Industry headlines

ScottishPower and the Scottish government will unveil a multi-million pound investment in tidal energy this week that will secure a number of lucrative contracts for the country's manufacturers. Alex Salmond, the First Minister, will be in Oslo on Tuesday to launch what is thought to be the world's most technologically advanced turbine, developed by renewables firm Hammerfest Strom. Click here for full story

When David Cameron became Prime Minister he pledged that the new Coalition would be the greenest government ever. As Climate Change Minister my job is to help deliver this promise. However, I am glad to say that the old debate of green energy versus energy security has become increasingly irrelevant. That is because in the 21st century energy security and climate change are two sides of the same coin. Click here for full story

There's a new beast on the loose in the countryside. Visitors are stalking Britain's rural communities in unsuitable footwear, offering farmers the deal of a lifetime. They're not pushing a wonder fertilizer or trying to side-step their local farmers' market in the hunt for a new superfood, but offering help to cash in on the new gold rush - solar power. Click here for full story

First official report says burying charcoal in the soil has potential to cut greenhouse gases but scientific uncertainties remain. The idea of burying charcoal produced from microwaved wood to tackle global warming is still beset with scientific uncertainties, says the UK government's first report on "biochar". The warning comes as a separate US study published this week said that as much as 12 per cent of global greenhouse gas emissions could be offset by biochar. Click here for full story

…….He is also worried that farmers’ efforts to hedge against volatile food prices by investing in solar and other renewable energy could be stymied by the Government’s “localism” agenda. Mr Kendall, whose 56,000 members account for 75pc of British agricultural production, says he is a firm supporter of moves to install solar panels on farms.…… However, he believes that Prime Minister David Cameron’s plans to give people a much greater say over issues that affect them could jeopardise some renewable energy schemes by encouraging “nimbyism” and giving power to vociferous minorities. Click here for full story

A dramatic increase in offshore wind manufacturing is needed to meet the scale-up required for Round 3 projects, a report published by AMA Research has claimed. Click here for full story

About 40km south of Beijing, some of the world's most exciting science is splitting atoms in pursuit of the nuclear physicist's Holy Grail – the tiny, cheap reactor. China started generating electricity from the first fourth generation nuclear station without fanfare last month, using largely home-grown technology that reduces waste, increases efficiency and vastly brings down costs compared with existing plants. Click here for full story

Plans for the largest wind farm in the southern hemisphere took a leap forward today when Australian firm AGL Energy inked a deal with New Zealand-based renewable energy developer Meridian Energy to build a 420MW facility. The $1bn wind farm near Hamilton, 260km west of Melbourne, is due to be completed in early 2013. Click here for full story

The French government has this week launched a major renewable energy investment programme, promising to provide EUR1.35bn (£1.1bn) of financial support to the sector over the next four years. The new programme – dubbed demonstrateurs energies renouvelables et chimie verte, literally renewable energy and green chemistry demonstration – will provide EUR450m in subsidies and a further EUR900m in low-interest loans to cutting-edge technology projects. Click here for full story

The country’s [USA] first utility-scale wave power project is moving forward in construction. The 1.5 megawatt wave energy park will generate enough energy to power 375 or more homes. The park will likely be located 2.5 miles off the Oregon coast near Reedsport, and use ten electricity-generating buoys. PB150 PowerBuoys will be used to generate power, and the first one has been constructed at Oregon IronWorks. Click here for full story

Ammonia energy has been a known fuel source for decades. It’s three parts hydrogen and one part nitrogen, which you get from air separation……Our concept is to go into deep enough water where there is unimpeded wind. By redesigning the wind turbines using the advanced oil fill platform design technology, we can get into about 600-foot depths and maybe more. Then the wind turbine is mounted on the small platform where it can generate around 50 megawatts. The blades are made from advanced composites and can be the length of a 90-story building. It is our intention to have 50 megawatt power plants every five miles down the Gulf of Maine, and we’re not going to use the power for electricity per se. We’re going to combine electricity and ocean water through forward osmosis to create distilled sea water. We’ll use part of that seawater as a new process of the old electrolysis to combine electricity and water to create hydrogen. Then through an air separation unit we’ll create nitrogen and what you’ll have is NH3, and we’ll also have distilled water. [Note from Editor: Mr Simmons spoke about this at All-Energy 2010] Click here for full story

