Published

11 months ago

December 24, 2024

Alice Rush

Figure courtesy of the Rocky Mountain Institute.

The new energy economy is booming in the Southeast, and we’re on the cusp of getting some of the infrastructure we need to keep it growing without increasing reliance on fossil fuels.

Last month, the Department of Energy recently issued a series of grants designed to help improve our national power grid. Two major grants impact our region:

TVA will improve reliability

$250 million went to the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) and some of TVA’s local utility customers, with the funding directed toward 84 projects that will strengthen the power grid and help foster the growth of renewable energy. The grant is part of the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, passed in 2021 and signed into law by the Biden administration.

According to the Knoxville News Sentinel, which reported on the grant when it was announced, the benefits of the projects will include:

*more than 2,400 MW of new electrical capacity—enough to power more than 1.4 million homes and put new renewable energy projects online;

*a faster and more efficient interconnection queue, meaning new power sources can be plugged into the grid and start providing energy to ratepayers more quickly; and

*the first-ever connection between TVA’s power grid and that of the Southwest Power Pool (SPP), which operates in the Midwest.

Once operational, these projects will significantly improve the reliability of electricity for customers within the TVA’s footprint, meaning they will face fewer power outages and likely lower prices. This has been too long in coming, but it is a win for families and businesses in the Tennessee Valley.

During Winter Storm Elliot in 2022, the TVA implemented rolling blackouts while SPP was forced to curtail the ample wind energy they were generating because it lacked the grid capacity. If TVA and SPP had been linked at the time, customers in both regions would have benefited.

The Department of Energy estimates that the TVA project will reduce local power outages by 94% and generate $250 million in economic benefits—in effect offsetting the entire cost of the grant.

Georgia Power’s grid gets enhanced

Another major grant was awarded to Georgia Power, the state’s largest utility, in the amount of $160 million to be spent on Grid Enhancing Technologies (GETs), including dynamic line rating technology and reconductoring. Both are technological enhancements that will improve power flow through the wires without requiring major new construction.

This grid update is a welcome improvement, though again it’s coming later than it should have. SACE witnesses appeared before the Georgia Public Service Commission in late 2023, arguing that these exact improvements – dynamic line ratings and reconductoring, along with other GETs – should be part of Georgia Power’s Integrated Resource Plan (IRP)—a periodically updated road map to the utility’s future activities. The Commission declined to enforce these suggestions, and Georgia Power did not take them on voluntarily. Now the federal government has stepped in to sponsor them.

What comes next

To dramatically understate matters, there is more work to do in Georgia, Tennessee, and across the region. The National Transmission Needs Study estimated in 2023 that the Southeast will need about 6.8 Terawatt-miles of new power lines to keep up with the growing electricity demand in the region within the next ten years (by 2035). The federal dollars are a decent start at offsetting these needs, but it’s unlikely a similar bill will pass under the next administration. Most or all of the remaining effort will need to be local.

Transmission is often seen as technical but its benefits are not abstract. The lights stay on during a brutal winter storm; the bill arrives and you don’t have to struggle to pay it; a new, power-needy manufacturing plant opens and you get a job.

In press releases touting the grant awards, both TVA and Georgia Power cheer the economic and social benefits that will come from the new transmission lines, including new jobs and less pollution. In short, these investments pay for themselves. We can’t afford to stop investing in our community even when the federal dollars dry up.

The post New federal grants will improve the Southeastern power grid. But the need for more will only grow from here. appeared first on SACE | Southern Alliance for Clean Energy.

New federal grants will improve the Southeastern power grid. But the need for more will only grow from here.

Renewable Energy

Terra-GEN, Nordex & Siemens Gamesa Improve

Published

13 hours ago

November 17, 2025

Alice Rush

Weather Guard Lightning Tech

Terra-GEN, Nordex & Siemens Gamesa Improve

Terra-Gen’s 238.5 MW project in Texas is now fully operational and the Philippines just awarded approvals for more than 10 GWs of renewables. Plus Nordex and Siemens Gamesa are optimistic about their future.

Sign up now for Uptime Tech News, our weekly email update on all things wind technology. This episode is sponsored by Weather Guard Lightning Tech. Learn more about Weather Guard’s StrikeTape Wind Turbine LPS retrofit. Follow the show on Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, Linkedin and visit Weather Guard on the web. And subscribe to Rosemary Barnes’ YouTube channel here. Have a question we can answer on the show? Email us!

