Alternative Energy

The fossil fuel divestiture campaign GoFossilFree equates the end of oil, gas and coal to the great moral crusades of our time — Apartheid and tobacco — while hoping to reduce demand for fossil fuel stocks and thereby threaten their stock prices.

Electric utilities are facing a need and opportunity to transform their business due to the bidirectional nature of distributed generation and energy storage. This is just one of several fundamental changes that the smart cities movement is driving to reshape how fundamental services are delivered and managed.

In the latest Build 100 Blog article, John Gϋlen, senior principal engineer at Bechtel, explores clean power-generation solutions for customers and countries that base their energy consumption on fossil fuels.

Chief Sustainability Officer, Cindy Ortega, discusses our latest decision to improve our renewable energy portfolio.

Cities across the globe have followed multiple tracks in their quest to become “smart.” It isn’t a question of right or wrong. However, two key themes are emerging in their approach – either start with a pilot project that produces quick results, or undertake a comprehensive master plan that strategically lays out the coming years and decades.

It used to be that the quality of infrastructure was measured by its lifespan. Water systems might last a century, and power plants at least half that. Those were measurements of solid assets, well worth the investment. But today, dependable infrastructure is just not enough. While it must be resilient and have an extended life cycle, now it must also be intelligent and communicate with other systems in ways that were unknown only a few years ago.

Grid parity is when new solar and wind farms cost less than new natural gas power plants, even without subsidies. And we might already be there.