Of all the power supplies in the energy mix, nuclear has historically been the most criticized and controversial. But this most unpopular of power sources has recently resurfaced in political and economic dialogue.
David Crane is a man who isn't afraid of a challenge. When he took the helm at NRG Energy in the winter of 2003, the company was mired in Chapter 11 bankruptcy proceedings -- just one of many companies caught in the meltdown of the U.S. power generation industry, instigated by the scandalous collapse of Texan power giant Enron in 2001.
Sandwiched between two nondescript commercial buildings in a vacant lot squats what looks like a long, plastic-shrouded greenhouse. Hanging nearby is a cluster of five-foot-long plastic sacks bulging with green slime that resemble intravenous drip bags for the Jolly Green Giant. It doesn't look like groundbreaking technology, but these scum bags in Cambridge, Mass., just might help save the planet.
Curt Mann's neighbors are livid, accusing him of erecting an ugly wind turbine among their historic homes for no other reason than to show off his environmental "bling."
Since it became a viable energy resource around 20 years ago, wind power has emerged as a leading renewable technology.
Halfway around the world, a zero-carbon, zero-waste, automobile-free city known as Masdar is rising from a 2.3-square mile plot of desert in Abu Dhabi.
Iran plans to link its electrical grid with neighboring Iraq as part of another "extended area of cooperation" between the countries, the Iranian president announced during his historic visit to Iraq.
Florida authorities are investigating how a small fire and a switch failure at an electrical substation outside Miami triggered a power failure that affected millions of people.
Power was restored Tuesday for most of Florida after a failed switch and fire at an electrical substation outside Miami triggered widespread blackouts across the state.
Whisky is for drinkin', water is for fightin'.
Of all the power supplies in the energy mix, nuclear has historically been the most criticized and controversial. But this most unpopular of power sources has recently resurfaced in political and economic dialogue.
David Crane is a man who isn't afraid of a challenge. When he took the helm at NRG Energy in the winter of 2003, the company was mired in Chapter 11 bankruptcy proceedings -- just one of many companies caught in the meltdown of the U.S. power generation industry, instigated by the scandalous collapse of Texan power giant Enron in 2001.
Sandwiched between two nondescript commercial buildings in a vacant lot squats what looks like a long, plastic-shrouded greenhouse. Hanging nearby is a cluster of five-foot-long plastic sacks bulging with green slime that resemble intravenous drip bags for the Jolly Green Giant. It doesn't look like groundbreaking technology, but these scum bags in Cambridge, Mass., just might help save the planet.
Curt Mann's neighbors are livid, accusing him of erecting an ugly wind turbine among their historic homes for no other reason than to show off his environmental "bling."
Since it became a viable energy resource around 20 years ago, wind power has emerged as a leading renewable technology.
Halfway around the world, a zero-carbon, zero-waste, automobile-free city known as Masdar is rising from a 2.3-square mile plot of desert in Abu Dhabi.
Iran plans to link its electrical grid with neighboring Iraq as part of another "extended area of cooperation" between the countries, the Iranian president announced during his historic visit to Iraq.
Florida authorities are investigating how a small fire and a switch failure at an electrical substation outside Miami triggered a power failure that affected millions of people.
Power was restored Tuesday for most of Florida after a failed switch and fire at an electrical substation outside Miami triggered widespread blackouts across the state.
Whisky is for drinkin', water is for fightin'.
Israel agreed Monday to relax a blockade of Gaza after fuel shortages left residents struggling with severe power cuts amid concerns from aid agencies of a humanitarian crisis.
Iran's first nuclear power plant will be operational within three months, providing electricity to Iran's national power grid by the summer, according to Iranian Energy Minister Parviz Fattah.
Coal is almost the perfect fuel. It's cheap and absurdly abundant -- especially in the United States, which has the world's larges reserves. There's just that tiny problem of massive climate-altering carbon dioxide emissions. Or is there?
Widespread anxiety about the damaging effects of burning fossil fuels, coupled with a genuine fear that oil and gas will become scarce before the century ends are fueling a renewed interest in renewable energy and, in particular, solar power solutions.
A typical exchange about wind farms tends to go like this: 'Are you in favor of wind farms?' 'Yes, of course I am...so long as they're nowhere near my house'. Nevertheless, wind turbines are fast-becoming an important piece in the energy puzzle, contributing a growing percentage to our overall energy needs.
