article thumbnail

Maryland Transit System Gets Solar + Storage Microgrid For Charging Its Electric Buses

CleanTechnica EVs

One of the big objections to electric vehicles, and even more to clean energy, is that the power grid isn’t always up. You can’t use solar power! Who thought any of this was a good idea?? Severe storms? You can’t charge your EV. Sun not shining?

Maryland 124
article thumbnail

GE VC Firms Announce $200M Open Innovation Challenge to Accelerate Power Grid Technology Through Open Collaboration

Green Car Congress

GE announced a $200-million open innovation challenge that seeks breakthrough ideas to create a smarter, cleaner, more efficient electric grid, and accelerate the adoption of more efficient grid technologies. Proposals are sought in three, broad categories: Renewables, Grid and Eco Homes/Eco Buildings.

article thumbnail

Tesla’s solar neighborhood in Austin could help TX learn if renewables are viable

Teslarati

These directives build upon the reforms passed this session to increase power generation capacity & ensure the reliability of the Texas power grid. The directives also included allocating “reliability costs to generation resources that cannot guarantee their own availability, such as wind and solar power.”

article thumbnail

ARPA-E issues $5M funding opportunity to support upcoming grid optimization competition

Green Car Congress

In the PSCOPF problem selected for this challenge competition, the objective is to provide a generation dispatch at the least cost to meet system load (demand) in the base case and in all credible contingencies cases, such that power flow obeys the physics of a power grid and satisfies system’s limits.

Grid 150
article thumbnail

How to Prevent Blackouts by Packetizing the Power Grid

Cars That Think

That need for balance is true of electric power grids, too. Spiking demand for electric heat collided with supply problems created by frozen natural-gas equipment and below-average wind-power production. Packetized energy management (PEM) allows the power grid to flexibly handle a varying supply of renewable energy.

article thumbnail

Gravity Batteries, Green Hydrogen, and a Thorium Reactor for China

Cars That Think

2021 was a big year for energy-related news, what with the ongoing hunt for new forms of energy storage and cleaner if not carbon-free electricity and events and research that spotlighted the weak links in our power grid. The basic idea is to add particles of sea salt to the atmosphere to brighten clouds and cool the planet.

Hydrogen 102
article thumbnail

The Greening of Transportation

Cars That Think

In this month’s special report on the greening of transportation, we examine a moonshot idea for powering electric vehicles, the biggest change in aviation since the jet engine, and cargo ships with a battle-tested mode of generation.