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Egypt-Huawei Smart Grid advances Egypt's energy sector with digital transformation, grid modernization, and ICT solutions, enhancing power generation, transmission, and distribution while enabling renewable integration, data analytics, cybersecurity, and scalable infrastructure nationwide.

Key Points

An Egypt-Huawei project to modernize Egypt's grid into a smart network using ICT, analytics, and scalable infrastructure.

✅ Gradual migration to a smart grid to absorb higher load

✅ Boosts generation, transmission, and distribution efficiency

✅ ICT training supports workforce and digital transformation

Egypt and China's tech giant Huawei on Thursday discussed the gradual transformation of Egypt's electricity network to a smart grid model, Egyptian Ministry of Electricity and Renewable Energy said.

Egyptian Minister of Electricity and Renewable Energy Mohamed Shaker met with Huawei's regional president Li Jiguang in Cairo, where they discussed the cooperation, the ministry said in a statement.

The meeting is part of Egypt's plans to develop its energy sector based on the latest technologies and smarter electricity infrastructure initiatives, it added.

During the meeting, Shaker hailed the existing cooperation between Egypt and China in several mega projects, citing regional efforts like the Philippines power grid upgrades, welcoming further cooperation with China to benefit from its expertise and technological progress.

"The future vision of the Egyptian electricity sector is based on the gradual transformation of the current network from a typical one to a smart grid that would help absorb the large amounts of generated power," Shaker said.

Shaker highlighted his ministry's efforts to improve its services, including power generation, transportation and grid improvements across distribution.

Li, president of Huawei Northern Africa Enterprise Business Group, commended the rapid and remarkable development of the projects implemented by the Egyptian ministry to establish a strong infrastructure along with a smart grid that supports the digital grid transformation.

The Huawei official added that despite the challenges the corporation faced in the first half of 2020, it has managed to achieve revenues growth, which shows Huawei's strength and stability amid global challenges such as cybersecurity fears in critical infrastructure.

In late February, Egypt's Ministry of Higher Education and Scientific Research and Huawei discussed plans to provide training to develop the skills of Egyptian university students talented in information and communications technology, including emerging topics like 5G energy use considerations.

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US Electricity Demand Outlook examines EIA forecasts, GDP decoupling, energy efficiency, electrification, electric vehicles, grid load growth, and weather variability to frame long term demand trends and utility planning scenarios.

Key Points

An analysis of EIA projections showing demand decoupling from GDP, with EV adoption and efficiency shaping future grid load.

✅ EIA lowers load growth; demand decouples from GDP.

✅ Efficiency and sector shifts depress kWh sales.

✅ EV adoption could revive load and capacity needs.

Electricity producers and distributors are in an unusual business. The product they provide is available to all customers instantaneously, literally at the flip of a switch. But the large amount of equipment, both hardware and software to do this takes years to design, site and install.

From a long range planning perspective, just as important as a good engineering design is an accurate sales projections. For the US electric utility industry the most authoritative electricity demand projec-tions come from the Department of Energy’s Energy Information Administration (EIA). EIA's compre-hensive reports combine econometric analysis with judgment calls on social and economic trends like the adoption rate of new technologies that could affect future electricity demand, things like LED light-ing and battery powered cars, and the rise of renewables overtaking coal in generation.

Before the Great Recession almost a decade ago, the EIA projected annual growth in US electricity production at roughly 1.5 percent per year. After the Great Recession began, the EIA lowered its projections of US electricity consumption growth to below 1 percent. Actual growth has been closer to zero. While the EIA did not antici-pate the last recession or its aftermath, we cannot fault them on that.

After the event, though, the EIA also trimmed its estimates of economic growth. For the 2015-2030 period it now predicts 2.1 percent economic and 0.3 percent electricity growth, down from previously projections of 2.7 percent and 1.3 percent respectively. (See Figures 1 and 2.)