There's no place like home -- especially when it comes to affecting the environment, it seems.
In the two years since Stefano (Steve) Bertamini moved to Shanghai to become CEO of GE China, he has a sense that the days are less smoggy and more sunny.
American Electric Power has agreed to install $4.6 billion in equipment to sharply reduce emissions at coal-fired power plants in five states, the Justice Department announced Tuesday.
In the largest environmental settlement in Justice Department history, American Electric Power has agreed to install $4.6 billion in equipment to sharply reduce emissions at coal-fired power plants in five states, sources said.
Two pieces of land in this fast-growing suburb south of downtown San Diego are suitable for an NFL stadium, according to a study released Thursday that was funded by the San Diego Chargers.
A unit at a Bulgarian nuclear power station on the Danube River underwent an emergency shutdown Saturday, facility operators said.
James Bond would be lost without them -- those madcap gadgets merging two technologies that help him beat the bad guys and save the planet. The underwater watch with a built-in Geiger counter, for example; or the car that doubles as a submarine; or the exploding bagpipes and missile-launching wheelchair.
One thing I've learned on my 7,000 mile journey through America's nuclear past and present is that when you're driving around scouting for a power plant -- any kind of power plant -- first locate the high-voltage transmission lines. (If you stand directly under those lines, sometimes you can hear the electricity cackle and spatter like rain drops on the roof.)
"We were at heightened security - we were at red," recalls Al Griffith, spokesman for the utility that owns the Seabrook Nuclear Power Plant in New Hampshire.
The magnitude 6.8 earthquake that hit on Monday morning is rocking the country's faith in its nuclear power plants
Fueled by climate change concern and a Texas utility's recent scrapping of several "dirty" power plants, one environmental group is looking to cut funding for new coal fired power plants at the source: the big banks.
President Bush Thursday said U.S. utilities could build up to 30 new nuclear power plants and could start construction by 2010 in order to keep up with growing electricity demand without spurring more global warming.
Clouds hang low over the New Mexico desert, deep inside a military reservation a dozen miles south of Albuquerque. A breeze stirs the air; tumbleweeds roll by. Then the sun shines through and a low...
U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's plan to make the U.S. Capitol complex more environmentally friendly is being hampered by the reluctance of lawmakers from coal-producing states to implement changes at the complex's coal-burning power plant.
With global warming on everyone's mind, combined with a slew of electronic gadgets consuming more and more electricity, there's a greater need than ever for clean coal technology in the United States.
Wind. Biomass. Solar.
Ethanol may be the hot topic when it comes to plant-based power, but it's certainly not alone in the biofuels arena.
THE BACKGROUND Carbon dioxide makes up nearly 80% of all greenhouse gases. More than a quarter of that CO2 comes from electrical power plants. That's why replacing plants that run on fossil fuels l...
Most people don't spend an hour gabbing on their cell phone in the middle of the day. It's just too expensive.
China, known worldwide for its smog-choked cities and rising status as global-superpolluter, may be cleaning up its act.
Big lumps of sooty coal hardly seem like the future of energy, but that's exactly what the U.S. Department of Energy predicts. Consumption of the fossil fuel --the main source of greenhouse gas and a major contributor to acid rain, smog and mercury poisoning --will hit 10.6 billion tons a year by 2030, a near doubling of the 5.4 billion tons burned in 2003, according to the agency.
Nuclear power plants will not be required to put up defenses against terrorist attacks from the air, according to a rule enacted Monday by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
The background: Carbon dioxide makes up nearly 80 percent of all greenhouse gases. More than a quarter of that CO2 comes from electrical power plants. That's why replacing plants that run on fossil fuels like coal, oil, and natural gas with renewable power sources, even nukes, has emerged as a major plank in the campaign against global warming.
If you wanted to choose the perfect location for capturing the ocean's energy, you couldn't do much better than the Oregon coast. Waves arrive there with immense power, having traveled across thousands of miles of open water with few barrier islands, reefs or other obstructions to slow them down.
ExxonMobil delivered its annual long term energy forecast Tuesday, saying that it expects the world will use 60% more energy in 2030 than in did in 2000. But despite this spike in demand, the oil giant does not expect to see any increase in the use of renewable energy sources from 2006 levels.
