Tag Archives: energy

Southern Company committed to communities, renewable energy, energy efficiency

Thomas A. Fanning, chairman, president and CEO of Southern Company, says his company is committed to communities, renewable energy, and energy efficiency. So helping finance municipal refitting and solar projects should be a natural for Southern Company!

According to PR from Southern Company, 25 May 2011, Southern Company Holds Annual Meeting of Shareholders

Fanning also emphasized a continued commitment to the communities the company serves and stressed the need for a national energy policy and a robust research and development initiative.

“Southern Company keeps customers at the center of every decision we make,” said Fanning. “We remain committed to providing reliable, affordable energy for our customers and to do that we need to maintain a diverse fuel mix as well as stay focused on developing the newest technologies.”

Referencing a diverse fuel mix, Fanning highlighted the company’s commitment to nuclear energy, including building the nation’s first new units in 30 years. He also discussed the importance of preserving coal – America’s most abundant energy resource – as well as the role of natural gas, renewable energy and energy efficiency in meeting its customers energy needs.

“Furthermore, we are the only company in the industry that is doing it all. We’ve committed more than $20 billion to these efforts,” Fanning said.

Sure, he listed renewable energy and energy efficiency last. But this is the same Thomas A. Fanning who said in May that he’s “bullish” on solar. The same CEO of the parent company of Georgia Power, which just connected a 300 kiloWatt solar plant in Lowndes County. The same CEO who’s being nagged by the Georgia PSC chairman “to come up with options in the next 30 days for expanding the tiny amount of electricity generated from solar power.” And a company that spends more than $20 billion on new energy projects can afford a few tens of millions for community refitting and solar.

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Solar conference in Birmingham, U.K.

Birmingham lures solar conference from London. Maybe soon we’ll read Valdosta lures solar conference from Atlanta.

Solar Power UK wrote 15 December 2010, Sun Shines on Birmingham’s Solar Industry:

Birmingham is to host the annual Solar Power UK Conference and Exhibitionin October 2011. Over 3000 solar industry participants, 30% of which will be overseas visitors, are due to descend on the city during the conference following sell out events in Munich and London in 2010, generating a predicted £4.15m for the city.
That’s about $6.7 million U.S. dollars.
It is the only time the event has been hosted outside of London in the UK and the first time the conference will be lighting up the city. The decision comes as Birmingham is increasingly recognised as a hub for the developing UK solar industry…
So becoming a leader in solar netted Birmingham a major conference, which brings income in addition to the jobs and energy generated directly by the solar projects.

Continuing: Continue reading →

Birmingham U.K. municipal solar didn’t wait for larger governments

Banks and power companies can fund municipal solar projects; cities and counties don’t have to wait for state or federal governments to provide them grants. Or at least Birmingham, U.K. has done it for public housing. And Quitman, Georgia did it last year, too.

According to Larry Elliott in the Guardian, 3 October 2010, 10,000 Birmingham council homes to get solar panels: City agrees £100m scheme, partly funded by banks and energy suppliers, to meet target for cutting carbon emissions

Plans to fit power generating solar panels to council-owned properties in Birmingham will be pushed forward this week after the council agreed a “green new deal” scheme covering 10,000 homes.

In the biggest proposal for retrofitting houses through an energy efficiency upgrade yet seen in the UK, the council agreed a £100m proposal last week designed to create jobs and meet the city’s ambitious targets for reducing carbon emissions.

The plan – Birmingham Energy Savers – will be jointly funded by Birmingham council and investment from energy suppliers and commercial banks, and follows two successful pilot schemes conducted in Europe’s biggest local authority.

Energy efficiency and solar power to create jobs!

We have local proof of concept right next door Continue reading →

Renewable Sustainable Energy Network —VLCoC

Had a chat today with Myrna Ballard, President of the Valdosta-Lowndes County Chamber of Commerce, and ReKasa Deen, Business Development Director, about the Renewable Sustainable Energy Network. Note that word Sustainable that they’ve added since last I spoke with them. They’re moving along the idea of a series of meetings or workshops of Chamber members together with an online forum. The next step is for the Chamber Board of Directors to decide whether to approve the project or not. They’re talking to various people and organizations around the community; if you want to get involved, please contact ReKasa Deen.

