Floating Solar Panels conserve water while flooding grid with Energy

That’s the situation at Far Niente Vineyards in Oakville, where nearly 1,000 solar panels have been grouped together, floating on a large irrigation pond.


Solar panels at Far Niente Winery (CBS)

“We don’t want to take vineyards out of production. Our livelihood here is winemaking,” said Greg Allen, President of Far Niente Winery.

Far Niente is in the heart of the Napa Valley, home to some of the most expensive farmland in the nation. It’s not land you want to cover in solar. The estate is also a national landmark, so no panels there either. But the pond surface was open.

The system helps the drought too by reducing evaporation from the pond by providing shade. The proximity to the water also keeps the panels cooler and more efficient than they would otherwise be.

“We believe it’s the first example of a grid connected floating solar array in the world,” said Allen.

It’s not a demonstration project either, the system is making real juice: 396 kilowatts when we visited earlier this week.

“The system is rated for 400 so I think we are doing pretty well,” said Allen.

That output is nearly four times what the winery uses on a daily basis, meaning the power meter is spinning backward pretty quickly.

“To me this is just a no brainier,” said Geof Syphers, CEO Sonoma Clean Power, who sees this catching on quickly. “Statewide this could be one hundred to five hundred times more around California than we are building right now.

The winery still receives a bill from PG&E, but the balance recently has been zero.

Source: CBS

Denmark to go 100% renewable in 2050

Denmark, a tiny country on the northern fringe of Europe, is pursuing the world’s most ambitious policy against climate change. It aims to end the burning of fossil fuels in any form by 2050 — not just in electricity production, as some other countries hope to do, but in transportation as well.

Now a question is coming into focus: Can Denmark keep the lights on as it chases that lofty goal?

Lest anyone consider such a sweeping transition to be impossible in principle, the Danes beg to differ. They essentially invented the modern wind-power industry, and have pursued it more avidly than any country. They are above 40 percent renewable power on their electric grid, aiming toward 50 percent by 2020. The political consensus here to keep pushing is all but unanimous.

Their policy is similar to that of neighboring Germany, which has spent tens of billions pursuing wind and solar power, and is likely to hit 30 percent renewable power on the electric grid this year. But Denmark, at the bleeding edge of global climate policy, is in certain ways the more interesting case.

The 5.6 million Danes have pushed harder than the Germans, they have gotten further — and they are reaching the point where the problems with the energy transition can no longer be papered over.

The trouble, if it can be called that, is that renewable power sources like wind and solar cost nothing to run, once installed. That is potentially a huge benefit in the long run.

But as more of these types of power sources push their way onto the electric grid, they cause power prices to crash at what used to be the most profitable times of day.

That can render conventional power plants, operating on gas or coal or uranium, uneconomical to run. Yet those plants are needed to supply backup power for times when the wind is not blowing and the sun is not shining.

With their prime assets throwing off less cash, electricity suppliers in Germany and Denmark are on edge. They have applied to shut down a slew of newly unprofitable power plants, but nervous governments are resisting, afraid of being caught short on some cold winter’s night with little wind.

The governments have offered short-term subsidies, knowing that if they force companies to operate these plants at a loss, it will be a matter of time before the companies start going bankrupt.

Throughout Europe, governments have come to the realization that electricity markets are going to have to be redesigned for the new age, but they are not pursuing this task with urgency. A bad redesign could itself throw customers into the dark, after all, as happened in California a decade ago.

Denmark is geographically lucky. It has strong electrical linkages to neighboring Sweden, with plentiful nuclear power capacity, and Norway, with power available on demand from dams. But Swedish politicians have vowed to shut down the country’s nuclear plants and go renewable, and Norway’s cheap hydroelectric power is in rising demand, with a supply line under consideration to energy-hungry Britain. So the Danish electricity industry sees trouble coming.

“We are really worried about this situation,” Anders Stouge, the deputy director general of the Danish Energy Association, said in an interview. “If we don’t do something, we will in the future face higher and higher risks of blackouts.”

The government is somewhat dismissive of that notion but well aware that it needs to find a way out of this box. Environmental groups, for their part, have tended to sneer at the problems the utilities are having, contending that it is their own fault for not getting on the renewables bandwagon years ago.

But the political risks of the situation also ought to be obvious to the greens. The minute any European country — or an ambitious American state, like California — has a blackout attributable to the push for renewables, public support for the transition could weaken drastically.

