EU agrees to spend billions to make grid crisis-proof
STRASBOURG, FRANCE - Europe's energy networks will receive a 4-billion-euro (US$5.3 billion) upgrade to make them more robust and flexible in future energy crises following a vote in the European Union assembly.
The project was launched after this winter's gas crisis left thousands of homes without heat, following a price row between Moscow and transit country Ukraine.
The plan to subsidize new power projects, gas pipelines and power cables aims to enable the 27 EU countries help each other during energy crises and to generate fresh employment for constructors and engineers in the face of recession.
The European Parliament had earlier voted to divert any unused funds from the project into energy efficiency program.
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'Unlayering' peak demand could accelerate energy storage adoption
WASHINGTON - The debate over energy storage replacing gas-fired peakers has raged for years, but a new approach that shifts the terms of the argument could lead to an acceleration of storage deployments.
Rather than looking at peak demand as a single mountainous peak, some analysts now advocate a layered approach that allows energy storage to better match peak needs. The idea is beginning to gain traction with some states and utilities.
"You don’t have to have batteries that run to infinity."
Some developers of solar-plus-storage projects say they can already compete head-to-head with gas-fired peakers. "I can beat a gas peaker anywhere…
