DETROIT - Consumers Energy plans to spend $100 million to upgrade "the backbone" of its electricity distribution system. High voltage lines move electricity to transformers, which then "step down" the power to lower voltages for customers. The move comes as climate change makes storms become more fierce and frequent. "As we are facing more severe
LANSING – A bill passed by the Michigan House of Representatives last week that would study how the state could add more nuclear plants after one of the state’s existing plants closes. House Bill 6019, sent to the state Senate after passing in an 85-20 vote Thursday, May 19, would require the Michigan Public Service
LANSING — A new loan program from Michigan Saves will help low- to moderate-income Detroiters and nonprofit organizations more easily access financing to update buildings and electrical systems to greener, cleaner and more cost-effective technologies. The new loan program will launch on Wednesday, June 1, 2022. Funded through a $2.5 million program-related investment from The
DETROIT - Imagine being able to power your house with solar "energy cubes" that you can stack up like LEGO pieces to create a network of energy. It sounds like something out of sci-fi movie, yet this remarkable idea invented by a Swiss company may one day actually provide us with inexpensive, clean energy across
NAGANO, Japan - Last month, Japanese researchers from Shinshu University in Nagano developed a two-step method that is dramatically more efficient at generating hydrogen, a clean and renewable fuel, from a photocatalytic reaction. The team, however, indicated that they needed to engineer an improvement of the technology's efficiency to make it practically useful. This improvement may finally be here! Access
PORTUGAL - Europe’s largest floating solar farm is ready to generate 7.5 gigawatt-hours annually starting in July, according to Reuters. The solar farm is built by Portugal’s main utility Energias de Portugal (EDP), on Western Europe's biggest artificial lake, the Alqueva reservoir. A vast array of 12,000 solar panels, the size of four soccer fields, is moved by
ANN ARBOR – The City of Ann Arbor Office of Sustainability and Innovations, in collaboration with the Downtown Development Authority, is working to expand public electric vehicle charging in downtown parking facilities. “We are excited to see this significant expansion of EV charging infrastructure in our downtown and are thankful for the collaboration with the
LOUISVILLE, Ky. — The nation’s largest electrical grid operator has approved a new process for adding power plants to the sprawling transmission system it manages, including a two-year pause on reviewing and potentially approving some 1,200 projects, mostly solar power, that are part of a controversial backlog. PJM Interconnection operates a competitive market for wholesale
SACRAMENTO, Ca. - Renewable sources of energy provided close to 100 percent of energy demands in the state of California on Saturday, Desert Sun reported. Naturally, environmentalists celebrated this achievement, which was first reported as over 100 percent by an online energy tracker. California Independent System Operator (CAISO), a non-profit organization that tracks the state's bulk electric
NEW YORK - The solar energy industry has been thrown into a panic and projects are grinding to a halt after the Biden administration launched an investigation that some solar CEOs worry could tank the industry. The Commerce Department launched the probe in March into whether four countries in Southeast Asia that supply about 80 percent of US
