Archive for the 'Infrastructure' Category
AT&T Buys Time Warner for $85 Billion
June 12th, 2018Insane, anticompetitive, Soviet-style vertical integration. So it goes… Via: Los Angeles Times: In the aftermath of a federal judge’s approval Tuesday of the mega-merger between AT&T and Time Warner, you’ll be reading about how this deal will vastly remake the entertainment and information landscape, most likely at consumers’ expense. That take is absolutely true. What’s […]
Solar Has Overtaken Gas and Wind as Biggest Source of New U.S. Power
June 12th, 2018Disclosure: I sell solar power systems in New Zealand. — Via: Bloomberg: Despite tariffs that President Trump imposed on imported panels, the U.S. installed more solar energy than any other source of electricity in the first quarter. Developers installed 2.5 gigawatts of solar in the first quarter, up 13 percent from a year earlier, according […]
Australia: 50,000 Tesla Powerwalls to Form Virtual Power Plant
May 24th, 2018Via: Electrek: Earlier this year, Tesla announced that it reached a deal with the South Australian government to install solar arrays and Powerwalls on up to 50,000 homes to create the biggest virtual power plant in the world. A new government was elected in the state a few weeks later and they quickly cast doubts […]
Hawaii Lava Approaches Geothermal Power Plant
May 21st, 2018Via: Reuters: Lava from the erupting Kilauea volcano on Hawaii’s Big Island flowed towards a geothermal power plant on Monday as workers scrambled to shut it down to prevent the uncontrollable release of toxic gases. It was the latest danger from Mount Kilauea’s eruption, which geologists says is among the worst events in a century […]
Australian Government Launches Urgent Fuel Security Review as Reserves Dip Below 50 Days
May 7th, 2018Via: New Zealand Herald: Energy Minister Josh Frydenberg has ordered an urgent review of Australia’s liquid fuel reserves as the country dips below 50 days, but says it should “not be construed as Australia having a fuel security problem”, reports news.com.au. The International Energy Agency mandates that countries hold at least 90 days’ supply, but […]
New Zealand: Final Splice of Hawaiki Cable Complete; End-to-End Connectivity Confirmed
May 4th, 2018Via: Hawaiki Cable Press Release: Hawaiki Submarine Cable LP and TE SubCom, a TE Connectivity Ltd. company and an industry pioneer in undersea communications technology, today announced that the final splice of the Hawaiki Submarine Cable has been made and the system is on schedule to be in service in June 2018. With the final […]
World’s Highest Capacity Grid Battery Might Be Built in Colorado
March 14th, 2018300 MWh. 😯 Via: Electrek: After breaking a few energy storage records with its battery system projects in Australia, Tesla looks to come back to the US to build a new world’s largest Powerpack battery system in Colorado. … In South Australia, Tesla’s 100MW/ 129MWh Powerpack project is known as “the most powerful battery system […]
California Bullet Train Boondoggle
March 11th, 2018Via: Los Angeles Times: The price of the California bullet train project jumped sharply Friday when the state rail authority announced that the cost of connecting Los Angeles to San Francisco would be $77.3 billion and could rise as high as $98.1 billion — an uptick of at least $13 billion from estimates two years […]
Tepco’s ‘Ice Wall’ Fails to Freeze Fukushima’s Toxic Water Buildup
March 8th, 2018Mmm hmm. This was treated like comedy gold on Cryptogon when it was announced. And now, not only has it not worked, but the problem is worse. Via: Reuters: A costly “ice wall” is failing to keep groundwater from seeping into the stricken Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant, data from operator Tokyo Electric Power Co shows, […]
The 11 Cities Most Likely to Run Out of Drinking Water – Like Cape Town
February 11th, 2018Via: BBC: Cape Town faces the unenviable situation of being the first major city in the modern era to run out of drinking water. However, the plight of the drought-hit South African city is just one extreme example of a problem that experts have long been warning about – water scarcity.
