SolarReserve, a developer of utility-scale solar thermal power projects based in Santa Monica, Calif., is planning to tap public and private money to finance the development of two new projects, each backed by recently signed long-term power purchase agreements (PPAs). Read More »
Utility-scale geothermal, or taping heat deep inside the earth’s core to generate large amounts of clean and reliable electricity, sounds like a great idea but it seems more and more like an impossible feat.
Yesterday, the New York Times reported, that AltaRock Energy, a geothermal developer backed by Google and other venture capital big wigs, gave notice to the Department of Energy that it would abandoned its Geysers drilling project, located north of San Francisco. The DOE confirmed that AltaRock had given notice and that it was walking away from the project. Read More »
San Francisco utility Pacific Gas and Electricity (PG&E) has acquired a $900 million, 246-megawatt wind project in Southern California from Iberdrola Renewables, the U.S. unit of the Spanish renewable energy company. This is PG&E’s first direct investment in wind generation.
The deal was announced Thursday. In the U.S. direct investments by utilities in renewable energy projects are rare and so we thought it was important to highlight rhis uniqe transaction despite the delay.
The Manzana project, located on about 7,000 acres (2,832 hectares) of land in eastern Kern County, could — pending regulatory approval — start operating in December 2011. Read More »
Rio Tinto's Kestrel coal mine in Australia
Rio Tinto, the Anglo-Australian mining giant, is selling its 50 percent stake in carbon capture and storage (CCS) project in Dubai to BP and will instead invest in the Hydrogen Energy California (HECA) CCS test project.
Rio Tinto says that as a miner, it makes more sense to invest in the coal-backed California initiative rather than Dubai’s Hydrogen Energy International (HEIL) project, which uses natural gas as a feedstock.
Coal is significantly cheaper than natural gas and also less prone to erratic price swings, which makes it a more manageable feedstock.
Standard practice: BP and Rio Tinto did not disclose the financial terms. Masdar, the Abu Dhabi clean tech investment group, controls the balance of the HEIL project. Read More »
First Solar has sold its 21-megawatt solar energy project now under construction in Blythe, Calif., 200 miles (321 kilometers) east of Los Angeles to NRG Energy.
Construction on Blythe, California’s largest utility-scale PV power plant, began in September and is expected to end at year-end. Once operational, the plant will sell its electricity output to Southern California Edison under a 20-year power purchase agreement.
The two companies did not disclose the acquisition price. Read More »
