But, a summit at Bismarck State College today is reminding people that our state also has a lot of renewable energy potential.

Speakers at the renewable energy summit say the country needs to invest in all forms of domestic energy, rather than depending on foreign oil.

There`s wind, biodiesel, solar, and of course, our traditional sources like oil and coal. Former NATO supreme allied commander Europe, Gen. Wesley Clark (Ret.), says we need them all here in America instead of shipping $300 billion a year overseas — for the sake of our national security.

“That`s more than the cost of the health bill, more than the cost of the way in Iraq, plus the war in Afghanistan. That`s all the research and development in the United States. That`s your kids` education,” said Clark, Growth Energy co-chairman.

Clark says our nation`s entrepreneurs have the know-how to develop renewable energy that will break the dependence on foreign oil. But, the investment can`t be done unless there`s demand for it, and he says that has to come through policy from the federal government, like tax incentives and mandates.

Clark asked, “Why can`t we have a vision that says, `We`re moving to a new, more sophisticated energy policy that strengthens America`s domestic energy production and reduces what we`re importing from abroad,`?”

Sen. Byron Dorgan, D-N.D., says Congress is working on a national energy policy that he says needs to focus on getting North Dakota`s energy to the rest of country.

“We already produce far more than we need,” explained Dorgan. “We need the conveyance. We need the pipelines to move product out of here. We`re working on that now and we need a modern transmission system that moves what we can produce here to the parts of the country that need it.”

Dorgan says this kind of policy will allow us to look back and say North Dakota played a major role in advancing the country`s energy industry through both traditional, and renewable sources.

Dorgan says he believes legislation will make it to the Senate floor for debate by the end of the summer.

Technorati Tags: electricity deregulation, green energy, North Dakota, renewable energy

The visit is part of a broader push by the White House to promote alternative forms of energy. But in the wake of the massive Gulf oil spill, some observers say Obama is missing an opportunity for even stronger action.

The Solyndra company in Fremont, Calif., was one of the early beneficiaries of Obama’s support for green energy. Last year, the federal government guaranteed a $500 million loan for the company that, White House economic adviser Jared Bernstein said, is allowing Solyndra to build a new solar cell factory employing 3,000 construction workers and creating 1,000 permanent jobs.

“But what’s happening at Solyndra isn’t just about new jobs today. It’s about new industries tomorrow,” Bernstein said. “What’s more, these new industries are in the business of clean, renewable energy, thus invoking environmental benefits while reducing our dependence on foreign imports of fossil fuels.”

Alternatives In Focus

The administration wants to do more to encourage alternative forms of energy, including solar, wind and nuclear power. It has asked Congress to expedite funding for additional loan guarantees.

Obama also called last week for higher fuel economy standards for cars and trucks of the future. He said it’s important to stretch every gallon of oil as far as it can go.

“The disaster in the Gulf only underscores that even as we pursue domestic production to reduce our reliance on imported oil, our long-term security depends on the development of alternative sources of fuel and new transportation technologies,” Obama said.

But the president acknowledged it would take more than higher fuel economy standards to make the U.S. a leader in green energy. He repeated his pledge to work with Congress to pass a broad energy and climate bill.

Political adviser David Axelrod said on MSNBC this week that effort could get a lift from the oil spill.

“I would like to think that this will increase the sense of urgency in Congress because it underscores the value in developing alternative sources of energy,” Axelrod said. “So I hope that it will give added impetus. We’re going to press very hard.”

Approach Criticized

But some have questioned whether the administration is pressing hard enough.

New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman accused the president of a “Bush-level failure of imagination.” He wrote that just as President Bush squandered an opportunity to remake energy policy with a gasoline tax after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, Obama is failing to capitalize on the April 20 oil spill that continues to pour oil into the Gulf of Mexico.

Energy expert Michael Levi of the Council on Foreign Relations says that may be going too far.

“[Sept. 11] made terrorism and the Middle East No. 1 on every American’s agenda,” he said. “The oil spill has not made oil and energy No. 1 on every American’s agenda this time. And that gives the president a much more difficult situation to work with.”

Levi says passing a big energy bill isn’t like financial regulation, where the administration successfully channeled public anger with Wall Street into new legislation. Although the public is angry at BP, he says, that won’t necessarily translate into support for, say, a new carbon tax.