Table 1. EIA electric generation projections by year of forecast (kWh billions)

Table 2. EIA forecast of GDP by year of forecast (billion 2009 $)

Back in 2007, the EIA figured that every one percent increase in economic activity required a 0.48 percent in-crease in electric generation to support it. By 2017, the EIA calculated that a 1 percent growth in economic activity now only required a 0.14 percent increase in electric output. What accounts for such a downgrade or disconnect between electricity usage and economic growth? And what factors might turn the numbers 
around?

First, the US economy lost energy intensive heavy industry like smelting, steel mills and refineries; patterns in China's electricity sector highlight how industrial shifts can reshape power demand. A more service oriented economy (think health care) relies more heavily on the movement of data or information and uses far less power than a manufacturing-oriented economy.

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Second, internet shopping has hurt so-called "brick and mortar" retailers. Despite the departure of heavy industry, in years past a burgeoning US commercial sector increased its demand and usage of electricity to offset the industrial decline. But not anymore. Energy efficiency measures as well as per-haps greater concern about global warming and greenhouse gas emissions and have cut into electricity sales. “Do more with less” has the right ring to it.

But there may be other components to the ongoing decline in electricity usage. Academic studies show that electricity usage seems to increase with income along an S curve, and flattens out after a certain income level. That is, if you earn $1 billion per year you do not (or cannot) use ten times a much electricity as someone earning only $100 million.

But people at typical, middle income levels increase or decrease electricity usage when incomes rise or fall. The squeeze on middle income families was discussed often in the late presidential campaign. In recent decades an increasing percentage of income has gone to a small percentage of the population at the top of the income scale. This trend probably accounts for some weakness in residential sales. This suggests that government policy addressing income inequality would also boost electricity sales.

Population growth affects demand for electricity as well as the economy as a whole. The EIA has made few changes in its projections, showing 0.7 percent per year population growth in 2015- 2030 in both the 2007 and 2017 forecasts. Recent studies, however, have shown a drop in the birth rate to record lows. More troubling, from a national health perspective is that the average age of death may have stopped rising. Those two factors point to lower population growth, especially if the government also restricts immi-gration. Thus, the US may be approaching a period of rather modest population growth.

All of the above factors point to minimal sales growth for electricity producers in the US--perhaps even lower than the seemingly conservative EIA estimates. But the cloud on the horizon has a silver lining in the shape of an electric car. Both the United Kingdom and France have set dates to end of production of automobiles with internal combustion engines. Several European car makers have declared that 20 percent of their output will be electric vehicles by the early 2020s. If we adopt automobiles powered by electricity and not gasoline or diesel, electricity sales would increase by one third. For the power indus-try, electric vehicles represent the next big thing.

We don’t pretend to know how electric car sales will progress. But assume vehicle turnover rates re-main at the current 7 percent per year and electric cars account for 5 percent of sales in the first five years (as op-posed to 1 percent now), 20 percent in the next five years and 50 percent in the third five year period. Wildly optimistic assumptions? Maybe. By 2030, electric cars would constitute 28 percent of the vehicle fleet. They would add about 10 percent to kilowatt hour sales by that date, assuming that battery efficiencies do not improved by then. Those added sales would require increased electric generation output, with low-emissions sources expected to cover almost all the growth globally. They would also raise long term growth rates for 2015-2030 from the present 0.3 percent to 1.0 percent. The slow upturn in demand should give the electric companies time to gear up so to speak.

In the meantime, weather will continue to play a big role in electricity consumption. Record heat-induced demand peaks are being set here in the US even as surging global demand puts power systems under strain worldwide.

Can we discern a pattern in weather conditions 15 years out? Maybe we can, but that is one topic we don’t expect a government agency to tackle in public right now. Meantime, weather will affect sales more than anything else and we cannot predict the weather. Or can we?

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FERC Transmission Planning Overhaul streamlines interregional grid buildouts, enabling high-voltage lines, renewable integration, and grid reliability to scale, cutting fossil reliance while boosting decarbonization, climate resilience, and affordability across regions facing demand and extreme weather.

Key Points

Federal rule updating interregional grid planning to integrate renewables, share costs, and improve reliability.

