Energy Law

The French government has agreed to invest ?1.35bn in a renewable energy and green chemistry demonstration programme.

The main objective of the new demonstrateurs energies renouvelables et chimie verte initiative is to promote the development of innovative technologies and low carbon organisations.

Only projects at the stage of industrial research and demonstration will be supported under the new regime, which aims to provide finance links in the chain of innovation in order to spur experimental research and promote the deployment of promising new energy systems.

Gov. Chris Christie signed a bill to promote offshore wind energy on Thursday.

The bipartisan measure is intended to spur economic growth in the Garden State through the development of renewable energy resources and the creation of green jobs.

The legislation will establish an offshore wind renewable energy certificate program (OREC) and will make available financial assistance and tax credits from existing programs for businesses that construct manufacturing, assemblage and water access facilities to support the development of qualified offshore wind projects.

A developer of tidal power in the nation's northeastern corner is reporting success with its first commercial-sized underwater turbine, putting it on track to have one connected to the power grid by the end of 2011, officials said Wednesday.

Ocean Renewable Power Co. describes its proprietary 60-kilowatt turbine generator as the largest ocean energy power plant ever installed in U.S. waters.

So far, the unit has met or exceeded specifications for power in testing this year in the waters of eastern Maine, said Chris Sauer, president and CEO.

A part of Ohio's energy future is emerging in a tiny farming town about 100 miles southwest of Cleveland.

There, a subsidiary of a large New Jersey utility has constructed a "solar farm" on more than 80 acres of county-owned land that grew soybeans until last year. Since April, the glass and silicon farm has "harvested" the sun.

The PSEG Wyandot Solar Farm consists of 159,200 solar panels -- nearly every one of them made by First Solar of Perrysburg. Together they generate up to 12 million watts, or 12 megawatts, when the sun is shinning.

Demand for solar electricity rose 50 percent in the past 12 months in Georgia, Public Service Commission Chairman Lauren "Bubba" McDonald announced this morning.

The rise comes in Georgia Power Company's Green Energy Program in which customers pay extra for blocks of electricity each month that is generated from renewable sources. Over most of the life of the program, the main renewable source was gas captured from landfills, but a recent PSC policy change required the utility to boost the amount of solar to 50 percent.