Energy Efficiency, Power Prices, Utilities, Distributed Generation, Sourcing Renewables  -  November 3, 2018

Weekend reads: Heavyweight fight in NV; Rickshaws lead the e-revolution

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

Billionaire Brawl: Warren Buffett vs. Sheldon Adelson in Nevada (Politico)  Warren Buffett's Nevada energy utility is clobbering Republican megadonor Sheldon Adelson in a power struggle over the fate of the state's electricity supply. The Omaha investor and the Las Vegas gambling magnate are on opposite sides of a Nevada ballot measure that could rattle the electric power industry: Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway owns NV Energy, a government-regulated monopoly that ranks as the state's largest utility. And Adelson is bankrolling a campaign to break up the company and take control of where his power-hungry casinos buy electricity. 

The Energy 202: Some Republicans in close races are (ever so slightly) changing their tune on climate change (Washington Post)  Back in June when Shawn Moody was vying for the Republican nomination to be Maine's next governor, the auto repair businessman stumbled when asked during a debate whether human activity is currently changing the climate in the state. “It's mostly …” Moody began before pausing to collect his thoughts. “It's no,” he finally responded. But four months later when asked about climate change again — this time as GOP nominee — Moody did not hesitate to hedge his answer. 

Could Energy Efficiency Be The “Cornerstone” For A Sustainable Energy System? (Clean Technica)  The International Energy Agency has claimed that a string of the right energy efficiency policies implemented around the globe could, on its own, result in the peaking of greenhouse gas emissions followed quickly by a global decline even as the global economy doubles. Writing in a report earlier this month, entitled Energy Efficiency 2018, the International Energy Agency (IEA) examined the global opportunities for improving energy efficiency through to 2040 and found that gains in energy efficiency would allow the world’s economies to extract twice as much economic value from the energy it produces and uses than it does today.

Study: Natural gas, wind, solar cheapest power generation (Utility Dive) Natural gas, solar and wind are the cheapest ways to generate electric power, according to a new study released by the University of Texas at Austin's Energy Institute on Thursday. The report calculates the Levelized Cost of Electricity (LCOE) by U.S. county, finding wind to be the cheapest resource across the central plains and down the Appalachian mountains. Natural gas is the cheapest resource across the Coastal Plain and parts of the northern Rocky Mountains, while solar leads in low cost across the Southwest and sporadically through the Midwest and Northwest. 

With e-rickshaws, India speeds ahead of China in electric-vehicle revolution (LiveMint)  An electric-vehicle revolution is gaining ground in India, and it has nothing to do with cars. The South Asian nation is home to about 1.5 million battery-powered, three-wheeled rickshaws – a fleet bigger than the total number of electric passenger cars sold in China since 2011. But while the world’s largest auto market dangled significant subsidies to encourage purchases of battery-powered cars, India’s e-movement hardly got a hand from the state. Rather, drivers of the ubiquitous three-wheelers weaving through crowded, smoggy streets discovered that e-rickshaws are quieter, faster, cleaner and cheaper to maintain than a traditional auto rickshaw. 

Read These Related Articles:

• Weekend Reads: COP29 on Energy Efficiency; Unscrambling Hydrogen
• Weekend Reads: Five Things to Know About COP29; Rethinking Gas Stations
• Weekend Reads: Where Climate Triumphed at the Polls; Iceland Goes to Space for Solar
• Weekend Reads: Candidates Avoid Clean Energy; Costco (Cautiously) Adds EV Charging
• Weekend Reads: The Carbon Offset Debate; New Powder Captures CO2

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