Wind Energy and renewable energy blog

Donald Trump is considering shelving his plans for his luxury golf resort near Aberdeen after claiming his ambitious project is being threatened by an offshore windfarm, reports the Guardian.

Trump, whose plans for this windswept, remote part of the Aberdeenshire coast include a high-rise tower and several 4 story units, has long complained that the offshore windfarm will be an eyesore.

The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) today released two reports detailing the country’s ocean wave and tidal resource energy potential. Mapping and Assessment of the United States Ocean Wave Energy Resource report is a follow-up to the Electric Power Research Institute’s (EPRI) 2004 study, with the most recent evidence suggesting a 26 percent increase in wave energy resources.

The Assessment of Energy Production Potential from Tidal Streams in the United States, led by researchers at Georgia Tech Research Corporation in collaboration with DOE, is the first of its kind in the U.S. and includes a geographic information systems (GIS) tool available for public use. The report data concludes that U.S. water power resources, including ocean wave, tidal and conventional hydropower, have the potential to provide 15 percent of the U.S’s electricity by 2030.

The government’s decision to contest the ruling that their plans to slash solar subsidies are illegal has sent the solar PV industry back into turmoil. Solar PV businesses have warned that this latest appeal will cost jobs and potentially risk businesses failing as they simply cannot tell their customers what their return would be.

An executive from Spirit Solar, Erica Robb, challenged David Cameron at a small business event today over the “weeks of chaos” that have resulted from the government’s proposals to cut feed-in tariff incentives for solar installations.

The latest Government figures on the amount of electricity generated by wind power have been welcomed by RenewableUK, the country’s largest renewable energy trade association, as proof of the increasingly significant contribution wind energy makes to UK households.

Statistics for the third quarter of 2011, released by the Department of Energy and Climate Change, show that renewable sources generated 9 per cent of the UK’s electricity from July to September. That represents an increase of nearly 1 per cent on the same quarter last year.

The UK now has enough installed capacity to supply more than 3,300,000 homes from wind energy.

With all of the big 6 energy companies and a number of smaller independent companies now selling green electricity how are we supposed to know which tariffs are genuinely encouraging new renewable energy generation in the UK and which are begrudgingly doing the bare minimum?

All electricity retailers in the UK are required to supply a proportion of their electricity from renewable sources (currently 11%). If they don’t they have to pay a ‘buyout’ fee – a bit like a fine. So how do you find out whether your chosen green electricity supplier is being forced into supplying your electricity from renewable sources as part of its legal obligation or whether it is going the extra mile in encouraging new renewable energy because you are paying a green electricity rate?