US Invests $44 Million In Grid Connected Renewable Energy Projects

US New Initiative Aims To Bring Energy Efficient, RT Heat Pump By 2027

The US Department of Energy (DOE) has announced the selection of eleven projects to receive $34 million for tools to advance a clean, reliable electricity grid run on wind and solar energy.

DOE also announced a new $10 million funding to streamline the interconnection of clean energy to the grid. Together, these initiatives are estimated to enable grid planners, grid operators, and utility companies to optimally connect and manage renewable energy and battery storage resources on the electric grid, resulting in a reduction of extreme weather-related outages. This funding can cut wait times for projects to connect to the grid and help accelerate the reliable deployment of clean energy resources to achieve President Biden’s goal of 100% clean electricity by 2035.

“We can’t deploy clean energy if we can’t get renewable sources connected to our grid,” told US Secretary of Energy Jennifer M. Granholm. “Thanks to support from the Biden-Harris Administration, we are developing new, state-of-the-art tools to break up logjams to connect more clean energy sources to the grid even faster, giving Americans access to more affordable and resilient sources of clean energy.”

US FERC Approves 810 MW Offshore Wind Project To Connect Into NYC Grid

Also Read

Improving Reliability on the Clean Energy Grid

Renewable generation accounts for as much as 21% of the US electricity supply, and the share of clean energy from low-cost renewables can need to increase to meet the country’s climate goals. As the power grid adds larger amounts of variable renewable energy resources like solar and wind, grid planners and operators need new tools to manage the intermittency of these generation technologies. This is especially true as rising temperatures worsened by climate change, retiring power plants, and increasing demand from massive electrification of building, transportation, and industrial sectors, put additional pressure on grid operations, including increased risk of blackouts if reliability challenges are not addressed.

Projects selected for the solar energy technologies office’s operation and planning tools for inverter-based resource management and Availability for the Future Power System (OPTIMA) funding program. It can advance tools that help grid planners and operators optimize the integration of these technologies. These tools can allow the grid to be more flexible and resilient to changes like weather events and fluctuations in demand.

The eleven projects are:

• Florida International University (Miami, FL): $2.4 million
• Washington State University (Pullman, WA) $2.4 million
• Georgia Institute of Technology (Atlanta, GA): $2.8 million
• Iowa State University (Ames, IA): $3 million
• Midcontinent Independent System Operator (Carmel, IN): $3 million
• National Renewable Energy Laboratory (Golden, CO): $3.2 million
• National Renewable Energy Laboratory (Golden, CO): $3.3 million
• University of Connecticut (Storrs, CT): $3.3 million
• Arizona State University (Tempe, AZ): $3 million
• Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (Richland, WA): $3.6 million
• Quanta Technology (Raleigh, NC): $3.8 million