Tag Archives: Georgia

Georgia Power buys 99MW in two Georgia solar projects

Decatur County scores two big solar projects. When will Lowndes County get a move on in solar? How about some projects like this at your empty industrial parks, Valdosta-Lowndes Development Authority? Now that even Southern Company CEO Tom Fanning is bragging about renewable energy, maybe the solar sun is shining enough for other local governments to see it.

Southern Company PR, PRnewsWire, 20 February 2015, Southern Company subsidiary acquires two Georgia solar projects totaling 99 megawatts,

Southern Company subsidiary Southern Power today announced the acquisition of two photovoltaic (PV) solar projects totaling 99 megawatts (MW) in Georgia — the 80-MW Decatur Parkway Solar Project and the 19-MW Decatur County Solar Project — from Tradewind Energy, Inc.

The projects were proposed by Continue reading

Tesla opening market for home solar batteries

Elon Musk’s recent reminder that Tesla is working on a house-sized battery has caused quite a stir, but not enough. Tesla alone isn’t the significant part: Tesla opening a market for inexpensive home solar storage methods is. And not all those methods will be batteries: also coming are capacitors, organic vats, compressed air, and water pumped up towers, for storage to car- and house- size to municipal- and utility-scale, all of which will drive solar and wind deployment even faster.

John McDuling, QZ, 30 July 2014, How solar energy storage could make Tesla much more than an automaker,

How lucrative could the solar energy storage business be for Tesla? Almost as lucrative as selling cars.

That’s according to Morgan Stanley, which this week Continue reading

Charges and findings for Quebec oil train explosion

Low-level employees taking the fall for railroad company executives, that’s what we can see in the future of yesterday’s West Virginia oil train explosion by looking at one in Quebec in 2013. Can we expect any different behavior from fracked methane pipeline executives?

Roger Annis, Truthout, 23 June 2014, What Happened in Last Summer’s Oil Train Disaster in Quebec That Killed 47,

Details of the events leading to last July’s oil train disaster in Lac Megantic, Quebec, have been made public for the first time. They reinforce an existing portrait of the accident as a perfect storm of corporate malfeasance.

Insufficient handbrakes applied, instead Continue reading

Another oil train crashes and burns: CSC CSX near Charleston WV

Yet another fireball, water supply turned off, state of emergency, from an oil train. When did you last hear of a solar farm explosion? Do we expect hastily-built and unnecessary fracked methane pipelines to be any safer than these shoddy exploding shale oil train tank cars? How long must fossil fuel fireballs rain down before we all get on with clean sun, wind, and water to power the world?

Fireball above Boomer, WV; Photo credit: Deslyne Copening

Marcus Constantino, Multimedia reporter and Matt Murphy, Charleston Daily Mail, 16 February 2015, Crude oil train derails in Fayette County, WV, Continue reading

Quail Hunt @ VLCIA 2015-02-17

Cold Weld Greensleeve Tire Bakeries: be there or wonder what is this stuff in their agenda.

Valdosta-Lowndes Development Authority
Tuesday, February 17, 2015 5:30 p.m.
Development Authority Conference Room
103 Roosevelt Drive
Monthly Meeting Agenda
Continue reading

Duke Energy expands solar stake from NC to SC

Duke Energy, purported big customer of FPL and Spectra’s Sabal Trail fracked methane pipeline boondoggle, is expanding into solar financing for commercial projects, and from North Carolina into South Carolina. After even FPL’s parent bought a Hawaii utility to get into the solar game, why would anybody want to waste time, money, eminent domain land takings, trees cut down, or the hazards of sinkholes, leaks, and explosions near schools and businesses when we can all go straight to faster, cheaper, and far safer and cleaner solar power?

First this: Jennifer Runyon, Renewable Energy World, 9 February 2015, Duke Energy Takes Equity Stake in REC Solar, Embraces Distributed Generation: The move gives REC Solar a cash injection, $225 million in funds available to finance commercial projects, and a streamlined process to deliver solar projects more quickly.,

The largest utility in the U.S. is doubling down on distributed solar by taking an equity stake in commercial solar developer, REC Solar. The companies announced today that Duke will now own a majority stake of REC Solar and that together they will make it easier for commercial customers to go solar. In 2013, Duke Energy invested in Continue reading

VSU’s S.A.V.E. protests Sabal Trail pipeline and for fossil fuel divestment

Stop the Sabal Trail pipeline to help fossil fuel divestment. WALB got the connection at VSU Thursday 11 February 2015.

Colter Anstaett, WALB, 12 February 2015, Lowndes environmental groups march through VSU,

“We’re using so much at a rate that, within our generation or our lifetime, there’s gonna be catastrophic changes that won’t be reversed,” SAVE President Adrianna Taylor….

Taylor also said she believed that if the university ultimately did divest from fossil fuels, it would show that VSU students have the ability to critically think at the same level as students at Stanford, Harvard, and Continue reading

Maps for Naylor Boat Ramp, Frank’s Creek Bridge, and Deloach Road @ LCC 2015-02-10

300x186 Naylor Boat Ramp aerial, in Maps from board packet, by John S. Quarterman, 10 February 2015 The three maps arrived by email for the engineering items in the Lowndes County Commission Monday Work Session and Tuesday Regular Session. The rest of the response to that Open Records request did not, so I’ll have to go back again to pick up the rest of it on paper. And the other Open Records request, for Continue reading

Videos: Devine tabled, Naylor boat ramp, no HB 170 or animals @ LCC 2015-02-10

Nothing was said about the GA HB 170 state tax grab from local governments, even though both school boards and the Valdosta City Council already passed resolutions against it. No citizens spoke about animals, or about anything else, not even in the Public Hearings, except for me thanking the Commission about the Naylor Boat Ramp.

The Devine Subdivision at Tillman Crossing was tabled at request of applicant to try to sort out continuing concerns about safety and congestion, while REZ-2015-01 Gramercy 2 and REZ-2015-03 Scurry Property, were unanimously approved. No citizens spoke for or against any of them.

You the taxpaying public didn’t get to see any of the materials in the board packet beyond the one-page agenda item forms, before the Commission voted last night, unless you were in the Commission Chambers or watched the LAKE videos of yesterday morning’s Work Session. The open records request for those rezonings came back with paper maps, despite my request for electronic format; at least the paper maps were in color this time. I asked again for electronic format, and will post them soon even if I have to scan them. The other open records request, for maps and materials for the engineering agenda items, came back with no maps at all, so I sent it back to be satisfied. Both County Planner Jason Davenport and County Engineer Mike Fletcher said they had never seen those open records requests, and they’d both be happy to email electronic copy if they were authorized to do so by the County Clerk.

All the other items were unanimously approved: Continue reading

HB 57 solar financing bill unanimously passed Georgia House

Monday morning HB 57 passed 165 to zero, according to Gavin Bade in Utility Drive yesterday. The bill still has (for 46-3-62(2)) the same residential 10 kilowatt limit as in the 1973 Territorial Electric Service Act, but changes the 100 kilowatt commercial limit to:

(B) One hundred and twenty-five percent of the actual or expected maximum annual peak demand of the premises the solar technology serves, for a commercial application.

Bade reported 13 January 2015 that Continue reading