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A key to community organizing work —Seth Gunning

This comment by Seth Gunning came in on the backfire effect and how to leapfrog it. -jsq
Great article John. Thanks for turning me onto the research presented here, I’ll be looking into and using it. I’d also suggest a book called “Breakthrough: from the death of environmentalism to the politics of possibility”. I think you will love it.

Beyond changing the messaging on signs, which I think is a great idea, I think what the research reflects is a fundamental change in the approach to the work.

A key to community organizing work, as opposed to activism,

Continue reading →

Neither wind nor solar power “need to be purchased by Halliburton”

Continuing to see what “the indigenous” think about solar power:
Today, a number of Native tribes, from the Lakota in the Dakotas to the Iroquois Confederacy in New York to the Anishinaabeg in Wisconsin, battle to preserve the environment for those who are yet to come. The next seven generations, the Lakota say, depend upon it.

“Traditionally, we’re told that as we live in this world, we have to be careful for the next seven generations,” says Loretta Cook. “I don’t want my grandkids to be glowing and say, ‘We have all these bad things happening to us because you didn’t say something about it.’

Part of this family and spiritual obligation to preserve

Continue reading →

Solar as electricity for remote people

PR from Sandia National Laboratories News 13 December 2005, Light-bringer Debby Tewa provides advice about solar power to people on Indian reservations: Most lived without electricity like Tewa did growing up
Debby Tewa spent her first 10 years living without electricity, water, or a telephone in a three-room stone house in an isolated area of the Hopi Reservation in Arizona.

Today, as a contractor to the Sandia National Laboratories Sandia Tribal Energy Program, she provides technical advice about maintaining photovoltaic (PV) units to people on Indian reservations who live remotely like she did. For many, it’s the first time they’ve had electricity in their homes.

“I can identify with the people I’m helping,” Tewa says. “Many live the way I grew up, and I fully appreciate their excitement in having electricity and light at night.”

As part of Tewa’s job, she and program director

Continue reading →

Wind produces much energy

According to Herald Scotland 2 May 2011, Row after wind farms ‘turned off’:
Six wind farms were given six-figure payments to switch off their turbines because the Scottish grid network could not absorb all the energy being produced, it has emerged.

Research by the Renewable Energy Foundation (REF) found energy companies were paid a total of £900,000 for stopping the turbines for several hours between April 5 and 6 this year.

The REF said some of the payments were as high as 20 times the value of the electricity which would have been generated if the turbines kept running.

The National Grid makes constraint payments to power stations that agree to stop generating in order to stabilise the network.

It happens when the grid system or a section of the system is unable to absorb all the electricity being generated, and some generators that are contracted to generate are asked to stand down.

Sounds like they just need to fix their prices. Adding some local storage of some kind would also help.

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What do “the indigenous” think about solar?

In a facebook conversation, someone said solar was useless because we should all live like “the indigenous” used to. Well, let’s see what some of “the indigenous” think about solar power. Zachary Shahan wrote 13 January 2010 in CleanTechnical, Native American Tribe Going for Solar, and Money:
The 3,000 members of the Jemez Pueblo tribe in New Mexico are looking to build the first utility-scale solar power plant on tribal land. They are also looking to make some money on it.

It is no secret that Native American tribes are more likely to be poverty-stricken and they generally have more than twice the unemployment rate of the United States. Former Jemez Pueblo governor James Roger Magdalena says, “We don’t have any revenue coming in except for a little convenience store.”

It is estimated this solar power plant could generate $25 million over the next quarter century and help create a sustainable revenue for his tribe.

Mr. Magdalena sees the environmental changes

Continue reading →

Greening Of America –James R. Wright

In a long-running email discussion that started with a post by Valdosta City Council member James R. Wright about switchgrass for biomass, Councilmember Wright wrote two messages on Saturday, 26 March 2011, each asking questions of Dr. Michael Noll. The first one contained this paragraph:
Economic development is a high priority on the mind of many people. If you read the local paper you will see page after page of foreclosures, failing businesses, and unemployment at a all time high. Please explain to me how we can address these problems through energy needs?
Councilmember Wright elaborated later that same day: Continue reading →