turbines and farms, according to a team of researchers at the University of Minnesota-Duluth’s Natural Resources Research Institute (NRRI). Doing so would not only enhance the competitiveness of wind power, it would make beneficial use of land that’s been severely degraded.

Wind energy has been growing fast in Minnesota, thanks to its geography, climate and impetus from the state’s Renewable Portfolio Standard (RPS), which requires that utilities and electric co-ops at least 25% of their electricity from qualifying renewable sources by 2025.

Thing is, wind power production typically picks up at night when wind energy is higher. Electricity demand is lower at night, however, and suppliers selling ...

The European Commission recently confirmed that €9.1 billion ($12.7 billion) for transmission networks would be included in the EU’s 2014-2020 budget plans. This is part of a €50-billion ($70-billion) infrastructure package. This is a big boon for (and probably largely driven by) offshore and onshore wind power projects across the continent.

Of course, such big numbers aren’t useful to most of us unless put into perspective, right? Well, this is a massive increase from the EU’s current budget for transmission networks, €163 million ($228 million).

It’s not yet clear how the funds will be split. The networks are for electricity, gas, and oil.

“While [the €9.1 billion] is a substantial increase in funding for what has been for a long time under-funded, it remains to be seen how this pot of money will be divided up between electricity, gas, oil and ...

I published preliminary stats on the American Wind Energy Association’s 2011 report on small wind turbine growth about a month ago. The official release of the study results is now out. Here’s AWEA’s news release on it (much more information and many graphs are included at the link on the bottom):

AWEA U.S. Small Wind Turbine Market Report: more homes, farms, schools and businesses using wind power

America’s small wind turbine industry saw substantial growth in 2010, the American Wind Energy Association (AWEA) reported [this week], highlighted by a 26 percent expansion in the market for small wind systems with 25.6 megawatts (MW) of capacity added, as well as a robust increase in sales revenue. Nearly 8,000 small wind units were sold last year, totaling $139 ...

Photo courtesy of Siemens AG

Ontario’s Hydrogenics has won a contract to supply a hydrogen production, storage and fuel cell system to the German city of Herten, the Mississauga-based company announced today.

Developing the means to manage intermittent electricity generation from wind power farms has been a key challenge for grid operators, one that Herten city officials decided was best addressed by using a Hydrogenics’ HySTAT 30 hydrogen generator to electrolyze water, storing the resulting hydrogen and then converting it back to electricity using a Hydrogenics’ HyPM 50-kilowatt (kW) fuel cell power system.

“Electrolyzing water into hydrogen using excess intermittent renewable energy is the optimal clean pathway to smart grid stabilization and energy storage capacity, Hydrogenics’ president and CEO Daryl Wilson stated in a press release.

“It has real advantages over alternative energy storage solutions. We are very pleased ...