Global Energy

It seems retirement stock portfolios aren’t the only things rapidly declining in the United States over the past few months. In a more uplifting turn of events, energy use in the U.S. declined almost 5 last year, good for the most significant energy reduction the country has ever seen. To put that in further perspective, though the mainstream push for “going green” is still relatively new, the government began tracking such statistics in 1949.Of course, a view held by many analysts is that this isn’t entirely good news. While the reduced levels of energy are no doubt a welcome sight for the environment, they could be interpreted as an equally disheartening look in the mirror for the national economy. After all, energy use tends to decrease alongside GDP per capita. In other words, when people have less money, they buy less, do less and use less, all across the board. It would be a nice to believe the full 5 was constituted by American’s making responsible energy decisions; however, it’s far more likely the statistic is merely a manifestation of equally reduced individual means. (more…)

California is generally thought of as a land of sunshine, celebrities and perhaps the most energy conscious destination in the United States. However, over the past 2 decades the California Energy Commission (CEC) has elected to decline proposals to build a major solar power plant on the Gold Coast. After years of repeated efforts, there is finally light at the end of the tunnel as energy developer NextEra Energy Resources finally got approval from the CEC to construct a 1 billion, 250 MW concentrating power plant in the state of California.Ground should be broken sooner than later as NextEra now finds itself in a race against the expiring federal grant program, set to give out its final financial aid at year’s end. The project will be officially recognized as the “Beacon Solar Energy Project,” operated by NextEra’s subsidiary, Beacon Power. (more…)