Monthly Archives: January 2017


 Green Power Revolution
 Grinds Forward,
 An Unstoppable Glacier

Webster’s defines revolution as “a sudden, radical or complete change.”  The ongoing revolution in the United States electric utility industry fits that definition to a T. The changes have been unbelievably quick (at least by company standards, if not by activists’ desires), and the long-term impacts are going to be both radical and complete. Importantly, particularly in today’s political climate, I would add that the transition is unstoppable—like the inexorable forward advance of a glacier.

What got me thinking about this were two short news releases from the National Electrical Manufacturers Association earlier this week regarding shipments of LEDs during the third quarter of 2016 (the latest data it has available). In one, NEMA said that shipments of A-type LEDs (the most commonly used bulb for residential applications) topped 30 percent of the total for the first time, continuing a surge that has seen its market share climb from essentially zero just two years ago.

In the second, NEMA pointed out that it had added so-called T-LEDs to its statistics tracking shipments of the linear fluorescent tubes (marketed largely as T5, T8 and T12, which denote their diameter in eighths of an inch) that dominate the commercial and big box retail markets.  In the third quarter, NEMA said, T-LEDs accounted from 12.8 percent of all shipments in this category—almost double the 1st quarter results, the first time NEMA even included the segment in its quarterly report. As with the A-line LEDs, sales of T-LEDs were essentially nonexistent in 2014.

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 Green Power Revolution
 Grinds Forward,
 An Unstoppable Glacier

EIA 2017 Outlook
 Shows Energy Transition
 Will Trump Trump

The Energy Information Administration’s Annual Energy Outlook is always chock full of interesting data, and the 2017 version, released uncommonly early last week, is certainly no exception. For its part, EIA highlighted the prospect of the U.S. becoming a net energy exporter in the near future, a far cry from the import-dependent years that drove policymakers crazy in the late 1900s and early 2000s. But from my perspective, the key takeaways can be found in EIA’s analysis of electric sector market shares in a reference case including the outgoing Obama administration’s climate change-fighting Clean Power Plan and a second case assuming the CPP is withdrawn, as the incoming president and his team have said they intend to do.

For starters, regardless of its assumptions, EIA sees no growth going forward for the nuclear power industry. In both its reference case, which incorporates the CPP and should, as a result, favor the construction of non-carbon emitting generation resources, and its no-CPP case, EIA comes up with the same results. Nuclear generation is expected to decline slowly from now through 2040—falling from 797 billion kilowatt-hours in 2016 to 701 billion kwh in 2040 as units are retired (either due to economic or age-related reasons) and no new reactors (save the four currently under construction in Georgia and South Carolina) are brought online.  [Charts showing the generation outlook in both cases are included below; the complete EIA Outlook can be found here.]

Continue reading EIA 2017 Outlook
 Shows Energy Transition
 Will Trump Trump