✅ Accelerates high-voltage, interregional lines for renewable transfer

✅ Optimizes transmission planning and cost allocation frameworks

✅ Boosts grid reliability, resilience, and emissions reductions

The US took a significant step towards a cleaner energy future on May 13th, 2024. The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) approved the first major update to the country's electric transmission policy in over a decade, while congressional Democrats continue to push for action on aggregated DERs within FERC's remit today. This overhaul aims to streamline the process of building new power lines, specifically those that connect different regions. This improved connectivity is crucial for integrating more renewable energy sources like wind and solar into the national grid.

The current system faces challenges in handling the influx of renewables, and the aging U.S. grid amplifies those hurdles today. Renewable energy sources are variable by nature – the sun doesn't always shine, and the wind doesn't always blow. Traditionally, power grids have relied on constantly running power plants, like coal or natural gas, to meet electricity demands. These plants can be easily adjusted to produce more or less power as needed. However, renewable energy sources require a different approach.

The new FERC policy focuses on building more interregional transmission lines. These high-voltage power lines would allow electricity generated in regions with abundant solar or wind power, and even enable imports of green power from Canada in certain corridors, to be transmitted to areas with lower renewable energy resources. For example, solar energy produced in sunny states like California could be delivered to meet peak demand on the East Coast during hot summer days.

This improved connectivity offers several advantages. Firstly, it allows for a more efficient use of renewable resources. Secondly, it reduces the need for fossil fuel-based power plants, leading to cleaner air and lower greenhouse gas emissions. Finally, a more robust grid is better equipped to handle extreme weather events, which are becoming increasingly common due to climate change, and while Biden's climate law shows mixed results on decarbonization, stronger transmission supports resilience.

The need for an upgrade is undeniable. The Biden administration has set ambitious goals for decarbonizing the power sector by 2035, including proposals for a clean electricity standard as a pathway to those targets. A study by the US Department of Energy estimates that achieving this target will require more than doubling the country's regional transmission capacity and increasing interregional capacity by more than fivefold. The aging US grid is already struggling to keep up with current demands, and without significant improvements, it could face reliability issues in the future.

The FERC's decision has been met with praise from environmental groups and renewable energy companies. They see it as a critical step towards achieving a clean energy future. However, some stakeholders, including investor-owned utilities, have expressed concerns about the potential costs associated with building new transmission lines, citing persistent barriers to development identified in recent Senate testimony. Finding the right balance between efficiency, affordability, and environmental responsibility will be key to the success of this initiative.

The road ahead won't be easy. Building new power lines is a complex process that can face opposition from local communities, and broader disputes over electricity pricing changes often complicate planning and approvals. However, the potential benefits of a modernized grid are significant. By investing in this overhaul, the US is taking a crucial step towards a more reliable, sustainable, and cleaner energy future.

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Hurricane Michael Statistics track catastrophic wind speed, storm surge, rainfall totals, power outages, evacuations, and fatalities across Florida and the Southeast, detailing Category 4 intensity, Saffir-Simpson scale impacts, and emergency response resources.

Key Points

Hurricane Michael statistics detail wind speed, storm surge, rainfall, outages, and deaths from Category 4 landfall.

✅ 155 mph landfall winds; 14 ft storm surge; 12 in rainfall max

✅ 1.6M without power; 30,000 restoring crews; 6 states emergency

✅ 325k ordered evacuations; 32 deaths; FEMA and Guard deployed

Hurricane Michael, a historic Category 4 storm, struck the Florida Panhandle early Wednesday afternoon, unleashing heavy rain, high winds and a devastating storm surge.

Here is a look at the dangerous storm by the numbers:

155 mph: Wind speed -- nearly the highest possible for a Category 4 hurricane -- with which Michael made landfall near Mexico Beach and Panama City. A hurricane with 157 mph or higher is a Category 5, the strongest on the Saffir-Simpson hurricane wind scale.

129 mph: Peak wind gust reported Wednesday at Tyndall Air Force Base, which is about 12 miles southeast of Panama City, Florida.

