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Solar Reliance: Keeping communities connected

  • English
  • Solar energy can play an important role in improving the resilience of the nation's electric grid. Instead of a main generator providing power to a large area, distributed solar energy systems - such as those on rooftops and in communities - can increase the overall resilience of the grid and the communities it serves.
© dcbel on Unsplash

California: Electric cars could save the U.S. power grid

  • English
  • Cars are no longer just a means of transportation, but are increasingly being integrated into the energy infrastructure. When your electric car is fully charged in the garage (cars are typically parked 95 percent of the time) and the power goes out, or during sudden spikes in demand, the large battery provides the ability to keep the lights on.
© Sterling Davis on Unsplash

California heat wave is a big moment for batteries

  • English
  • The scorching temperatures in the Golden State are a test case for a more flexible energy grid. Because this time, the California ISO had a little more power at its disposal: a relatively new fleet of grid-wide batteries. Capacity has almost doubled in the past year. Shortly after 6 p.m. Tuesday, the batteries surpassed the output of the last nuclear power plant at nearly 3,000 megawatts.

How to build more microgrids in rural U.S. communities – and why we should do it

  • English
  • Michelle Moore, former sustainability chief under President Obama, advocates for building microgrids to provide robust, clean energy to rural areas. U.S. President Joe Biden's Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) provides an unprecedented amount of funding for rural communities, including for resilience and microgrids.
© Pedro Lastra on Unsplash

Chicago will soon be powered only by renewable energy

  • English
  • Chicago plans to power all buildings and operations with 100% renewable electricity by 2026. These include the two airports, the Central Library and the U.S. city's main water treatment plant. More than 100 cities around the world now get at least 70% of their electricity from renewable sources, according to the non-profit environmental organization CDP.

A solar company plans to build off-grid neighborhoods in California

  • English
  • Connecting a single home to the grid can cost tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars, which means that an off-grid system may actually be cheaper - especially for properties in remote areas or locations where the local grid is reaching capacity and would require significant upgrades to serve additional homes.
Ganja Spliff on Pixabay

Do hemp batteries replace lithium-ion batteries?

  • German
  • Environmentally friendly materials are gaining importance in battery development, including hemp. The natural product is said to be even more powerful than lithium-ion batteries. Texas-based Bemp Research is working on a hemp battery for heavy-duty electric trucks and aircraft. The hemp battery is a lithium-sulfur battery based on "B4C hemp" (boron carbide from hemp).
Image: Rebecca Miller

A new concept for low-cost batteries

  • English
  • An aluminum-sulfur battery made from low-cost, abundant materials could provide low-cost backup storage for renewable energy sources. The three basic materials are cheap and readily available: aluminum, sulfur and widely used salts.

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