Jim Pierobon is Founder and principal writer of The Energy Fix. He is a policy, marketing and social media strategist who has reported on, testified and consulted about smarter grids, cyber-security as it affects the power grid, fossil fuel shortages, price spikes, energy efficiency and the rise and fall -- and the rise again of nuclear and renewable energy sources.With Obama’s win, cleaner energy has another chance, but these questions loom
Just because President Obama won four more years, doesn’t mean the next four will be any easier. Sure, it’s now his legacy he is beginning to focus on. But there are tall hurdles even the election results will do to change. Renewable energy developers and suppliers have a few rays of sunshine and a more [...]
Energy ‘datapalooza’ draws more apps; know the cost of that old refrigerator?
The Obama administration threw a its third datathon (my word) this week dubbed the “Energy Datapalooza.” It featured about 150 entrepreneurs, policymakers and software developers, among others, and aspired to offer ways to learn new ways to save energy and lower bills from what is supposed to be free and secure data. Government and private [...]
Green Button approaching critical mass – 27 million households now getting access to their energy data
NOW, we’re getting somewhere with the Green Button Initiative. Nine investor-owned utilities from across the country have jumped on board enabling an updated total of about 27 million households to access their electricity usage data. This is a huge step forward for motivated consumers to better understand how they can save on their energy bills [...]
Consumer energy data from the ‘Green Button’: how long before adoptions match the hype?
The White House wants it. Some California utilities get it. But will more than a few U.S. utilities sign on to help ratepayers better understand how they use electricity with one-click access to their data? One year after the Obama Administration began talking about the idea, and in the roughly six months since it formally [...]
Even without the Keystone XL Pipeline, 350 ppm of carbon dioxide is no longer achievable
Here’s one slice of irony from today’s protest against TransCanada’s proposed Keystone XL pipeline surrounding the White House: actually reducing the amount of carbon dioxide (CO2) in the atmosphere from about 389 parts per million (ppm) currently to the widely-held threshold of 350 ppm is no longer possible. The combined impacts, to name a few, [...]
Upton vs. Wall Street and EPA’s greenhouse gas emissions standards plan
Fred Upton, the incoming Chairman of the Energy and Commerce Committee in the U.S. House of Representatives, essentially declared war on the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s just-announced plan for setting limits on harmful greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from power plants and oil refiners. “We will not allow the administration to regulate what they have been [...]
Is a Smarter Grid a More Secure Grid? What if . . . ?
Just one of the many questions cyber-security experts, along with utilities and consumers, are asking as we deploy smart grid applications is: will all this interconnectivity heighten the expose of homes, businesses and governments to cyber attacks? “I’m not sure we’re paying enough attention to cyber-security,” asserts Peter Fox-Penner, a principal at the Brattle Group. [...]
White House solar panels belong on the South Lawn
The latest chapter in the tug-of-war over whether solar panels should grace the White House compound has President Obama trying to accomplish with PR what now is likely out of reach for him and the nation: either a carbon tax, a cap ‘n trade program or a national renewable electricity mandate. So now comes an [...]