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Saturday, December 10, 2011

Atlantis flicks switch on giant 1MW tidal turbine


Atlantis flicks switch on giant 1MW tidal turbine

New AR1000 device to be tested in waters off Orkney for two years

15 Aug 2011
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Scotland's first grid-connected, commercial-scale tidal turbine came online last week when Atlantis Resources Corporation flicked the switch on its AR1000 device at the European Marine Energy Centre (EMEC) in Orkney.
The 1MW capacity, three-blade turbine stands 22.5 metres high and has an 18 metre rotor diameter, making it one of the largest marine turbines ever built.
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It will be tested for two years in the waters off Orkney before being deployed in Scotland's Pentland Firth.
Atlantis has a 10 per cent stake inMeyGen, a joint venture with International Power and investment bank Morgan Stanley, which won the right to develop the Inner Sound site in October last year.

Tim Cornelius, Atlantis chief executive, said that the deployment of the AR1000 represents the culmination of a long development process, including fine-tuning the nacelle from its earlier two-rotor, AK1000 turbine.
"Our business enters the next phase of its evolution in great shape and I want to thank the huge ecosystem of technology partners, suppliers, contractors and industry figureheads who have supported us to date," Cornelius said in a statement.
"We will continue to invest in the AK1000 research and development programme as the supply chain matures, but our customers need commercial reliability and that's what the AR1000 system can give them today."
The AK1000 will soon be joined at EMEC by rival developer Aquamarine Power's Oyster 800. The 800kW wave energy device, which was unveiled last month, is set to be far more efficient that its 315kW predecessor, and Aquamarine plans to fit two more devices off the coast of Orkney in 2012 and 2013.
All three Oysters will eventually form a 2.4MW array linked to an onshore hydro-electric plant, the company said.
The west of Scotland could also see a further marine energy boost after Argyll and Bute council revealed that it is bidding for £20m of government funds to develop the town of Oban as a renewable energy hub.
Council leader Dick Walsh told The Scotsman today that discussions are already underway with renewable energy industry and government representatives, adding that ScottishPower's proposed Argyll Array wind farm off the coast makes Oban the ideal location for a west coast service centre.
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    Plug-In Electric Vehicles That Can Pump Power Back Onto the Grid


    DECEMBER 10, 2011

    Plug-In Electric Vehicles That Can Pump Power Back Onto the Grid
    Reversing the usual paradigm, prototype vehicles can draw power from and supply it to the grid

