Energy Storage News: First Grid-Scale Tesla Powerpack for Europe Installed in U.K.
The first grid-scale installation of the Tesla Powerpack system in Europe has been completed in the U.K. by Camborne Energy Storage and is already providing ancillary services to the National Grid.
The 500 kWh capacity system has been co-located with a 500 kWp solar farm in Somerset to demonstrate the potential to provide a balanced grid.
Each of Camborne’s installed systems are designed to further assist and improve the efficiency of the U.K.’s energy infrastructure, with this latest project providing firm frequency response to the grid.
Fortune: SunPower Embraces Drones and Robots to Help Evolve Its Solar Farms
Solar panel maker and farm developer SunPower is embracing the latest in computing technology to help lower the cost of its solar panel farms while minimizing the impact that the farms have on land.
The Richmond, Calif.-based company on Tuesday announced an array of new technology that it’s using to design, build, operate, and monitor big solar panel farms that are built to sell energy to utilities and large companies.
New York Times: In Backing Autonomous Cars, U.S. Tells Automakers to Figure It Out
The Obama administration’s approach to hands-free driving is remarkably hands-off.
In one of the country’s most heavily regulated industries, the new federal guidelines that are meant to speed the development of self-driving cars give automakers wide latitude. The policy, announced on Tuesday, would generally let the industry decide for itself how to create supersmart automobiles that can navigate roads on their own, whether driving across town or across the country.
The one firm requirement: Make sure those cars are safe. Otherwise, federal officials have warned, the government will exercise its right under current regulations to pull them off the road.
Electric Light & Power: Hawaiian Electric Customers to Use Time-of-Use Electricity Pricing
Regulators have approved a program for Hawaiian Electric customers to pay different rates for electricity based on the time of day.
Under the pilot program announced Monday, customers will pay more for power at night when it's more expensive to produce. They'll be charged less during the day when the state's many solar panels reduce the cost of electricity. Hawaii residents pay the highest electricity rates in the nation. On a typical day, electricity demand peaks in the evening when people return home from work and turn on their lights, air conditioners, dishwashers and washing machines.
InsideClimate News: Climate Programs Will Be Cut in Clinton Foundation Restructuring
The Clinton Foundation's plan to stop accepting foreign donations if Hillary Clinton becomes president, announced following intense political scrutiny, would also decimate its programs combating climate change.
The foundation, a source of criticism from Clinton's political opponents and worrisome to some supporters, runs a sprawling global network of programs and partnerships devoted to public health and development issues. That includes a slice dedicated to climate. The Clinton Climate Initiative had a budget of $8.3 million in 2014, which is only 4 percent of the foundation's total program spending of $217.7 million.
What had a far wider impact, however, was the annual Clinton Global Initiative (CGI) event, which brought together corporate executives, foreign leaders and nonprofit leaders who collaborated on support for many climate programs.