“It simply is not intuitively clear to anyone in this country why you need to do something that addresses coal power plants and that changes electricity rates because of an oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico,” Levi said.

Obama said last week he’s encouraged by the efforts of Democratic Sens. John Kerry (D-MA) and Joe Lieberman (I-CT) to craft an energy and climate bill. But the lone Republican who had been working on that effort, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC), withdrew his support.

The president had hoped to win some GOP backing for an energy bill by including an expansion of offshore oil drilling. But with claims about the safety of deep-water drilling now discredited, that bargaining chip is very much in doubt.

by Scott Horsley

NPR.org

Technorati Tags: green energy, Obama, photovoltaic, renewable energy, solar energy, Solyndra company

“If key changes can be made to standard operating procedures, our research shows that large amounts of wind and solar can be incorporated onto the grid without a lot of backup generation,” said Dr. Debra Lew, NREL project manager for the study. “When you coordinate the operations between utilities across a large geographic area, you decrease the effect of the variability of wind and solar energy sources, mitigating the unpredictability of Mother Nature.”

The study focuses on the operational impacts of wind, photovoltaics, and concentrating solar power on the power system operated by the WestConnect group of utilities in the mountain and southwest states. WestConnect is a group of transmission providers, which includes Arizona Public Service, El Paso Electric Co., NV Energy, Public Service of New Mexico, Salt River Project, Tri-State Generation and Transmission Cooperative, Tucson Electric Power, Western Area Power Administration, and Xcel Energy. Though wind and solar output vary over time, the technical analysis performed in this study shows that it is operationally possible to accommodate 30 percent wind and 5 percent solar energy penetration. To accomplish such an increase, utilities will have to substantially increase their coordination of operations over wider geographic areas and schedule their generation deliveries, or sales, on a more frequent basis. Currently generators provide a schedule for a specific amount of power they will provide in the next hour. More frequent scheduling would allow generators to adjust that amount of power based on changes in system conditions such as increases or decreases in wind or solar generation.

The study also finds that if utilities generate 27 percent of their electricity from wind and solar energy across the Western Interconnection grid, it would lower carbon emissions by 25 to 45 percent. It would also decrease fuel and emissions costs by 40 percent, depending on the future price of natural gas.

Other key findings from the study include:

• Existing transmission capacity can be more fully utilized to reduce the amount of new transmission that needs to be built.
• To facilitate the integration of wind and solar energy, coordinating the operations of utilities can provide substantial savings by reducing the need for additional back-up generation, such as natural gas-burning plants.
• Use of wind and solar forecasts in utility operations to predict when and where it will be windy and sunny is essential for cost-effectively integrating these renewable energy sources.

The study was undertaken by a team of wind, solar and power systems experts across both the private and public sectors. The study complements the recently released Eastern Wind Integration and Transmission Study, which examines the feasibility of integrating up to 30 percent wind in the eastern states.

The report released today is an important first step in assessing the impact of solar and wind energy on the electrical grid. Under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, the Department of Energy is investing more than $26 million to further study the Western transmission interconnection, which will help states, utilities, and grid operators prepare for future growth in energy demand, renewable energy resources, and Smart Grid technologies.

The study can be downloaded at www.nrel.gov/wwsis.  

By: TES Staff

Technorati Tags: green energy, National Renewable Energy Laboratory, photovoltaic solar plant, renewable energy, solar power, wind energy

The American Wind Energy Association is holding its annual conference here (“kind of a Woodstock for capitalists,” joked Cathy Zoi, an assistant secretary of energy), with a record 20,000 people in attendance. Its intended message could not be clearer: The federal government needs to help speed the growth of the clean-energy industry.

“We need a strong renewable electricity standard now,” Denise Bode, the chief executive of the wind group, told attendees on Monday morning. She was referring to congressional efforts to pass a requirement that the nation get a certain percentage of its electricity — say, 20 percent, as proposed by Senator Byron Dorgan, Democrat of North Dakota — from renewable energy in the future.

Currently, renewables other than dams supply 3.5 percent of the nation’s electricity.

About half the states have a renewable energy requirement. Even Oklahoma, whose senators have led the charge against the notion of human-caused global warming, is thinking of passing one. But a national requirement has eluded Congress. 

