Coating developer wins best-practices award

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Excerpt: Hempel’s accomplishments in the protective-coatings market for wind turbines have won the company the 2011 Frost & Sullivan Product Line Strategy Award. Business research and consulting firm  Frost & Sullivan’s Best Practices Award recognises outstanding achievement and superior perform …

Ontarians say wind one of the safest forms of electricity generation

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Excerpt: A high 78% of Ontarians say wind energy is one of the safest forms of electricity generation according to a recent Oracle Research poll commissioned by the Canadian Wind Energy Association (CanWEA). The poll was conducted between February 22 to 29 and has a margin for error of ±3.1%, 19 times out o …

Electronics assembler acquires custom wire firm

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Excerpt: ETI, through its subsidiary American Cable & Harness LLC (ACH), Fort Atkinson, Wisc., has acquired the assets of CMK Enterprises Inc. and Calmer Industries LLC, Eagle, Wisc., a supplier for wire processing, custom wire, and cable-harness assembly, and UL 508A control box design and assembly. The …

Quantifying the cost obstacles for windpower (and solar)

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Excerpt: The low cost of natural gas gets frequent mention in reports and releases because the fuel brings a new low price to the production of electricity. Bloomberg Energy (Bloomberg.com/energy/) tracks the cost for fuels, and on May 2, posted a price of about $2.28/million Btus. What are the implicati …

Start-up sees future in wind-turbine gearbox repairs

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Excerpt: A new company, Gearbox Express (GBX), along with state and local public officials, recently celebrated the official grand opening of its new 43,000 ft2 facility in Mukwonago, Wisconsin. The company says it is the only one in North America focused on providing independent, down-tower, wind-gearbo …

Finally, we have bipartisan support!

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Excerpt: In some of my past show recaps, you'll sense my frustration with the dissent between parties over renewable energy decisions—particularly the PTC. One former member of FERC noted at a recent wind event that Democrats and Republicans used to agree on clean-energy policy until, basically, Solyndra. …

EPA tools screen contaminated and underutilized sites for renewable energy potential

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Excerpt: Finding ideal sites for solar and wind projects can be challenging, especially for those who lack technical expertise. But Bloomberg reports that the EPA and Energy Department have made this easier by offering new tools for evaluating commercial and industrial rooftops, parking lots, and contaminate …

Report on community and residential energy storage

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Excerpt: Community and residential energy storage systems (CRES) usually sit at the “end of the line” on the grid. These systems are typically much smaller than utility-scale or bulk energy storage and are either situated at the distribution transformer or on the customer premise. Of the varied applicati …

Software efficiently, realistically simulates composite wind turbine blades

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Excerpt: Allan Wood, President and CEO of AnalySwift As wind-turbine manufacturers seek additional ways to reduce costs and improve performance, greater focus has turned to improving modeling techniques as a way to reliably predict wind-turbine behavior prior to expensive prototyping and testing. In parti …

Demand for ultracaps keeps manufacturer busy

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Excerpt: Maxwell Technologies Inc. is outfitting a new ultracapacitor electrode production facility that will double the company’s current electrode capacity by year end, and is increasing internal and outsourced assembly capabilities to ensure that it can meet rapidly increasing worldwide demand for ultra …