There’s news from the wind industry this week. And for once… the headlines tell a story of growth. Down in Hidalgo County, Texas… something worth celebrating happened this week. Terra-GEN commissioned the Monte Cristo ONE Windpower Project. Two hundred thirty-eight-point-five megawatts. Fully operational. The wind facility will generate more than 850 gigawatt-hours of clean electricity every year. Enough to power roughly 81,000 homes. And the power? Already sold. Long-term purchase agreements with two corporate customers. Construction created about 280 jobs at peak activity. More than 490,000 work hours. Not one lost-time incident. They upgraded 11 miles of state roads. Twenty-five miles of county roads. Over its lifetime… the project will deliver more than 100 million dollars to the local community. Property taxes. Landowner payments. Other economic contributions. “It is an honor,” said John O’Connor, Chief Financial Officer for Terra-GEN, “to celebrate the hard work and dedication of the hundreds of men and women who made the commissioning of the Monte Cristo wind project possible.” Meanwhile… halfway around the world in the Philippines… the government just awarded approvals for more than 10 gigawatts of renewable power. That’s ten-point-two gigawatts, to be exact. One hundred twenty-three winning bidders. Solar. Storage. And wind. Onshore wind alone claimed two-point-five gigawatts of that capacity. Twenty-one projects. All set to deliver power by 2029. The Philippines is targeting 50 percent renewable generation by 2040. And they’re not waiting around. The “overwhelming response,” said the department of energy, “reflects the growing confidence of investors.” Back in Europe… in Germany… Nordex is making moves. The turbine manufacturer just secured orders for 123 megawatts from Denkerwulf. Twenty-five onshore wind turbines. Installation begins in 2027. Commissioning in 2028. And Nordex shares? They’re climbing. Hit a multi-year high this week. Trading at 28 euros and 2 cents. Denkerwulf’S orders for Nordex in 2025 now total nearly 144 megawatts. And last week… Mingyang signed a contract with ORE Catapult… a state-owned British test center. They’re going to test main bearings for Mingyangs offshore 18.5MW turbines in the United Kingdom. “A major milestone,” said Mingyang’S chief technology officer for Europe, Marc Sala. “A decisive breakthrough for our local operations.” Mingyang has big plans for Britain. One-point-five billion pounds in investments. Half for factories. Half for the offshore wind supply chain. Now… over at Siemens Gamesa… things are looking up. The wind business has been struggling. Over four fiscal years… losses totaled eight-point-six billion euros. But Chief Executive Officer Christian Bruch confirmed this week… they’re still targeting profitability by 2027. Break-even by 2026. Revenue for full-year 2025 rose 5 percent to ten-point-three-seven-five billion euros. Losses improved slightly. “The journey towards profitability is going to take time,” said Chief Financial Officer Maria Ferraro. “But I think the team is doing a great job.” They expect a positive fourth quarter in 2026. So there you have it. The wind industry is pushing forward. Two hundred thirty-eight-point-five megawatts commissioned in Texas. One hundred twenty-three projects approved in the Philippines. One hundred twenty-three megawatts ordered in Germany. Eighteen-point-five megawatt turbines heading to Britain for testing. And Siemens Gamesa … now seeing light at the end of the tunnel. The numbers tell the story. Things are beginning to stabilize – and there’s hope for the future. That’s the state of the wind industry on the 17th of November 2025. Join us tomorrow for the Uptime Wind Energy podcast.

https://weatherguardwind.com/terragen-nordex-siemens/

Renewable Energy

Has the Fever Broken?

Published

2 days ago

November 15, 2025

Alice Rush

Many Americans are starting to feel like the lady whose observations we see at left.

Exactly how this moves forward from here is anyone’s guess. Maybe the Democrats gain a huge majority in Congress in 2026 and then impeach and convict Trump–perhaps joined by lots of Republicans.

There are plenty of different scenarios.

Has the Fever Broken?

Renewable Energy

Trump and Climate Change

Published

2 days ago

November 15, 2025

Alice Rush

As shown in this short video, Donald Trump says that climate change is the biggest con job ever perpetrated on Earth.

We are to believe that Trump a) understands the subject better than the thousands of our planet’s top scientists, located in countries all around the globe, and b) he’s telling the truth, where they have somehow gotten together and conspired to lie.

That’s quite a stretch.