Mr. Dorgan, who also spoke at the conference and is retiring next year, urged the creation of an “an interstate highway of transmission capability,” something that windy, but sparsely populated, North Dakota is particularly interested in. However, transmission development has been slowed by difficulties with siting and pricing the lines.

Mr. Dorgan noted that oil and gas developers in the United States had received strong tax incentives in those industries’ early days in the 1910s, whereas recent tax incentives for wind power have been weaker and stop-and-start.

“Let’s do what we did for other energy sources,” he said.

By KATE GALBRAITH

The New York Times

Technorati Tags: American Wind Energy Association, clean energy, dallas, electricity transmission, fossil fuels, green energy, North Dakota, Oklahoma, renewable energy, Tax Credits, tax incentives, wind power

The bill, known as the Renewable Resource Credits bill, would allow energy generation produced from waste such as garbage to be classified as renewable and qualify that electricity for the state’s renewable power mandate.

The bill was drafted to grant renewable status to the Apollo light pipe, a a small glass skylight dome that, when mounted in a roof, reflects daylight inside to help cut energy use. The light pipe is a technology developed by Orion Energy Systems Inc. of Manitowoc, a maker of high-efficiency lighting systems.

Environmental and renewable energy groups had called on Doyle to veto the bill after it was amended to allow garbage-to-energy projects to be classified as renewable as well.

Doyle said he was torn on whether to sign the bill but said that, ultimately, Orion is the kind of business the state wants to see grow and succeed.

“I certainly didn’t want to be in the position I was in. To me the (state) Senate’s refusal to go ahead with the Clean Energy Jobs Act put everybody in a very difficult spot on this bill,” he said.

Doyle conceded that there would be some effect on the wind industry from the new law but said it would be so slight as to be negligible.

A waste-to-energy process known as plasma gasification is being envisioned by Alliance Federated Energy, which announced a plan in February to build a waste-to-energy plant in Milwaukee that would create up to 250 construction jobs and 50 permanent jobs.

The bill’s signing came after Doyle vetoed a bill that would have required the state to make its buildings greener, saying the measure was laudable but unworkable.

The bill “will result in all current maintenance projects being delayed indefinitely,” Doyle said in a letter to lawmakers explaining his veto. “In the future, the commitment of all these funds for this single purpose will also sharply curtail the state’s ability to build new buildings or maintain its existing facilities.”

The bill would have required buildings to take steps to make improvements in accordance with green-building standards adopted by the U.S. Green Building Council. It was supported by the Wisconsin Green Building Alliance.

Doyle said he is a proponent of energy efficiency who has directed state agencies to cut energy use, but said the bill would have created “chaos” for the state’s building construction program.

Wisconsin lags other states in making a big commitment to developing sustainable public buildings that lower energy costs, said Sue Loomans, executive director of the Wisconsin Green Building Alliance.

“Obviously state agencies didn’t feel ready or able to do this,” she said.

Loomans said the bill’s adoption by the Legislature is a “good first step” and that the alliance hoped to work with stakeholders to develop other measures to advance construction of energy-efficient public buildings.

By Thomas Content of the Journal Sentinel

Jason Stein, reporting from Madison, contributed to this report.

Technorati Tags: green energy, renewable energy, Renewable Resource Credits bill, wind energy, wind power

Western wind turbine manufacturers are losing ground in China, the world’s fastest-growing green energy market.

The combined market share for companies such as General Electric and its European rivals, Vestas Wind Systems and Siemens, fell to 14 percent last year from 71 percent in 2005, according to Bloomberg New Energy Finance. Sales are being eroded by local companies including Sinovel Wind and Xinjiang Goldwind Science & Technology.

“It’s a tough market,” said Jesus Zaldua, president of Gamesa Corporacion Tecnologica’s Chinese subsidiary, which has four wind-turbine factories in Tianjin. “Some companies will have to leave China in the next five years.”

To get back in the game, the foreign companies are introducing newer technology. Siemens, based in Munich, Germany, expects to open an $80 million plant this year in Shanghai to build 3.6-megawatt turbines — bigger than anything made by a Chinese company.

