EnergyOnline
Services

RSS FEED

EnergyOnline.com rss

News

MISO Long-Term Nodal Insights

LCG, November 12, 2025--LCG Consulting is excited to announce the release of the MISO 2034 Data Model, built from the latest MISO Transmission Expansion Plan (MTEP). This powerful, nodal-level data model offers a forward-looking view of generation, transmission, and load forecasts across the MISO region—empowering energy professionals to explore the grid of the future with confidence.

Read more

Xcel Energy and "Allies" Request Retirement Extension for Comanche Generating Station Unit 2

LCG, November 12, 2025--Xcel Energy, together with the Utility Consumer Advocate (UCA), Colorado Energy Office (CEO), and Trial Staff of the Public Utilities Commission (PUC), filed a petition on November 10 requesting Commission approval to keep Comanche Generating Station Unit 2 available for up to one additional year after its currently planned retirement on December 31, 2025.

Read more

Industry News

CPUC Approves 150-MW solar-Thermal Project in California

LCG, January 25, 2013--The California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) approved a power purchase agreement (PPA) for PG&E Corp., the owner of California?s largest utility, to receive power from a 150-MW solar-thermal project in California?s Sonoran Desert.

The developer of the Solar Rice Energy Project is SolarReserve LLC., and the term of the PPA is 25 years, commencing June 1, 2016. SolarReserve originally announced the agreement with PG&E in December 2009.

The solar project will be constructed on approximately 1,500 acres of private land near Blythe. The project will use a concentrated solar power (CSP) design with molten salt storage technology from Pratt & Whitney Rocketdyne.

Thousands of mirrors will focus sunlight onto a central tower containing molten salt, which is heated from 500 to over 1,000 degrees Fahrenheit. When electricity is needed, day or night, the high-temperature molten salt flows into the steam generator, as water is piped in from the water storage tank, to generate steam. After the steam is used to drive the steam turbine to generate power, the steam is condensed back to water and returned to the water holding tank, where it flows back into the steam generator when needed.

Once the hot salt is used to create steam, the cooled molten salt is then piped back into the cold salt storage tank, where it will then flow back up the receiver to be reheated as the process continues.

The molten salt system includes as much as 10 hours of energy-storage capability. The estimated cost is approximately $600 million, and construction may begin early next year, according to the CEO of SolarReserve.

In September 2011, SolarReserve began construction in Nevada on a similar project, the 110-MW Crescent Dunes Project, which is scheduled to be completed late this year.
Copyright © 2025 LCG Consulting. All rights reserved. Terms and Copyright
UPLAN-NPM
The Locational Marginal Price Model (LMP) Network Power Model
Uniform Storage Model
A Battery Simulation Model
UPLAN-ACE
Day Ahead and Real Time Market Simulation
UPLAN-G
The Gas Procurement and Competitive Analysis System
PLATO
Database of Plants, Loads, Assets, Transmission...
CAISO CRR Auctions
Monthly Price and Congestion Forecasting Service