The OurEnergyLibrary aggregates and indexes publicly available fact sheets, journal articles, reports, studies, and other publications on U.S. energy topics. It is updated every week to include the most recent energy resources from academia, government, industry, non-profits, think tanks, and trade associations. Suggest a resource by emailing us at info@ourenergypolicy.org.
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Winter Storm Elliott hit the eastern United States over the Dec. 23–25 weekend and tested the reliability of much of the Eastern Interconnection. Precipitous temperature drops and powerful winds caused widespread generator failures and froze up natural gas supplies while driving up electricity demand, leading to power outages in some of PJM’s neighbors.
PJM and its members were able to maintain the reliability of the system, serve customers and even support neighboring systems during some periods, which was a significant accomplishment. Specifically, PJM operators were able to avoid electricity interruptions throughout this event. Nevertheless, PJM operators had to implement multiple …
View Full ResourceWith soaring energy costs for American families, electric grid-induced fires burning up the West Coast, and the looming threat of power blackouts, the need for equitable, affordable, and resilient local clean energy has never been clearer.
Today, corporate utilities and Wall Street control much of the country’s clean energy infrastructure. They prioritize profits over people, keeping many of the benefits of clean energy for themselves. But if households and communities owned more of this clean energy, we could maximize the positive local impacts while putting power back in the hands of people to meet their own energy needs. This melds …
View Full ResourceThis year’s State of Reliability (SOR) is comprised of two publications: the 2023 State of Reliability Overview, which is a high-level summary of the important findings, and this 2023 State of Reliability Technical Assessment, which provides NERC’s detailed comprehensive and annual technical review of BPS reliability for the 2022 operating (calendar) year.
The 2023 State of Reliability Overview replaces the executive summary normally found in NERC reports. This 2023 State of Reliability Technical Assessment provides detailed descriptions of key findings and key occurrences for 2022 along with in-depth analysis of risks and resilience, grid transformation, grid performance, and the status …
View Full ResourceFirst developed in 2013 by the climate investment firm HASI, CarbonCount is a decision tool that evaluates investments in U.S.-based carbon-free energy, energy efficiency, and climate resilience projects to determine how efficiently they reduce CO2 equivalent emissions per $1,000 of investment. CarbonCount scores reflect a quantitative impact assessment of the avoided emissions of a project by integrating forward-looking project assumptions, emissions factors, and capital investment.
HASI recently released a new and improved CarbonCount 2.0 to give a more precise assessment of avoided emissions via newly available locational marginal emissions (LME) factors that reflect the grid composition specific to each project’s …
View Full ResourceThe purpose of this document is to highlight the need for collaboration between electric utilities and the electric vehicle (EV)/electric vehicle supply equipment (EVSE) manufacturing industry to develop strategies that will help ensure bulk power system (BPS) reliability, resilience, and security.
This document focuses on an area that is relatively unexplored: EV charging behavior during infrequent grid disturbances that originate from the BPS. These events last no more than a few seconds but may have catastrophic consequences for grid reliability if left unchecked (i.e., cascading blackouts and widespread power interruptions). This document outlines the need for early engagement and information …
View Full ResourceUtilities are well aware of climate risks, and they’re actively developing solutions to improve grid resilience. That includes looking at new solutions to improve existing load flexibility and demand response (DR) approaches. Utilities already rely on customer participation in DR programs to shift electricity away from periods of peak demand. But traditional DR programs often come with barriers to participation. For example, they may require the customer to enter their utility account number, which customers may
not know how to locate, let alone have readily available, at the time of enrollment. They also require reading and accepting program terms and …
The roughly 3,000 utilities in the United States are diverse in geography, customer demographics, structure, assets, and corporate culture. Yet, the C-suites within these utilities share many of the same top boardroom priorities.
The priorities arise from trends that disrupt how utilities have done business for the last century. It’s imperative that utility leaders assess these priorities, develop a point of view on what each means for their utility, and build a strategy to start evolving for the future. These seven boardroom priorities will define the strategic roadmaps utilities are creating for the coming years — and decades. The priorities …
View Full ResourceElectric school buses (ESBs) equipped with Vehicle-to-Everything (V2X), or bidirectional charging capability, can serve as “mobile power units” to provide backup power to emergency shelters and other critical facilities, enhancing much-needed infrastructure resilience and aiding in emergency planning, preparedness, and response efforts. Given that underserved communities often are hit the hardest by extreme weather events, such as hurricanes, floods, tornadoes, or wildfires, ESBs as mobile power units could be particularly useful in enhancing resilience in these areas.
This implementation guide (guide) describes the potential to use V2X-enabled ESBs as alternative emergency backup power sources during power outages. The core of …
View Full ResourceThis analysis assessed the local tax and landowner payment implications and local sentiment of utility-scale renewable energy projects and energy storage, particularly in rural Texas counties.
The purpose of this report is two-fold, 1) to estimate the levelized (per MW) stream of tax and landowner payments that flow into counties in Texas (with a particular focus on rural counties) when utility-scale wind, solar, and energy storage projects are built and 2) to provide some perspective from some of the residents of those areas. Funds flowing into counties from renewable energy projects typically consist of two major forms: increased tax revenue …
View Full ResourceA typical electric vehicle (EV) sits parked 90% of the time with a battery capable of storing 40kWh – enough to power an average modern home for two days. EVs have the potential to provide game-changing flexibility for the grid and, by optimizing charging to occur at times of low demand, they could enable energy systems to:
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– utilize more renewable generation
– save billions in infrastructure reinforcement and reduce energy costs for customers, and
– increase operational resilience.
However, one-way smart charging is just the beginning. Through bidirectional charging, EVs can push excess energy back into homes …
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