Gamesa plans to retrofit its existing plants to build 2-megawatt turbines and will open its fifth Chinese factory next year. The Spanish company’s machines cost a third more and are more reliable than Chinese models, according to Beijing-based consultancy Mint Research.

“Competing on cost isn’t the way to go,” said Jens Tommerup, president of the Chinese business unit of Vestas, which is based in Denmark. “It’s about quality.”

Chinese manufacturers say they are improving their quality. Goldwind and Sino­vel plan to introduce higher-output turbines next year.

“We already have 2.5-megawatt and 3-megawatt products” under development, said Thomas Yao, Goldwind’s public relations director. “We are going to produce some 2.5-megawatt, and they will be put into mass production early next year.”

The head start in technology may pay off for Western companies, particularly as the Chinese venture abroad, said Keith Hays, global wind research director at Emerging Energy Research.

Western bankers, who would finance the majority of projects outside China, have more faith in U.S. and European turbine makers because of the companies’ experience, he said.

“For now, the West has an advantage in quality,” said Hays, an industry consultant in Barcelona and Cambridge, Mass. “But the Chinese are catching up fast.”

Buoyed by $47 billion in stimulus spending for environmentally friendly power over two years, China installed more than double the number of wind turbines in 2009 than in the previous year. This year, the country plans to add 18 gigawatts of wind capacity, the equivalent of 15 nuclear power plants. That’s double what’s expected in the U.S., the No. 2 market, according to estimates from New Energy Finance.

Germany and Spain, Europe’s largest wind energy markets, will add 1.8 gigawatts and 1 gigawatt in 2010, respectively.

Vestas, the top foreign wind turbine maker in China, installed turbines with a total capacity of 620 megawatts on the mainland last year, New Energy Finance said. Despite losing market share, Western turbine makers still are selling more units in China, UBS estimates.

“The very explicit growth targets for wind energy in China have spurred the growth and emergence of many new competitors, which has driven down the prices of wind turbines,” Tommerup said.

The biggest domestic competitor, Beijing-based Sino­vel, sold turbines with a capacity of 3,523 megawatts.

Sinovel and Goldwind, the second-biggest Chinese wind-turbine maker, are among the top five global turbine manufacturers, even with almost no sales overseas, according to the Danish wind advisory firm MAKE Consulting.

Vestas and GE were respectively the first and second- largest suppliers of turbines worldwide in 2009, according to MAKE Consulting. Sinovel was third, followed by Germany’s Enercon. Goldwind was fifth.

By MARK SCOTT
Bloomberg News

Technorati Tags: department of energy, green energy, renewable energy, wind energy, wind power

His San Francisco-based startup, One Block Off The Grid, operates as a kind of solar brokering middleman, gathering together large groups of homeowners to negotiate cheaper deals with solar installation companies, often saving customers as much as 15 percent.

Llorens also guides his clients through the complex process, simplifying the science of solar energy and breaking down the jargon that throws off most consumers.

“It’s not like buying a bathroom remodel, where you can look at different contractor quotes and say, ‘OK, I like that one,’” said Llorens, who prior to launching 1BOG two years ago, worked in sales for Next Energy Solar, a large Bay Area solar installation firm. “You have to know rebates and incentives, and the difference between a DC watt and an AC watt. The average consumer can’t know these things. It’s like if a plumber came into your home and asked, ‘What type of pipes would you like in your plumbing?’ And you’re like, ‘I don’t care, I just want it to not leak and do what it supposed to do.’”

To simplify things even further, Llorens created a handy Web-based calculator that allows consumers, without much technical knowledge, to plug in some basic information about their home (location, roof dimensions, wood or brick, sunny or shady, etc.) and be provided with a free assessment of the cost of installing the panels.

Block by block
Llorens said his system works because it saves money for both parties — the homeowner and the installer — and eliminates a lot of the trust issues that surround the process of buying solar panels. 1BOG makes money by charging the installer a fixed fee of 25 cents per watt installed, which works out on average to about $1,000 per home.

“The industry spends such a huge amount on customer acquisition that this is a huge savings for them and we can pass that on to our members,” he said, adding consumers are more likely to sign up if they know they’re part of a large group in the same community. “If you find somebody on the block who’s got solar already, the receptivity to other people on the block for getting solar is like ten-fold. So we’re trying to create that feeling.”

