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PG&E’s fossil fuel-powered microgrids

Workers install portions of the 8.5 megawatt-per-hour battery system at Fort Carson, Colorado. Huntsville Center’s Energy Savings Performance Contracting program coordinated the project designed to reduce peak electricity use costs, especially during the summer cooling season. (Photo by Scott Clark) found on by Scott Clark, found on https://www.hnc.usace.army.mil/Media/Images/igphoto/2002081389/

by Kavya Balaraman, Utility Dive Highlights: The towns of Angwin, Calistoga, Placerville, and Grass Valley are part of PG&E’s effort to build a network of “resilience zones” and temporary microgrids in portions of its service territory that are especially vulnerable to fire-related outages. PG&E deployed 23 MW of temporary generation from fossil fuel power (diesel) … Read more

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Opinion: Microgrids could prevent need for planned power outages

Community microgrids are safe, reliable, clean, smart, and distributed.

Our aging and unstable electrical system must be replaced now, not decades from now This piece was originally published in the Mercury News opinion section on October 25, 2019. (Subscription required.) The dramatic increase in the size and severity of California’s wildfires in recent years is just one example of the devastating effects of climate … Read more

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Another Important Legislative Victory for Community Choice Energy

A two-year struggle to defeat an insidious piece of legislation in Sacramento, Assembly Bill 976, has come to a happy conclusion. On September 27 Governor Brown vetoed AB976 and added a brief signing statement (see below). In this statement the Governor echoed what community choice proponents drove home repeatedly in committee hearings and elsewhere. The … Read more