So the trick now is to get the market redesign right. A modest version of reform would essentially attach a market value, and thus a price, to standby capacity. But Rasmus Helveg Petersen, the Danish climate minister, told me he was tempted by a more ambitious approach. That would involve real-time pricing of electricity for anyone using it — if the wind is blowing vigorously or the sun is shining brightly, prices would fall off a cliff, but in times of shortage they would rise just as sharply.

As Denmark, like other countries, installs more smart meters and smart appliances able to track those prices with no human intervention, one can imagine a system in which demand would adjust smoothly to the available supply. Most people would not care if their water heater were conspiring with other water heaters to decide when to switch on and off, as long as hot water reliably came out of the tap.

Yet, even if Denmark can figure out a proper design for the electric market, it has another big task to meet its 2050 goal: squeezing the fossil fuels out of transportation. Prematurely, perhaps, the country embraced a proposed system of electric cars in which depleted batteries would be switched for fresh ones in minutes, but only a few hundred cars were sold before that overly ambitious plan flopped.

Mr. Petersen told me he still felt electrification of cars was the way to go, but the cars themselves were not really ready.

“We need longer range and lower prices before this becomes a good option,” he said. “Technology needs to save us here.”

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Source: 
A version of this article appears in print on November 11, 2014, on page D1 of the New York edition.

Malaysia perlu tenaga boleh baharu

Loji tenaga boleh diperbaharui biogas Biopower Climate Care di Palong, Negeri Sembilan.


RAMAI tidak sedar kepentingan tenaga boleh baharu (RE) kepada negara. Mereka tertanya-tanya mengenai caj tambahan sebanyak satu peratus dikenakan kepada semua pengguna elektrik termasuk pengguna industri dan komersil sejak 1 Disember 2011, sebelum caj itu dinaikkan kepada 1.6 peratus bermula tahun ini.

Pengecualian hanya diberikan kepada pengguna kediaman yang menggunakan elektrik kurang 300 kWh sebulan.

Ketua Pegawai Operasi Pihak Berkuasa Pembangunan Tenaga Lestari (Seda) Dr Ali Askar Sher Mohamad berkata, Tenaga Nasional Bhd (TNB) bertanggungjawab mengutip amaun itu setiap bulan kerana caj tambahan itu dimasukkan ke dalam bil elektrik TNB.

“Setelah mengutip bayaran tersebut, TNB akan menghantar jumlah yang dikutip setiap bulan kepada Seda untuk dimasukkan dalam Tabung Tenaga Boleh Diperbaharui (TBB),” katanya.

Ali Askar berkata, sehingga September 2013, jumlah kutipan (caj 1 peratus) untuk RE melebihi RM400 juta.


Caj 1.6 peratus bukan disebabkan tarif elektrik

Berkuat kuasa 1 Januari 2014, kadar elektrik naik 14.98 peratus atau 4.99 sen kepada 38.53 sen per kWh bagi Semenanjung Malaysia dan lima sen bagi Sabah dan Labuan.

Sementara itu, caj untuk TBB turut dinaikkan daripada satu peratus kepada 1.6 peratus mulai 1 Januari 2014.

Ramai menganggap kenaikan caj itu disebabkan kenaikan tarif elektrik tetapi Ali Askar menafikannya.

“Kenaikan caj RE disebabkan kerajaan mahu perbanyakkan lagi kapasiti tenaga boleh diperbaharui di negara ini. Perancangan asal adalah untuk menaikkan kepada dua peratus mulai 1 Januari 2013,” katanya.

Namun katanya, ia ditangguhkan sehingga 1 Januari 2014 dan dikurangkan kepada 1.6 peratus sahaja.


Kebaikan tenaga boleh baharu

Ali Askar berkata, RE masih baharu di negara Malaysia dan penggunaannya memberikan kebaikan terutama kepada alam sekitar, sumber asli dan ekonomi.

“Penggunaan RE boleh menjamin keselamatan bekalan tenaga elektrik negara kerana mengurangkan pergantungan kepada bahan api yang diimport seperti arang batu. Ia juga memberikan kepelbagaian sumber penjanaan tenaga elektrik supaya kita tidak bergantung kepada satu jenis sumber sahaja.

“RE juga membantu memelihara alam sekitar kerana pengeluaran gas rumah hijau lebih kecil berbanding dengan membakar bahan api fosil. Selain itu, dengan adanya industri RE di Malaysia, ia mewujudkan peluang pekerjaan dalam teknologi baharu,” jelas beliau.


Insentif kepada pengguna RE

Kerajaan memberikan pelbagai manfaat kepada pengguna RE.