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    By Tom Johnson, December 6, 2011 in Energy & Environment |Post a Comment
    In the not-too-distant future, the so-called smart power grid may want to have a quick conversation with your plug-in electric vehicle.
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    In a demonstration in Trenton yesterday of emerging technologies that are driving the development of electric vehicles, the University of Delaware and others showcased prototypes that not only draw electricity from the power grid, but also can deliver rapid bursts of power the other way. And the vehicles get paid for that power.
    The technology, dubbed Vehicle-to-Grid (V2G), can help grid operators like PJM Interconnection correct short-terms changes in electricity use, an issue that can affect the stability of the power system. Although the problem, dubbed frequency regulation, is largely unknown to the public, it has attracted the attention of grid operators and the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC).
    V2G also can provide a modest source of income for owners of plug-in electric vehicles, which can help offset the higher costs of the cars when compared to conventional vehicles. In a pilot program being run by the University of Delaware, PJM is paying five plug-in electric vehicles each about $200 a month to deliver almost simultaneous service if the power grid is out of balance.
    Bigger vehicles, such as cargo vans used by companies with large fleets and even larger electric batteries can earn even more money, according to backers of the technology. These include the university, AC Propulsion, a California-based company, and NRG Energy, a Princeton-based company that is trying to develop the infrastructure for electric vehicles through private investment.
    The long-term goal of having electric vehicles become a source of needed power to keep the lights on will become even more important as New Jersey and the nation increase their reliance on intermittent sources of electricity, such as solar and wind, which do not generate power consistently because the sun does not always shine or the wind blow.
    “To my mind, it’s the ultimate smart grid application,’’ said James Sherman, director of the Northeast Transportation Electrification Alliance (NTEA), a trade organization pushing to build an infrastructure for electrical vehicles. The technology incorporates software that enables the plug-in electric vehicles, while not running, to quickly switch from drawing power from the grid to storing it and sending it in the other direction, if necessary, a conversation that takes place over the Internet.
    FERC also sees the technology as a way to deal with frequency violations, a problem for the grid. It recently recognized that batteries that can push power to the grid are superior and announced a policy to pay a premium for batteries that provide this service. While the payments to consumers and businesses may not be huge, the market is. Last year, PJM paid out $300 million to companies providing frequency regulation service.
    “There’s a lot of interest right now,’’ said Scott Fisher, director of policy coordination and management for NRG, which was at the event at a parking garage a block from Trenton’s rail station, one of a handful of places in the state offering electric charging stations for plug-in vehicles. “People understand the value about this, but there’s a lot of blocking and tackling that still needs to be done,’’ he added.
    In the short-term, this application probably will not be available until the next generation of plug-in electric vehicles, because car manufacturers have not incorporated the technology into the cars, according to Nathaniel Pearre, part of the University of Delaware V2G team. That could take up five years or so to realize, he said,
    The more pressing challenge, according to backers, is convincing large companies with fleets of vehicles to convert some of them to plug-in electric vehicles. Sherman said there have been conversations with Public Service Electric & Gas (PSE&G) and Verizon New Jersey to convert up to 500 cargo vans to the technology, but they will not commit unless the price is right.
    Some advocates believe that electric vehicles probably will not happen unless there is an infusion of state or federal financial assistance to reduce the cost difference between them and conventional diesel-fueled vehicles. Raymond Kennard, also of NETA, noted California has spent tens of millions of dollars to convert United Parcel Service trucks to electric vehicles.
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    Massive Battery System Captures The Wind


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    Massive Battery System Captures The Wind

    DECEMBER 6, 2011 BY  2 COMMENTS
    AES Battery Storage System
    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. It’s a multi-billion dollar industry that employs 75,000 people in 42 states and generates about 2 percent of the nation’s electricity. And, the Department of Energy says that number could grow to20 percent of America’s electricity by 2030.
    That potential is far from reality, though. And, in order to reach 20 percent, one in five new turbines will have to be built offshore where the wind is faster and more consistent, and offshore wind is yet to be stalled in this country.
    Intermittency is a commonly cited problem for renewable energy options, but intermittency is only a problem because the energy industry hasn’t come up with an efficient way to store electricity on a large scale – until now, perhaps.
    A massive new battery storage system has sprung up in the heart of coal country, and it could change wind energy forever.AES Corporation, a global power project developer, has built a wind farm of more than 60 turbines spread across twelve miles of West Virginia’s Laurel Mountains. The farm generates enough power for 20,000 homes, and feeds power into the PJM Interconnection regional grid.
    But the really impressive aspect of this wind farm is a series of white shipping containers, nondescriptly nestled into the hills, containing 1.3 million lithium ion batteries. Each battery is about the size of a typical C or D cell, and together they provide frequency regulation to the grid. Grid operators at PJM send signals to the battery system every four seconds, telling it to either send the electricity generated by the wind farm onto the grid, or store it for later use when the wind isn’t blowing. “It’s a level of control over power that we haven’t seen,” said Praveen Kathpal, Vice President of Market and Regulatory Affairs for AES Energy Storage.
    The storage system technology is impressive, but, for now, its impact is relatively small. The West Virginia project can only hold enough electricity at any one time to power about 5,000 homes for 15 minutes.
    “Projects like these are the beginning of a long wave of energy storage projects to come,” said Kathpal. AES says they’re taking the next step in West Texas, where they want to build a second battery project, roughly three times larger than the West Virginia system.
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