DOE allots $1.6 billion to decarbonize coal country

“Today, Treasury and IRS, in partnership with DOE, announced the intent to release approximately $4 billion in a first round of tax credits for projects that expand U.S. supply chains for clean energy technologies and critical materials for clean energy technology production, and for projects that reduce greenhouse gas emissions at industrial facilities. Approximately $1.6 …

Molten salt storage in concentrated solar power plants could meet the electricity-on-demand role of coal and gas

The first thing you see of the Crescent Dunes Solar Energy Facility, and you can be miles away, is a light so bright you can’t look directly at it. This sits atop a 640-foot cement tower, rising from the flat, empty Nevada desert around the halfway point on the highway from Reno to Las Vegas. …

How Germany plans to phase out coal without losing all the coal jobs, and how other countries could do the same

Germany has committed to completely decarbonize its national energy system.  Going 100% renewables, however, comes with electricity dispatchability challenges. One of the possible solutions would be to replace the coal in coal power plants with renewable energy as the ‘fuel’ for the turbines, using thermal storage to offset the intermittency of renewables and thereby keep …