100% Renewables: Pipe Dream or Reality

The U.S. Offshore Wind Collaborative and Clean Energy States Alliance hosted the first of a three-part series of webinars for state energy and environmental officials on Building the U.S. Offshore Wind Supply Chain, on Wednesday, December 1, 2010, 9:30-11 a.m. ET. For coastal and Great Lakes states working to help launch the U.S. offshore wind energy industry, the offshore wind supply chain represents an important opportunity to stimulate state and regional economic development. As states individually and regionally begin to consider their capacities to establish the complex infrastructure necessary to implement their offshore wind development strategies, there is much to be learned by looking at the experience of the world-leading UK offshore wind market. The first webinar in this series explained the components of the supply chain and lessons learned through the first two rounds of offshore wind development in the UK, providing participants with a comprehensive overview of the UK experience in offshore wind industry supply chain development.

The webinar provided an overview of the Texas Competitive Renewable Energy Zones (CREZ) process, including the regulatory, procedural and technical considerations that were critical to its successful implementation in Texas. The webinar also introduced a Renewable Energy Zones “Toolkit” developed through a USAID and NREL partnership and intended to guide other power systems in adapting elements of the CREZ approach to their own power system planning processes.

In the scope of the EurObserv’ER project, the Renewables Academy (DE), Observ'ER (FR), ECN part of TNO (NL), Frankfurt School of Finance and Management (DE), Fraunhofer-ISI (DE) and Statistics Netherlands (NL) invite you to join our free live webinar, featuring the main results of the recently released annual report “The State of renewable energies in Europe” (18th edition). The 1-hour live webinar will present the main findings of “The state of renewable energies in Europe” and its dedicated chapters on for the EU-28 on: Energy indicators Socio-economic indicators Investment indicators Renewable energy costs, prices and cost competitiveness Avoided fossil fuel use and resulting avoided costs Indicators on innovation and competitiveness International Trade

Feed-in tariffs (FITs) are used throughout the world to promote renewable energy technology. States and municipalities are increasingly turning to FITs to promote the development of new power resources. Counsel to renewable energy producers and utilities must understand the key challenges involved. A threshold challenge is in proper structuring. Several issues come into play that impact the FIT: the reverse auction vs. single price clearing mechanism, inclusion of publicly and investor-owned utilities, the size and type of projects, and discrimination against out-of-state projects. Another critical challenge is raised by preemption. FERC recently issued the first order ruling on its role in a state-approved feed-in tariff, identifying conditions under which federal law governing wholesale electricity sales in interstate commerce would not preempt California’s feed-in tariff. Listen as our authoritative panel of energy attorneys examines the issues of preemption and integration with renewable energy standards, discusses recent developments at both the state and federal level, and offers guidance for using the renewable program.