Llorens explained the company’s name is a metaphor, whereby through the act of converting blocks of homeowners — 100 at a time — to solar energy 1BOG is theoretically removing the equivalent of an entire city block from the conventional fossil-fuel dependent electric grid. “So if we get enough homes to go solar, metaphorically, we’ve taken a block off the grid.”

Earlier this year 1BOG raised $5 million in funding from venture capital firm New Enterprise Associates, which Llorens said will be used to expand the company’s reach from 12 to 24 cities across the country by the end of the year. Currently 1BOG operates in six states, from California to New Jersey. Llorens said a sunny climate and an abundance of government incentives and rebates are the main determinants for the communities they enter.

Grassroots marketing
Last year 1BOG helped place solar panels in nearly 600 homes and Llorens said “we’d like to do about 5-10 times that in 2010.”

That may be a tough sell in the U.S. where the solar energy adoption rate is less than 1 percent, something Llorens is attempting to change by appealing to the post-recessionary consumer, whose main concern is paring down expenses.

“I think most people currently think solar is something that rich environmentalists do and it’s not,” he said, noting the installation pays for itself very quickly — often within five years — and the consumer then reaps the benefits for the lifetime of the solar panels. “You’ve got three decades of free power. That’s the production of a commodity that only increases in value. So the economics look great; it basically crushes all other investments you can make in that situation.”

Llorens said the solar industry has been plagued by boom and bust cycles, where consumer demand is driven by government subsidies and when the rebate period ends, so does the demand. While Llorens said he was heartened by the $80 billion for clean-energy investments included in last year’s Recovery Act legislation, President Barack Obama needs to do more to promote solar as a solution to consumers.

“There’s going to be a lot of stimulus headed this way, there’s going to be a lot of, I think, scalable, long-standing rebates,” said Llorens, who does lots of grassroots marketing, which involves election-style yard signs and hosting house parties to talk about solar. “But it would also help if (Obama) stood up and said, hey, you should check out solar. Just check it out, get a quote, because it may save you money.”

Technorati Tags: department of energy, energy department, green energy, photovoltaic solar plant, renewable energy, solar power

The DOE said Friday that it has made $62 million available to 13 companies to test equipment and materials, such as molten salts, to add storage to solar power systems that use heat to produce electricity.

Concentrating solar power, in which the sun’s heat creates steam to drive an electricity turbine, is seeing a renaissance because it can be used for large-scale power plants in deserts. Adding storage can extend the time these plants supply electricity to the grid and can potentially improve the economics of solar versus fossil fuels.

The DOE’s target is to extend the output of concentrating solar power systems to 18 hours, covering the peak times of electricity usage.

The top three recipients are Abengoa Solar, eSolar, and Pratt & Whitney Rocketdyne, each of which received more than $10 million for molten-salt research.

Abengoa Solar is already operating a solar storage facility and will test a solar tower that operates at a higher temperature, which could improve the overall output for a given land area. Solar tower designs use heliostats, or mirrors that track the sun, to reflect light onto a tower to heat a liquid.

eSolar’s project will seek to build components for smaller, distributed solar towers to heat molten salt. It will also test an electricity generator that operates using molten salt.

Pratt & Whitney Rocketdyne, which developed the molten-salt solar storage technology now being used by start-up SolarReserve, will test different materials and a more efficient power-conversion cycle.

The other 10 projects, which received funds ranging from $2.1 million to $4.5 million, are “feasibility studies” with the goal of creating prototypes for concentrating solar power products that can generate baseload power, or a steady supply at times of high demand.

Different storage materials, such as heated solids and sulfur, will be tested. Also, the research is aimed at lowering the cost of concentrating solar power with low-cost production techniques or alternative components.

By Martin LaMonica

Technorati Tags: department of energy, energy department, green energy, photovoltaic solar plant, renewable energy, solar power

One of the report’s authors David Wheeler said the province’s energy sector, while primarily controlled by Nova Scotia Power, should enter into a form of deregulation.

“(Nova Scotia Power) does a very good job and is a very efficient utility, but the way they are regulated and the way the system works around them, I think, not only holds them back but also holds back the people who want to be producing energy and putting, particularly renewable energy into the grid,” Wheeler told the Cape Breton Post following the release of the report, Tuesday.