Last week's climate change negotiations in Bonn, Germany reportedly marked movement backward on international climate cooperation. This does not seem to bode well for a successful outcome for the major climate negotiations scheduled for this November and December in Cancun, Mexico. However, five new factors since last year's climate negotiations in Copenhagen suggest that a good outcome in Cancun is at least still possible. Click here for full story

Corus today (13 August) unveiled plans to construct a new £31.5-million manufacturing plant in Teesside which would potentially create 220 jobs. Preliminary engineering work is underway at the Corus Redcar site to develop a new facility to produce steel foundation structures – called monopiles – used to secure offshore wind turbines to the seabed. Jon Bolton, Corus Long Products Director, explained that the company is moving now in order to establish its position in this emerging market. He said: “The development of a new plant is dependent on us securing enough orders for monopiles. Our engineers will be carrying out work in Teesside over the coming weeks to give us a head start on creating a new facility.” Click here for full story

……The British energy sector is poised for a quantum leap within the medium to long term. The imminent introduction of smart metering has initiated a wave of reforms across the industry and, following on from similar developments worldwide, the network businesses in Britain are now considering the forthcoming development of smart grids. Click here for full story

Waitrose is making carbon savings equivalent to permanently taking a thousand cars off the road – all by stopping its food waste from going to landfill. The scheme is producing enough electricity to continually power around 200 homes. The food waste is collected from one hundred of its stores and processed by specialist anaerobic digestion operators BiogenGreenfinch. Click here for full story

How can a technology known to ancient potters and spinners help create a 21st-century smart energy grid? A company based in Massachusetts aims to demonstrate when it begins operating the world’s first grid-scale, flywheel-based energy storage plant in New York later this year. Beacon Power Corporation is currently building the $69 million plant with the help of a just-closed $43 million loan from the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE). Click here for full story

A multi-million pound project to create a testing platform for wave energy devices in Cornwall has ground to a halt. Engineers have postponed plans to float the copper cable ashore after it sank, raising fears it could become enmeshed on the seabed. The cable, which was 650ft (200m) from land on Thursday evening, will now be rewound onto a ship offshore. Click here for full story

The first wind turbine to be installed on Ministry of Defence (MoD) land was unveiled this week in a move that observers hope will herald a new era of peace and co-operation between the wind energy industry and the military top brass. Energy giant E.ON installed the 15 metre tall turbine at the Duke of York's Royal Military School near Dover as part of the Land Forces Sustainable Development Action Plan goal of generating 10 per cent of electricity from renewable sources. Click here for full story

Scottish Hydro Electric Transmission Ltd (SHETL) has applied for permission to open a massive borrow pit to extract rock to build and upgrade service tracks for the towering pylons set to become a feature of the Scottish sky-line. The company won the right to build the 400kv overhead line down Scotland's spine after a lengthy and costly planning battle.

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The European Union started an investigation into shipments of U.S. biodiesel to Europe as it seeks to find out if antidumping measures introduced last year are being circumvented. The probe will look at whether biodiesel originating in the U.S. is being shipped to the EU through Canada and Singapore, thereby getting around tariffs on U.S. producers, the European Commission said in the Official Journal. Click here for full story

Technology group Andritz has acquired a 33.3% stake in Norwegian tidal power specialist Hammerfest Strøm AS, including its Scotland-based subsidiary Hammerfest Strom UK Ltd, by means of a capital increase…… the company is currently collaborating with Scottish Power Renewables (part of Iberdrola Renewables) on the manufacture of a 1-MW tidal current turbine to be deployed at the European Marine Energy Centre in Orkney, Scotland, in 2011. Click here for full story