32: Number of storm-related deaths attributed to Michael thus far, including an 11-year-old girl who local officials say was killed when part of a metal carport crashed into her family's mobile home in Lake Seminole, Georgia, and a 38-year-old man who was killed when a tree fell onto his moving car in Statesville, North Carolina.

Waves take over a house as Hurricane Michael comes ashore in Alligator Point, Fla., Oct. 10, 2018.

14 feet: Maximum height forecast for the storm surge when Michael's strong winds pushed the ocean water onto land. A storm surge just over 9 feet was reported Wednesday in Apalachicola, Florida.

12 inches: Isolated maximum amount of rain that Michael was expected to dump across the Florida Panhandle and the state's Big Bend region, as well as in southeast Alabama and parts of southwest and central Georgia.

9 inches: Maximum amount of rain that Michael could bring to isolated areas from Virginia to North Carolina.

1.6 million: Number of homes and businesses without power in Florida, Alabama, Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina and Virginia as of Friday morning, a reminder that extended outages can persist after major disasters.

30,000: Number of workers mobilized from across the country to help restore power, underscoring the risks of field repairs such as line crew injuries during recovery.

6: Number of states that had emergency declarations in anticipation of Michael: Florida, Alabama, Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina and Virginia.

325,000: Estimated number of people in the storm's path who were told to evacuate by local authorities.

6,000: Approximate number of people who stayed in the roughly 80 shelters across Florida, Alabama, Georgia, South Carolina and North Carolina on Wednesday night, while those sheltering at home were urged to avoid overheated power strips that can spark fires.

3,000: Number of personnel the Federal Emergency Management Agency deployed ahead of landfall, while utilities prepared on-site staffing plans to maintain operations during widespread disruptions.

35: Number of counties in Florida, of the state's 67, where Gov. Rick Scott declared a state of emergency prior to landfall, and grid reliability warnings often underscore systemic risks during national emergencies.

3,500: Number of Florida National Guard troops activated for pre-landfall coordination and planning, with an emphasis on high water and search-and-rescue operations.

600: Number of Florida state troopers assigned to the Panhandle and Big Bend region to assist with response and recovery efforts, including public reminders about downed line safety in affected communities.

500: Number of disaster relief workers that the American Red Cross was sending to affected areas in the Sunshine State.

200: Approximate number of patients being evacuated from at least two hospitals in Florida due to damage from the hurricane, highlighting how critical facilities depend on staff who have raised workforce safety concerns during other crises. Bay Medical Center Sacred Heart in Panama City said in a statement Thursday that its facility was damaged during the storm and thus is transferring more than 200 patients, including 39 who are critically ill, to regional hospitals. Gulf Coast Regional Medical Center, also in Panama City, announced in a statement Thursday that it's evacuating its roughly approximately patients, starting with the most critically ill, "because of the infrastructure challenges in our community."

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Energy Justice Program drives a renewables-based transition, challenging utility monopolies with legal action, promoting rooftop solar, distributed energy, public power, and climate justice to decarbonize the grid and protect communities and wildlife nationwide.

Key Points

A climate justice initiative advancing renewables, legal action, and public power to challenge utility monopolies.

✅ Challenges utility barriers to rooftop solar and distributed energy

✅ Advances state and federal policies for equitable, public power

✅ Uses litigation to curb fossil fuel dependence and protect communities

The Center for Biological Diversity on Monday rolled out a new program to push back against the nation's community- and wildlife-harming energy system that the climate advocacy group says is based on fossil fuels and a "centralized monopoly on power."

The goal of the new effort, the Energy Justice Program, is to help forge a path towards a just and renewables-based energy future informed by equitable regulation principles.

"Our broken energy system threatens our climate and our future," said Jean Su, the Energy Justice Program's new director, in a statement. "Utilities were given monopolies to ensure public access to electricity, but these dinosaur corporations are now hurting the public interest by blocking the clean energy transition, including via coal and nuclear subsidy schemes that profit off the fossil fuel era."

"In this era of climate catastrophe," she continued, "we have to stop these outdated monopolies and usher in a new electricity future that works for people and the planet."

