Advanced Energy Perspectives

This post is one in a series featuring the complete slate of advanced energy technologies outlined in the report This Is Advanced Energy. 

Image courtesy of Ford Motor Company.

Diesel engines are compression-ignition engines, meaning that they work by compressing air in the cylinders to heat it beyond the auto- ignition temperature of diesel fuel. When fuel is injected, combustion occurs without an external ignition source (such as a spark plug). Due to the higher compression ratio used in diesel engines and the higher energy content of diesel fuel, diesel engines can achieve 35% higher fuel economy than gasoline engines. Clean diesel engines are quieter, more efficient, more reliable, and cleaner than older diesel vehicles, thanks to innovations such as allowing for higher fuel-air mixing prior to combustion and the addition of re-circulated exhaust gas to the intake air stream. In addition, electronic controls and sensors throughout the vehicle ensure that just enough fuel is injected exactly when it is needed, improving efficiency. Using ultra-low-sulfur diesel fuel and exhaust treatment mechanisms such as on-board particulate traps and catalytic converters, clean diesel vehicles can achieve tailpipe emissions comparable to gasoline vehicles. 

Rapid improvements in advanced energy technologies, increased customer adoption of distributed energy resources (DER), and changing public policy goals are driving change in our electric grid. Utilities historically have not taken DER - such as solar PV, demand response, energy efficiency, energy storage, or electric vehicles (EVs) - into consideration in their resource planning. The result is a business-as-usual resource plan, as if no DER were deployed. Cost savings in utility distribution system spending may be going unrealized because of excess capacity or because of investments in equipment for grid services that could be provided by DER at a lower cost. Getting utilities to consider DER in competition with traditional investments can lead to a more flexible, reliable, resilient, and clean grid, all while saving money for customers. The question is: how to do it?

As an ambitious proceeding intended to revolutionize the electricity marketplace in New York State, “Reforming the Energy Vision,” has generated a lot of filings, but none more noteworthy than the one submitted last week by New York’s six investor-owned utilities and three solar development companies – all members of AEE. Under the name of the Solar Progress Partnership, utilities including ConEdison and National Grid joined with SolarCity, SunEdison, and SunPower on a filing that put forth a framework for the transition from the current full-retail value of net metering to the REV-envisioned future of a new system of compensation for distributed energy resources (DER). Though it did not sign on to the filing, AEE Institute facilitated the discussions that led to this landmark statement between sometime industry antagonists over the issue that most divides them.

Every week we see news of advanced energy companies and technologies challenging the energy status quo and growing the industry. This week was no different, with the news that the United States had reached 1 million solar installations. As always, AEE’s members are right at the fore, driving the industry and the economy forward.

Just last week, we were ready to say that the Senate had experienced a failure to communicate on energy policy. Momentum had been building to include an energy tax title to the Federal Aviation Administration re-authorization bill, which would have addressed advanced energy technologies left out of the year-end extension of tax credits, but the politics turned sour on the tax provisions. While one bill sank under political pressure, however, the long-stalled energy bill suddenly sprang to life, and passed the Senate in bipartisan fashion. Can this spirit of bipartisanship carry this bill all the way to becoming law? Here is our take.