“We have to move to a more modern system of oversight and governance, and that does require rearranging some of the pieces, changing some of the lines of accountability.”
While the interim report isn’t a comprehensive document making final recommendations, it is presented in a “spirit of  consensus-building” with the intention of being for open discussion, Wheeler and co-author Michelle Adams wrote in a note on its title page.

Legislation will be required to create a Nova Scotia energy authority to control request-for-proposals, providing a logical counterpart to the Nova Scotia Utility and Review Board for price regulation, and feed-in tariff contracting, a policy mechanism designed to encourage the adoption of renewable energy sources by electrical utilities.
“Our current assessment is that a power authority with a procurement and systems operator mandate would create many efficiencies through the consolidation of staff currently employed in various bodies including within NSP,” the report stated.

Wheeler said it’s time NSP focused more on its core activities, as well as complying with carbon targets and contributing to renewable energy targets for the province.
“We need to make sure (Nova Scotia Power) and others are on a level playing field and that we get the best value for money for Nova Scotia.”
Part of opening up the energy sector includes a commitment to biomass projects generating approximately 500 gigawatt hours of electricity annually from sustainable forest and non-forest biomass.

The co-firing of biomass at Nova Scotia Power’s coal-fired generating stations could contribute “technically feasible levels” of the renewable energy targets of 20 per cent at Point Aconi, and 10 per cent at Point Tupper, Lingan, and Trenton.
This provides a total potential technical output of roughly 1,000 gigawatt hours annually and represents “the lowest cost renewable energy source for the province,” Wheeler and Adams state in the report, noting co-firing “allows for considerable renewable electricity generation without large capital investment.”

Biomass projects would cost about $150 million for each of four to five projects, and in addition, would allow for the co-firing of existing coal plants with forest and non-forest biomass.
The report cautioned that more discussion on forestry management and the ecological integrity of the province’s forests are required.

Another early goal for 2015 is 1,300 gigawatt hours of energy generated through wind projects annually, of which 300 gigawatt hours would be produced from community scale projects.
Large wind farms comprising 20 to 40 turbines at a cost of $120 million for each of five to six projects, while community wind farms of five to 10 turbines would cost $36 million for each of six to eight projects. The province should also consider a provision for imports of up to 500 gigawatt hours of renewable energy for “security of supply reasons,” the report said.
Wheeler said the targets set out for 2015 are attainable considering the assets and the opportunities at the province’s disposal.

Of course, political stability is a key factor to its success, he added.
“You don’t want a minister or deputy minister changing every eight months, and then investors and developers not knowing where they are.
“You want to set the system up, make it bulletproof, and then people investing now know they’re investing in a very renewable-energy-friendly environment.”
The final report is due Dec. 24.

By CHRIS SHANNON
The Cape Breton Post

cshannon@cbpost.com

Technorati Tags: biomass generation, renewable energy, Sydney Australia

ATLANTA, Oct. 9 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ — Southern Power, a subsidiary of Southern Company that acquires, builds, manages and owns wholesale generation assets, today announced that it is acquiring Nacogdoches Power, LLC from American Renewables, LLC and will move ahead with construction of the planned biomass power plant in Sacul, Texas. Groundbreaking is expected in the fall of 2009 and commercial operation is projected for the summer of 2012. When completed, the project will be one of the largest biomass-fueled electric generating facilities in the U.S., capable of generating approximately 100 megawatts.

The plant’s output is committed through a 20-year power purchase agreement with Austin Energy, the municipal utility owned by and serving Austin, Texas.

“This acquisition fits Southern Power’s business strategy of growing the business in the wholesale market through acquiring generating assets and building new units – for which the output is significantly covered by long-term bi-lateral contracts,” said Southern Power Company President and CEO Ronnie Bates. “We have a reputation of helping our customers meet their energy needs in a cost-effective, reliable and environmentally responsible manner, and we look forward to working with Austin Energy.”

Acquiring the Nacogdoches project diversifies Southern Power’s fuel mix, which aligns with Southern Company’s overall goal of using a variety of fuels to ensure reliable and affordable electricity generation.

