Energy Efficiency, Energy Storage, Sourcing Renewables  -  June 1, 2019

Weekend reads: World's largest energy storage project; How much oil in an EV?

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

'World's Biggest' Energy Storage Project Planned For Utah (Forbes)  Mitsubishi is leading an ambitious project to develop what it claims will be the world’s largest energy storage project. The venture will take advantage of salt caverns owned by Magnum Development. While lithium-based technology dominates the utility-scale battery market, the Advanced Clean Energy Storage (ACES) project will look to develop four competing technologies with no lithium in sight. It will have the equivalent power rating of 1GW. The energy storage capacity figure, in GWh, has not been provided. A 100MW system has been installed in the UAE with similar sized projects in Australia and China also.

How California became far more energy-efficient than the rest of the country (Vox)  The Trump administration is currently attempting to stop California from setting its own pollution standards for automobiles. Trump’s Environmental Protection Agency has proposed freezing federal fuel economy standards for 10 years (a measure so extreme that even automakers oppose it), but as things stand, California has a waiver under the Clean Air Act that allows it to opt out of federal standards and implement its own vehicle standards. 

How Much Oil is in an Electric Vehicle? (Visual Capitalist)  When you think about oil, there is probably only one thing that comes to mind: gasoline. But there is more to oil than gasoline. In fact, oil along with natural gas has hundreds of different uses in a modern vehicle - including electric vehicles - through petrochemicals.

Terawatt-scale photovoltaics: Transform global energy (Science) Solar energy has the potential to play a central role in the future global energy system because of the scale of the solar resource, its predictability, and its ubiquitous nature. Global installed solar photovoltaic (PV) capacity exceeded 500 GW at the end of 2018, and an estimated additional 500 GW of PV capacity is projected to be installed by 2022–2023, bringing us into the era of TW-scale PV. 

In Ohio, craft breweries emerge as leaders for clean energy (Energy News Network)  A decade before Budweiser’s Clydesdales galloped alongside wind turbines in the beer giant’s 2019 Super Bowl commercial, solar panels were going up on the roof of Great Lakes Brewing Company’s Cleveland brewpub. Since then, the Ohio brewer has continued to invest in clean energy, including adding a 62-panel solar array to its brewery roof in early 2017. While financing renewable energy and efficiency projects can be challenging, craft brewers in Ohio and beyond are finding the benefits worthwhile.

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