An innovative eco-friendly scheme that could see wind turbines installed in two Suffolk villages – with income from electricity sales ploughed back into the parish – was last night hailed as a blueprint for the county’s green future. The ground-breaking project was the brainchild of Cookpole Energy Action (CEA), a not for profit group made up of residents from Cookley and Walpole, near Halesworth. Click here for full story

Wave energy company Aquamarine Power has recently visited the Western Isles to explore the potential for installing a small demonstration wave power project off the west coast of Lewis. Click here for full story

If wave and tidal energy is to take hold in the UK, it will almost certainly be founded on technology tested by the National Renewable Energy Centre……. A £15m marine testing facility known as Project Nautilus will be built in Blyth to test-drive components before they are forced to battle the harsh waters and Narec is keen to strengthen links with the two other main marine centres in the UK. Click here for full story

The internet releases around 300m tonnes of CO2 a year – as much as all the coal, oil and gas burned in Turkey or Poland, or more than half of the fossil fuels burned in the UK. Click here for full story

Renewable energy developer Wind Prospect has announced its intention to open a South African office in Cape Town in October, which would service the whole of the African continent. The office would provide wind resource assessment, undertake due diligence and development support services to developers, banks and financial institutions. Click here for full story

……… According to the EOEA’s website, this “roadmap” was first published on 5 May of this year at a dinner debate hosted by the Danish Social-Democratic MEP Britta Thomsen. It was later re-issued with a press release on 15 July. It is, as you may expect from a report issued by an “ocean energy association”, rather upbeat about the prospects of ocean energy. In fact, the report claims that ocean energy (that is, energy from waves, tides, currents, temperature gradients and salinity gradients) could meet no less than 15% of ‘EU energy demand’ by 2050. If that is true, it would be reason for some enthusiasm of course. Later in the report, the claim is somewhat amended, as it turns out that what the EOEA is really talking about is 15% of electricity consumption in Europe. Doesn’t the EOEA know the difference between energy and electricity? The false “energy” claim was repeated in a story by the online publication Euractiv on 20 July, which uncritically cited the EOEA’s press release. Click here for full story

President Obama’s visit to ZBB Energy Corp. Monday will provide him a backdrop to discuss clean-energy priorities including a smarter power grid and expanded renewable energy. The Menomonee Falls energy storage developer represents a good fit for Obama, company Chief Executive Officer Eric Apfelbach said, because it’s a clean-technology company focused on energy storage technologies. The company was awarded a $14.7 million tax credit under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act earlier this year, and its energy storage systems are designed to work with a smarter power grid and enable expanded use of renewable energy -- key energy priorities of the Obama administration, Apfelbach said in an interview Thursday. Click here for full story

The University of Brighton is co-ordinating a EUR6.3m programme to equip social housing schemes in the UK and France with energy systems that combat climate change. Professor Mike McEvoy, from the university's School of Architecture and Design, is co-ordinating Innovation for Renewal (IFORE) which is being financed by the European Regional Development Fund's Interreg programme. Click here for full story

German energy company E.ON is pressing ahead with its Kingsnorth project, after making it through to the last two in the UK Govenment’s competition build one of the world’s first industrial-scale demonstration carbon capture and storage (CCS) plants earlier this year. E.ON UK has now awarded contracts to Swiss-based international engineering firm Foster Wheeler and its Japanese partner Mitsubishi Heavy Industries (MHI) for the design of a post-combustion CO2 capture and compression plant.
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Copper thieves could have caused hundreds of thousands of pounds worth of damage to the Whitelee Windfarm after a hapless robbery caused a power surge. The sudden failure of two 110 metre-high turbines at Europe’s largest windfarm threatened a site-wide shutdown this week, after thieves severed two kilometres of copper cable near to Ardochrig Farm on the outskirts of East Kilbride. ScottishPower Renewables said it’s too early to confirm the extent of the damage, but did say the site will have to be shut down while extensive repairs are carried out. Click here for full story

