Solar, Sourcing Renewables, Wind  -  February 29, 2020

Weekend reads: The Airbnb of renewable energy; Shell's new offshore wind breaks records

It's the weekend! Kick back and catch up with these must-read articles from around the web.

How America's Wind Power Could Triple by 2030 Without Using More Land (Inverse) The U.S. currently gets a little under 7 percent of its electricity from wind energy, and the industry is growing. New research shows that number could roughly triple within a decade without taking up any additional land if the right investments are made. According to the IPCC, renewables need to produce 70 to 85 percent of our energy by 2050 to avoid the worst effects of climate change, so that would be a great start.

Shell unveils world's largest offshore wind plan to power green hydrogen (Recharge) Shell and Gasunie unveiled plans for what’s claimed to be Europe’s biggest green hydrogen project in the Netherlands, powered by up to 10GW of offshore wind in the North Sea. The oil giant and gas infrastructure group will advance the NortH2 project in conjunction with Groningen Seaports, with a large hydrogen electrolyser slated to be sited in Eemshaven. The partners want to have the first hydrogen flowing from the project by 2027, powered by an initial 3-4GW of offshore turbines. The offshore wind fleet could grow as large as 10GW by 2040, said a statement announcing the project, with a production of 800,000 tonnes of green hydrogen annually.

Translating auction technology to renewable energy (eRENEWABLE) No one would blame 62-year-old Mike Nemer for capping off his oil and gas career after 40 years in the industry and settling into retirement with his wife, kids, and grandbabies. But it’s those grandbabies and kids – and a chance phone call – that re-directed Nemer’s thinking. “Through my 40-year work career, I’ve always looked for opportunity, not just for me, not only for myself but for an industry or a market,” says Mike Nemer, President of eRENEWABLE. That opportunity presented itself when Nemer, thanks to a routine business phone call, realized the auction technology he’s used for years in his oil and gas business, could translate seamlessly to the renewable side of things. More specifically, Nemer did his due diligence and found his technology could streamline the way Virtual Power Purchase Agreements and renewable RFPs were done.

New Jersey town keeps its water clean with the country’s largest floating solar system (Solar Power World) Installing a floating solar system in the United States is still a novel effort. The first “floatovoltaic” array in the world was installed a decade ago at a California winery, but solar systems that reside atop stagnant water still haven’t claimed a significant share of the U.S. solar market. NREL released a study in 2018 that claimed if solar was installed on just a quarter of the manmade bodies of water in the United States, it would account for 10% of the country’s electricity needs. Engineering firm RETTEW and contractors Solar Renewable Energy (SRE) and J&J Solar pushed U.S. floating solar into new waters with the construction of a 4.4-MW array on a retention pond in Sayreville, New Jersey. It’s currently the only floating solar array in the state, and the largest in the country. It powers 100% of Sayreville’s water treatment plant.

This Startup Aims to Be the Airbnb of Renewable Energy Sharing (Observer) We like the sharing community, right? Remember that trip to Barcelona and that nice Airbnb you stayed at? That all worked out. The Uber Pool you took last Thursday night saved you some money. Now, (and get ready for this), what if you applied the principles of the sharing community to energy? In the future (a time beyond right now), we might be able to buy energy directly from our neighbors, Airbnb-fashion. Dutch startup Vandebron has already set up a site where consumers can buy electricity from independent producers, such as farms with wind turbines. That’s great for the Dutch—they’re known for their windmills—but the implementation of energy sharing is still pretty rare.

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