Pengguna yang memasang sistem fotovoltaik di rumah akan mendapat bayaran bulanan dari TNB untuk elektrik yang dijana selama 21 tahun.

“Pengguna yang tidak memasang sistem ini juga dapat manfaat dari segi alam sekitar lebih bersih kerana pengurangan penjanaan tenaga elektrik dari bahan api fosil,” katanya.

Ali Askar berkata, kos yang digunakan untuk menggunakan RE berbeza mengikut teknologi dan saiz projek dan akan ditanggung sepenuhnya oleh pemaju atau pemilik sendiri.

Tetapi selepas itu, mereka akan mendapat bayaran bulanan untuk elektrik yang dijana melalui pembayaran tarif galakan (FiT).

“Kami harap semua pengguna elektrik di Malaysia dapat menyokong usaha kerajaan untuk meluaskan penjanaan tenaga boleh baharu di Malaysia.

“Sumbangan kita sebanyak 1.6 peratus adalah sangat kecil berbanding dengan faedah yang akan diperolehi oleh negara dari segi jaminan bekalan tenaga, pengurangan pengeluaran gas rumah hijau dan pewujudan peluang pekerjaan dalam industri baharu,” katanya.

Menurutnya, Seda menyasarkan tahun ini, penjanaan tenaga boleh baharu akan bertambah sebanyak 100 MW lagi.


Projek Seda disambut baik pengguna

Menurut Ali Askar, pada masa ini, Seda melaksanakan pelbagai projek RE iaitu hidro kecil, biojisim, biogas dan fotovoltaik di seluruh negara.

Sistem fotovoltaik terbahagi kepada sistem komersil dan sistem individu yang sesuai untuk pengguna rumah kediaman.

“Projek ini ada di seluruh negara kecuali Sarawak sebab Akta Tenaga Boleh Baharu tidak terpakai di sana,” katanya.

Ali Askar berkata, walaupun masih baru dan belum meluas, projek ini mendapat sambutan baik rakyat.

“Permohonan untuk fotovoltaik komersil jauh lebih banyak daripada kuota yang tersedia. Sistem fotovoltaik untuk rumah kediaman juga mendapat sambutan amat menggalakkan sejak beberapa bulan lalu sehingga semua kuota habis dilanggani,” katanya.

Sumber: Sinar harian

FGV Akan Mulakan Pengeluaran Komersil Biodiesel Di Kuantan Bulan September 2013

Felda Global Ventures Holdings Bhd (FGVH) merancang memulakan pengeluaran komersil biodiesel di kilangnya di Kuantan bulan September.

Kilang menelan kos RM35 juta itu yang dibeli pada April lepas, beroperasi sejak 1 Julai, 2013.

Ketua Pegawai Eksekutifnya, Dr Emir Mavani Abdullah berkata perniagaan baharu itu sejajar dengan strategi FGVH menggerakkan lagi perniagaan hilirannya dalam usaha untuk melindungi perniagaan huluannya.

"Kami telahpun berada di tahap pengeluaran akhir. Kini kami sedang menguji produk dan akan memulakan pengeluaran komersil, harapnya dalam tempoh dua atau tiga minggu akan datang," katanya pada majlis rumah terbuka Hari Raya syarikat di sini, Selasa.

Beliau berkata FGVH juga membentuk sebuah syarikat konsortium dengan Sime Darby Bhd, yang dinamakan Biodiesel Malaysia Sdn Bhd, untuk meningkatkan lagi industri.

Pengerusinya Tan Sri Isa Samad berkata penubuhan konsortium tersebut bertujuan untuk mengurangkan simpanan stok minyak sawit mentah (MSM) negara bagi menyokong harga.

Ini, katanya, merupakan sebahagian daripada usaha untuk mengurangkan stok kerana disebabkan bekalan yang terlampau banyak bukan sahaja di Malaysia dan Indonesia, ia akan menyebabkan permintaan menjadi kurang, yang seterusnya membawa kepada penurunan harga.

FGVH dan Sime Darby setiap satu memegang 32 peratus pegangan dalam konsortium itu.

Pegangan selebihnya diperuntukkan bagi syarikat perladangan, peserta biodiesel dan pelabur lain.

Isa berkata FGVH masih sedang mencari pelabur yang sesuai untuk menyertai konsortium itu bagi mengembangkan pasaran biodiesel b5 dan b10, dalam dan luar negara.


BERNAMA
27 Ogos 2013