Energy News Roundup: August 20-August 26

This week in regional energy news …

• In the waters off of Martha’s Vineyard and Nantucket, Massachusetts’s first in-ocean demonstration of a tidal energy generator was completed recently.  UMass Dartmouth’s New England Marine Renewable Energy Center and the Massachusetts Clean Energy Center have laid out plans for a 300-square-mile test site.
• The Massachusetts DPU has approved NStar’s long-term contracts for the purchase of wind power from developments in Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and Maine.
• Neptune Wind has announced plans to develop a 500-MW offshore wind farm 20 miles from the Mass-RI border, with construction estimated to be completed by 2018.
• Gov. Lincoln Chafee is working to ensure that low-cost hydro power from Canada finds its way to Rhode Island.

Energy News Roundup: March 12-March 18

This week in regional energy news …

• Rumford Paper Co. is selling its cogeneration assets, which provide electricity and thermal energy to the paper mill in Rumford, to New York-based ReEnergy Holdings LLC.  ReEnergy specializes in renewable energy from integrated biomass waste fuel.
• The Portland Press Herald looks into the economic benefits and costs of waste-to-energy plants.  
• NB Power works to shore up the Point Lepreau nuclear reactor.  The reactor is undergoing a refurbishment currently but, in the wake of the disaster in northern Japan, NB Power is using the opportunity to make the generating station more earthquake-resistant.
• Adding a new standard to its merger approval rules, the Massachusetts Department of Public Utilities will require merging utilities to prove that the merger will help the state meets its renewable energy portfolio goals.

Energy News Roundup: October 2-October 8

This week in regional energy news …

• The University of Maine’s Tidal Power Initiative is the recipient of a $1 million grant from the U.S. Department of Energy.  The money will help to fund an environmental impact study relating to Ocean Renewable Power Co.’s Eastport, Maine, tidal turbine.
• A Newfoundland paper company may begin burning tires to fuel its mill.  Tire burning is an inexpensive source of fuel but is controversial due to its effects on the environment; Nova Scotia blocked the practice in 2007.
• The Biomass Thermal Energy Council, or BTEC, is encouraging legislators to develop incentives to promote increased use of biomass for heating fuel.  BTEC argues that biomass, a renewable energy source that can render very low emissions, should meet 25% of heating needs in the Northeast by 2025.
• First Wind, which is working toward permitting a Rumford-area wind development, has opened a Rumford, Maine, office.  First Wind has also filed an environmental impact statement for a new wind project in Hawaii.
• Interior Secretary Ken Salazar marked a milestone for Cape Wind by finally signing the project’s federal lease for commercial offshore wind energy generation.  Cape Wind awaits approval from the Massachusetts DPU.

Energy News Roundup: September 11-September 17

This week in regional energy news …

• Hydro-Quebec has announced an imminent deal to construct a high-voltage transmission line to export power from its generators through to New England.  Hydro-Quebec is currently in talks with NStar and Northern Utilities on the proposed line.  A line to New York could be in the works, too.
• Massachusetts AG Martha Coakley has asked the Department of Public Utilities to reject National Grid’s rate increase, which could add up to $15 per month to customers’ bills.
• Maine’s Board of Environmental Protection has granted the Calais LNG terminal project more time to find financial investors.  Calais LNG has until Dec. 1 to file its application to build the facility.
• Susan Eisenhower, a proponent of nuclear power who serves on the U.S. DOE’s Blue Ribbon Commission on America’s Nuclear Future (and granddaughter of DDE), will speak at Husson College on Sept. 28.
• The University of Maine will soon take energy via a landfill gas line from neighboring Old Town.  University Trustees approved the project on Monday.
• Gardiner, Maine, is looking into building a small hydroelectric power plant at the New Mills Dam, along the Cobbosseecontee Stream.
• Maine’s latest Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative auction garnered $1.7 million for Efficiency Maine.  All told, $7.1 million in RGGI funds have been added to Efficiency Maine for efficiency grant programs.

Energy News Roundup: September 4-September 10

This week in regional energy news …

• The Maine Public Utilities Commission has approved a five-year contract for energy supply to Verso Paper in Bucksport.  The mill is converting to a biomass boiler, and the additional capacity will support that switch.
• Ocean Renewable Power Co. continues to make good news on its tidal turbine in Eastport, Maine: the Department of Energy is giving the Portland, Maine, company $10 million to advance its tidal generation technology on a commercial scale.  Earlier this week, ORPC announced that the turbine would be moved this month to benefit local fishermen.
• In Canada, Atlantic Resources Corp. has plans to install the world’s largest tidal turbine off of Nova Scotia, in the Bay of Fundy, sometime in 2011.
• Public hearings on Cape Wind are under way at the Massachusetts Department of Public Utilities.  Regulators must determine whether electricity generated from Cape Wind and sold by National Grid will benefit ratepayers.
• First Wind met with commissioners from Piscataquis County, Maine, regarding a proposed 33- to 35-turbine wind development there.
• The Maine Public Utilities Commission is investigating the need for a smart grid operator.  The MPUC is looking into whether it’s in the public interest to have one or more smart grid coordinators in Maine.
• It’s official: David Littell was sworn in as the newest Maine PUC commissioner on Wednesday.  On the same day, Beth Nagusky was sworn in as acting DEP commissioner to replace Littell.

Energy News Roundup: August 28-September 3

This week in regional energy news …

• The Cape Wind project stepped over a major hurdle this week as the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court approved, by a 4-2 vote, the offshore development’s consolidated “super permit” approving a transmission cable that will traverse state tidelands.  Cape Wind still awaits the Massachusetts DPU’s go-ahead.
• On Tuesday, the Maine Public Utilities Commission granted conditional approval to CMP’s plans to connect the Record Hill wind project to the utility’s transmission lines.  To do so, CMP will construct a new 115-kV line.
• A two-day conference of New England and Atlantic Canada business leaders in Bangor, Maine, this week was focused greatly on energy issues, particularly a reduction in consumption of fossil fuels.
• Solar panels area heading from Maine to the roof of the White House.
• First Wind is looking into an 80-megawatt wind project in Eastbrook and Township 16, Maine. 
• Meanwhile, Rumford, Maine, selectmen consulted with representatives from First Wind and the Maine DEP regarding proposed town ordinances relating to wind.

Energy News Roundup: August 21-August 27

This week in regional energy news …

• Governor Baldacci and Ocean Renewable Power Co. celebrated the success of ORPC’s tidal project in Eastport on Tuesday.  The Coast Guard was on hand, as well, as the 60-kW tidal turbine powers the USCG’s search and rescue boat stationed in Eastport.  The boat will receive all its electricity from the tidal project, and no electricity from the grid.
• The federal government has other renewable projects in the Downeast region: in Southwest Harbor, the Coast Guard has erected a wind turbine to supply power to USCG crew residences in the area.
• Prime Minister Stephen Harper announced that Canada’s government has agreed to devote $12 million to a wind energy generation, research, and development park on Prince Edward Island.  Meanwhile, P.E.I. residents have succeeded in curbing their electricity usage by 20 percent over the past two years.
• An Arizona-based wind turbine manufacturer announced plans to open another manufacturing center in Fall River, Mass.  The state has awarded the company a $250,000 grant to get the development rolling.
• NStar has asked the Massachusetts Department of Public Utilities for a rate reduction of approximately one-third, in light of far lower natural gas prices.
• Consultants to Massachusetts’s attorney general report that electricity from the Cape Wind project will cost on average 23 cents per kilowatt-hour for the first 15 years the project is operational.