“Southern Power continually seeks appropriate opportunities that fit the business strategy and risk profile of the company,” said David Ratcliffe, Southern Company chairman, president and CEO. “We are especially pleased that this project is consistent with our goal to pursue cost-effective renewable energy options that allow us to continue to provide reliable, affordable and cleaner electricity.”

The plant, which will be built on 165 acres, will be fueled with biomass materials, including forest residue from the surrounding areas, wood processing residues and clean municipal wood waste. The project will require approximately 1 million tons of fuel annually, which is planned to be procured within a 75-mile radius of the project site.

American Renewables develops, builds and operates clean energy facilities that utilize biomass materials as fuel. American Renewables brings together the successful track records and project development, operations, energy investment and asset management expertise of its three partners: BayCorp Holdings, Energy Management, Inc. and Tyr Energy.

Southern Power is among the largest wholesale energy providers in the Southeast, meeting the electricity needs of municipalities, electric cooperatives and investor-owned utilities. The company owns and operates more than 7,500 megawatts with facilities in Alabama, Florida, Georgia and North Carolina and has an additional 820 megawatts committed to construction in North Carolina and Texas.

With 4.4 million customers and more than 42,000 megawatts of generating capacity, Atlanta-based Southern Company (NYSE:SO) is the premier energy company serving the Southeast. A leading U.S. producer of electricity, Southern Company owns electric utilities in four states and a growing competitive generation company, as well as fiber optics and wireless communications. Southern Company brands are known for excellent customer service, high reliability and retail electric prices that are below the national average. Southern Company is consistently listed among the top U.S. electric service providers in customer satisfaction by the American Customer Satisfaction Index (ACSI). Visit our Web site at www.southerncompany.com.

Cautionary Note Regarding Forward-Looking Statements:

Certain information contained in this Release is forward-looking information based on current expectations and plans that involve risks and uncertainties. Forward-looking information includes, among other things, plans and estimated costs for new generation resources for the Company, estimated construction and other expenditures for the Company and completion of the Company’s construction projects. The Company cautions that there are certain factors that can cause actual results to differ materially from the forward-looking information that has been provided. The reader is cautioned not to put undue reliance on this forward-looking information, which is not a guarantee of future performance and is subject to a number of uncertainties and other factors, many of which are outside the control of the Company; accordingly, there can be no assurance that such suggested results will be realized. The following factors, in addition to those discussed in the Company’s Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2008, and subsequent securities filings, could cause results to differ materially from management expectations as suggested by such forward-looking information: the impact of recent and future federal and state regulatory change, including legislative and regulatory initiatives regarding deregulation and restructuring of the electric utility industry, implementation of the Energy Policy Act of 2005, environmental laws including regulation of water quality and emissions of sulfur, nitrogen, mercury, carbon, soot, or particulate matter and other substances, and also changes in tax and other laws and regulations to which the Company and its subsidiaries are subject, as well as changes in application of existing laws and regulations; current and future litigation, regulatory investigations, proceedings, or inquiries, including Federal Energy Regulatory Commission matters; the effects, extent, and timing of the entry of additional competition in the markets in which the Company operates; variations in demand for electricity, including those relating to weather, the general economy, population and business growth (and declines), and the effects of energy conservation measures; available sources and costs of fuels; effects of inflation; ability to control costs and cost overruns during the development and construction of facilities; internal restructuring or other restructuring options that may be pursued; potential business strategies, including acquisitions or dispositions of assets or businesses, which cannot be assured to be completed or beneficial to the Company; the ability of counterparties of the Company to make payments as and when due and to perform as required; the ability to obtain new short- and long-term contracts with wholesale customers; the direct or indirect effect on the Company’s business resulting from terrorist incidents and the threat of terrorist incidents; interest rate fluctuations and financial market conditions and the results of financing efforts, including the Company’s credit ratings; the ability of the Company to obtain additional generating capacity at competitive prices; catastrophic events such as fires, earthquakes, explosions, floods, hurricanes, droughts, pandemic health events such as an avian or other influenza, or other similar occurrences; the direct or indirect effects on the Company’s business resulting from incidents similar to the August 2003 power outage in the Northeast; and the effect of accounting pronouncements issued periodically by standard setting bodies. The Company expressly disclaims any obligation to update any forward-looking information.

Source: PR Newswire

Technorati Tags: renewable energy