Civil engineer Balfour Beatty brushed off the potential impact on its business of government spending cuts as it unveiled higher profits and orders, writes Philip Waller. Balfour said ministers’ decision to put off many school building and refurbishment projects were unlikely to hit it because such schemes accounted for only about 1-2 per cent of its business. It said it was prepared by focusing on other areas, such as renewable energy, airports and nuclear power projects. Click here for full story

Highland Council must keep up the pressure on the owners of the mothballed Nigg fabrication yard to sell the site quickly to prevent work contracts going abroad, a senior councillor said yesterday. The local authority’s planning, environment and development committee heard that KBR and the Wakelyn Trust will decide on a preferred bidder out of five businesses which have submitted a bid. Click here for full story

Local people will be consulted over proposals for the controversial Beauly to Denny power line. Scottish Power announced that it would carry out the voluntary consultation, in addition to the formal consultation which has already taken place through Stirling Council’s Beauly to Denny Steering Group. Click here for full story

Atlantis Resources Corporation, one of the world’s leading developers of electricity-generating tidal current turbines, unveiled the largest and most powerful tidal power turbine ever built, the AK1000, yesterday (11 August) at Invergordon, Scotland. The AK1000 is due for installation at a dedicated berth at the European Marine Energy Centre (“EMEC”), located in Orkney, Scotland later this summer. Dignitaries, utilities and technology partners from around the world attended the unveiling of the flagship turbine at the Isleburn Engineering facility, taking the only opportunity to view the turbine before it is installed on the seabed and connected to the grid at EMEC. Click here for full story

Five years ago, when 17% of Portugal’s energy came from renewable energy – about like California now – the government made a bold decision to aim for 45% during the next five years – by 2010. Sounds impossible, right? Yet, according to Elizabeth Rosenthal at the NYT, they will have achieved their goal by the end of this year. “You cannot imagine the pressure we suffered that first year,” said Manuel Pinho, Portugal’s minister of economy and innovation from 2005 until last year, who largely masterminded the transition, adding, “Politicians must take tough decisions.” Click here for full story

Energy giant E.ON, one of the companies behind the London Array offshore wind farm, has today (August 11) reported a 7% rise in worldwide sales to roughly EUR44 billion (£36 billion). ….. E.ON's results also show that it has installed 2,800MW of "new, climate-friendly generating capacity" in the first half of this year, which includes the 180MW Robin Rigg offshore wind farm in the Solway Firth. Click here for full story

More than 2,200 commercial divers will be needed to help build and develop Europe’s offshore wind sector as it rapidly expands over the next six years, according to leading industry analysts. A new report commissioned by subsea training provider The Underwater Centre in Fort William has studied the number of divers who will be needed to meet the renewable energy targets which have been set by governments across Europe. The study, which was carried out by Douglas Westwood, focuses on the installation and maintenance phases of offshore wind farm development over the next six years. Click here for full story

U.K. solar power installer jobs have increased by 75 percent this year as government incentives spurred demand for photovoltaic panels, Solar Century Holdings Ltd. said. The combined number of employees for Solar Century, which builds solar systems for homebuilders Persimmon Plc and Barratt Developments Plc, and 11 companies it works with to install panels has risen to 350 from 200 at the beginning of the year, the London-based company said today in an e-mailed statement. There will be “well over 500 jobs by 2011,” it said. Click here for full story

More than 900 homes will soon be powered by renewable energy after plans to develop a hydropower project were approved. After a nail-biting five month wait, not-for-profit company Ham Hydro - working closely with Ham United Group (Hug) - has been chosen by the Environment Agency (EA) to develop a hydropower project at Teddington Weir, alongside a major civil contractor. Click here for full story