When a new product from Microsoft debuts, it doesn't arrive quietly. Instead it gets tracked through the R&D pipeline by trade magazines, bloggers and carefully controlled announcements from the ma...
A look at the best innovations coming from small businesses next year.
Can a coal-fired power plant completely eliminate carbon-dioxide emissions? That's what Swedish energy company Vattenfall is hoping to prove with a pilot project under construction in Germany that...
European members of the U.N. Security Council have proposed sanctions that would target Iran's nuclear and ballistic missile program, including a ban on the sale of technology and material related to those programs and a freeze of financial assets of officials involved in those programs.
While the U.S. hems and haws over reviving nuclear energy as a less expensive alternative to oil, Russia has dug back 30 years in our nuclear history to find a solution for some of its own energy woes: the floating nuclear power plant.
Rattling down a red dirt road on the edge of the Australian outback, Roger Davey hits the brakes and hops out of a rented Corolla. With a sweep of his arm, he surveys his domain - 24,000 acres of e...
CNN.com asked users for their ideas on the best way to fuel America and break the country's dependence on fossil fuels, especially from foreign sources. Here is a sampling of the responses, some of which have been edited:
Who wouldn't want to help the environment while increasing the value of their business and lowering their expenses?
Commercial satellite photos indicate Iran has begun to expand its nuclear fuel plants and has buried one beneath dozens of feet of earth and concrete, a U.S.-based nuclear watchdog group reports.
SOARING WAREHOUSES with minimalist decor, textile factories transformed into chic spaces for the wealthy and stylish ... these days there's really nothing that unusual about real estate makeovers.
TRADING
Energy company AGL will spend Aust. $236 million ($177 million) to build Australia's largest wind farm.
When Seamus Herron and his brother John inherited 1,100 acres of rugged farmland in Donegal, Ireland, in the 1970s, neither was sure whether it was a blessing or a curse. The northern tip of Irelan...
Four explosions struck a new, soon-to-be-operational electrical power plant in northern Spain on Tuesday, shortly after warning calls were made in the name of the Basque separatist group ETA, a Basque regional police spokesman told CNN.
On a raw winter afternoon, the training manager at Cooper Nuclear Station, a power plant run by Entergy Corp. on the bleak plains of eastern Nebraska, sits across a conference table from his boss, ...
The answer to global warming may be blowing in the wind. It's probably also driving on four wheels and could be in your next tank of gas.
ON A FREEZING, PRISTINE DAY, WITH the Bighorn Mountains shining nearly 100 miles away across the Wyoming prairie, a huge dragline with an arm longer than a football field gulps 100 cubic yards of r...
The U.S. economy runs on cheap, abundant fossil fuels--but that can't last. Even if supplies of oil, coal, and natural gas were unlimited, burning them in mass quantities generates greenhouse gases...
Tony Rogers is a member of the rosebud Sioux tribe who lives on the tribe's South Dakota reservation. He doesn't have an engineering degree, hasn't worked for a power station, and has never investe...
When you hear the term "green business," a plastics manufacturer probably isn't the first thing that comes to mind. But then, Harbec Plastics of Ontario, N.Y., is a little unusual. You can see the ...
Spark wants to hear from you. Are you passionate about technology? What topics do you want to learn more about? What sort of technology advances would make your life better?
Imagine trading stocks with no data about other people's transactions and no news about the companies whose shares you're buying—no Dow Jones, no Bloomberg, no Maria Bartiromo. That's what it was l...
Outside, it's another warm summer afternoon in Madison, Pa., a forested suburb 30 miles southeast of Pittsburgh. Inside—in a brightly lit Westinghouse control room packed with computer monitors, sc...
Rick Priory was on top of the world. It was early 2002, and as CEO of Duke Energy he had taken a conservative electric utility and plunged it headlong into the newly deregulated power market. Durin...
Two Russian civilian contractors have been killed in Iraq and five wounded after gunmen opened fire on their bus, according to a hospital official and a statement from Russia's Foreign Ministry in Moscow.
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission failed to identify and prevent corrosion at an Ohio nuclear plant more than two years ago, an oversight that was the most serious safety incident since the 1979 Three Mile Island disaster, according to a report released Tuesday by the investigative arm of Congress.
Dangling from the claws of a remote-controlled robot, the spent nuclear fuel rods look strangely impotent. Only the heat waves shimmering around the metal tubes give any clue to the radioactivity ...