To meet those goals, the new program will pursue a number of avenues, including using legal action to fight utilities' obstruction of clean energy efforts, helping communities advance local solar programs through energy freedom strategies in the South, and crafting energy policies on the state, federal, and international levels in step with commitments from major energy buyers to achieve a 90% carbon-free goal by 2030.

Some of that work is already underway. In June the Center filed a brief with a federal court in a bid to block Arizona power utility Salt River Project from slapping a 60-percent electricity rate hike on rooftop solar customers—amid federal efforts to reshape electricity pricing that critics say are being rushed—a move the group described (pdf) as an obstacle to achieving "the energy transition demanded by climate science."

The Center is among the groups in Energy Justice NC. The diverse coalition seeks to end the energy stranglehold in North Carolina held by Duke Energy, which continues to invest in fossil fuel projects even as it touts clean energy and grid investments in the region.

The time for a new energy system, says the Energy Justice Program, is now, as climate change impacts increasingly strain the grid.

"Amid this climate and extinction emergency," said Su, "the U.S. can't afford to stick with the same centralized, profit-driven electricity system that drove us here in the first place. We have to seize this once-in-a-generation opportunity to design a new system of accountable, equitable, truly public power."

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France Electricity Crisis drives record power prices as nuclear outages squeeze supply, forcing energy imports, fuel oil and coal generation, amid gas market shocks, weak wind output, and freezing weather straining the grid.

Key Points

A French power shortfall from nuclear outages, record prices, heavy imports, and oil-fired backup amid cold weather.

✅ EDF halted reactors; 10% capacity offline, 30% by January

✅ Imports surge; fuel oil and coal units dispatched

✅ Prices spike as gas reverses flow and wind output drops

Electricity prices surged to a fresh record as France scrambled to keep its lights on, sucking up supplies from the rest of Europe.

France, usually an exporter of power, is boosting electricity imports and even burning fuel oil, and has at times limited nuclear output due to high river temperatures during heatwaves. The crunch comes after Electricite de France SA said it would halt four reactors accounting for 10% of the nation’s nuclear capacity, straining power grids already facing cold weather. Six oil-fired units were turned on in France on Tuesday morning, according to a filing with Entsoe.

“It’s illustrating how severe it is when they’re actually starting to burn fuel oil and importing from all these countries,” said Fabian Ronningen, an analyst at Rystad Energy. The unexpected plant maintenance “is reflected in the market prices,” he said

Europe is facing an energy crisis, with utilities relying on coal and oil. Almost 30% of France’s nuclear capacity will be offline at the beginning of January, leaving the energy market at the mercy of the weather. To make matters worse, Germany is closing almost half of its nuclear capacity before the end of the year, as Europe loses nuclear power just when it really needs energy.

German power for delivery next year surged 10% to 278.50 euros a megawatt-hour, while the French contract for January added 9.5% to a record 700.60 euros. Prices also gained, under Europe’s marginal pricing system, as gas jumped after shipments from Russia via a key pipeline reversed direction, flowing eastward toward Poland instead.

Neighboring countries are boosting their exports to France this week to cover for lost nuclear output, with imports from Germany rising to highest level in at least four years. In the U.K., four coal power units were operating on Tuesday with as much as 1.5 gigawatts of hourly output being sent across the channel. 

The power crisis is so severe that the French government has asked EDF to restart some nuclear reactors earlier than planned amid outage risks for nuclear-powered France. Ecology Minister Barbara Pompili said last weekend that, in addition to the early reactor restarts and past river-temperature limits, the country had contracts with some companies in which they agreed to cut production during peak demand hours in exchange for payments from the government.

Higher energy prices threaten to derail Europe’s economic recovery just as the coronavirus omicron variety is spreading. Trafigura Group’s Nyrstar will pause production at its zinc smelter in France in the first week of January because of rising electricity prices. Norwegian fertilizer producer Yara International, which curbed output earlier this year, said it would continue to monitor the situation closely and curtail production where necessary.

Freezing weather this week is also sending short-term power prices surging as renewables can’t keep up, even though wind and solar overtook gas in the EU last year. German wind output plunged to a five-week low on Tuesday.

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