3 Big Things – Didn’t get a change to watch our weekly roundup on Friday? No worries you can catch up on the newest episode of the series – 3 Big Things – here. (i like that you put it in here – jfw)
Solar modules coming to the US are increasingly coming from a wider market – globally, even as China’s experts ramped up this year due to an internal slowdown. “China’s solar module exports rose to the equivalent of 58 gigawatts of capacity in the first three quarters of the year, compared to 41.6 GW for all of 2018, as a slowdown at home pushed panel sales overseas, an industry association said. Europe accounted for 34.9% of the export sales in the first three quarters, and the United States only 0.2%.” Source – Reuters
Deep sea pumped storage – Imagine a large farm of metal spheres surrounding floating wind turbines to catch excess electricity that can’t move through the system for whatever reasons, or of course when prices are lower due to massive volumes of wind being generated. “In order to use this potential, a hollow concrete sphere is installed in deep water. A pump-turbine in the hollow sphere enables the electrical energy to be stored as mechanical energy. When the water is flowing into the sphere, the storage is generating. In this case the pump-turbine is running in turbine mode, generating electricity. In order to re-charge the storage system, the water is pumped out of the sphere against the pressure of the surrounding water column. The StEnSEA system was designed with an electrical power of 5 MW and a capacity of 18 MWh.” Source – Fraunhofer IEE
Gemini solar PPA Approved – Finally, the 25-year power purchase agreement (PPA) between Quinbrook infrastructure partners and NV Energy has been approved by Nevada regulators. The PPA is for the project’s entire anticipated 690 MW output. The move is part of the big-picture approval of NV Energy’s IRP, which you can read bout here. Source: Quinbrook Infrastructure Partners
Huntsinger Farms awarded solar grant – “Huntsinger Farms, the world’s largest grower and processor of horseradish and the parent company of Silver Spring Foods, announced it has won a $28,902.60 Focus on Energy grant to subsidize a new solar power installation on its Eau Claire farm. Carlson Electric of Hudson, WI will install the solar farm in Spring 2020. The Huntsinger Farm solar project will be one of the first farm solar installations in Wisconsin. According to the US Energy Information Administration, less than 2% of energy in Wisconsin is generated by solar power today. BMO Harris Bank will provide further financing for the project.” Source: Huntsinger Farms
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to increase cost efficiencies why not a COMBINATION of :-
1. Offshore Wind Farms ( coated with solar film to take advantage of REFLECTIVE properties of water ! ) ;
2. Floating Solar ( inherent in 1. above ) ;
3. Deep Sea Pumped Storage ;
Cheers Jeff M. Weeks