A Reliant Resources Inc. subsidiary and four of its officers were indicted on charges of manipulating California energy markets, the Justice Department announced Thursday.
There was never much question that one of the first companies President Bush and his administration would call on to help with the vital task of rebuilding Iraq would be Bechtel Group.
Six people are dead after around 50 rebels attacked a power station south of the Philippine capital of Manila with grenade launchers and machine guns.
As the luncheon at the swank Miami resort begins, Mary Tolan takes a seat and braces herself. After weeks of frantic preparation, Tolan, a superstar at the big consulting firm Accenture, has just u...
You'd think that by now--in this annus horribilis for the once highflying energy-trading sector--all the bad news would have come out. The sham trades that boosted revenues have been exposed. The s...
"Two offers at 150."
A few years back, Duke Energy CEO Rick Priory left Charlotte, N.C., and headed north to make one of his periodic pitches to Wall Street. As far as Priory was concerned, he had a pretty exciting sto...
On the western edge of the vast Nevada Test Site, where hundreds of nuclear weapons have been detonated, lies a dusty ridgeline known as Yucca Mountain. Located in a desert region of north-south mo...
As far back as Jules Verne, visionaries have predicted that society will someday be utterly transformed by energy based on hydrogen. The lightweight gas, the most abundant element in the universe, ...
Who has the toughest job in President Bush's cabinet? These days I'd say it's Secretary of Energy Spencer Abraham.
It's tempting to laugh at all those Californians shivering in their hot tubs when their power goes out. But the reality of what's happening in America's most technologically advanced state isn't fu...
California's power crisis has left even die-hard free-market types wondering whether electricity deregulation makes sense. For reassurance, visit an office park in Valley Forge, Pa. That's the home...
When it comes to big-time economic disasters, it can be hard to specify exactly when "the situation" turned into "the crisis" and "the crisis" into "the catastrophe." Nonetheless, there always come...
About a year ago Jason Selch, an analyst for Liberty Wanger Asset Management, had a eureka moment. Energy prices were soaring, and Dynegy, a Houston-based wholesaler of electricity and natural gas,...
As a provider of electricity, London's Bankside Power Station was a flop. First fired up in 1963, it shut down 18 years later because its power source, oil, was too expensive. Designed by Giles Gil...
Imagine a country-club dinner dance, with a bunch of old fogies and their wives shuffling around halfheartedly to the not-so-stirring sounds of Guy Lombardo and his All-Tuxedo Orchestra. Suddenly y...
It seems so incredibly obvious you want to slap your forehead for being so obtuse all these years. Electric power costs a bundle in places like New York and California but barely a third as much in...
The best-performing utility stock over the past 12 months is California's Edison International, up 61%; the worst performing, Texas' Central & South West, is down 26%.
Kenneth Lay skied down Ajax Mountain in Aspen, Colorado, on a cold dark afternoon last December, blissfully unaware that the stock of his Houston-based energy conglomerate was taking an even steepe...
Q. Quick, now. In what city has a Baby Bell made a 300% return on money it invested about two years ago? A. Bangkok.
WESTERN INVESTORS have poured some $15 billion into Eastern Europe in the five years since the Berlin Wall came down, but not everyone is happy. General Electric had to put an additional $400 milli...
Will Parish is in a dirty business. His company, National Energy Associates, runs a power plant in California's Imperial Valley that burns pasture patties -- a.k.a. cow chips, a.k.a. bovine dung. E...
HERE'S A TEST of your investment acumen. You have a choice of buying stock in one of two companies. Do you believe in return on shareholders' equity? For 1988, Company A had an ROE of 22%; Company ...
DEEP IN THEIR HEARTS, utility men love to build generating plants. Big boilers, broad dams, tall stacks. Power for the nation. And this is the time when utilities would normally be starting a new r...
ON A BLISTERING July morning in the year 2010, Kyle O. Watt of Kansas City flips on the television news and sits down to breakfast with Mrs. Watt and the two little Watts. As they gulp cold orange ...
THE FIRST NUCLEAR power plant in the Philippines sits on a verdant bluff overlooking the South China Sea, just off the road where U.S. soldiers marched to their death under the bayonets of Japanese...
NUCLEAR POWER was not a wonderful business to be in even before the disaster at Chernobyl. It now figures to become a lot less wonderful for utilities. Several companies that build and service nucl...
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