Dive Brief: All regions of the North American electric grid are expected to have sufficient resources under normal operating and weather conditions this summer, but some may face supply shortfall risks during periods of extreme heat, the North American Electric Reliability Corp. said Wednesday in its annual 2025 Summer Reliability Assessment. Peak demand across NERC’s 23 assessment areas is forecast to increase by 10 GW since summer 2024, “more than double the increase from 2023 to 2024,” NERC said in a news release. Data centers, electrification, and industrial growth are driving demand higher. The addition of solar, wind and battery resources, frequently referred to as inverter-based resources, or IBRs, is also creating risks, the assessment states, as they have been known to trip offline during grid disturbances. NERC plans to issue an alert in the next month regarding modeling deficiencies and technical requirements to integrate more IBRs into bulk power system, officials said. Dive Insight: New solar, wind and batteries resources are helping to meet rapidly increasing load growth. Those additions offset generator retirements, but the rise in variable IBRs also injects “complexity and energy limitations” into the system, NERC said. “While we’re adding a lot more resources — solar, batteries and other emerging technologies — the pace and performance of that build-out doesn’t yet fully align with the reliability needs of a rapidly electrifying economy,” John Moura, NERC’s director of reliability assessments and performance analysis, told reporters during a discussion of the analysis. “That said, there are some encouraging signs this summer. It’s a welcome contrast to what we’ve seen during winter seasons,” Moura added. He noted that solar and batteries tend to underperform during colder months, and fuel supply limitations, especially for natural gas, create “far more serious risks.” The Midcontinent Independent System Operator region has less supply capacity than it did last

U.S. officials have discovered undisclosed communication devices on the power inverters of some Chinese-manufactured solar panels, Reuters reported today based on anonymous sources within the federal government.  The inverters are part of the hardware package connecting solar arrays to the power grid. The package includes communication devices so technicians can monitor performance and have remote access for maintenance. These devices are disclosed in what’s called a software bill of materials – a listing of the components that comprise the package. The communication devices uncovered by the government are considered rogue because they’re undisclosed.  These devices “provide additional, undocumented communication channels that could allow firewalls to be circumvented remotely, with potentially catastrophic consequences,” Reuters reported the sources as saying.  Inverters are also included in other types of energy hardware, including batteries and heat pumps, and officials have found undisclosed devices in some of those as well.  “Over the past nine months, undocumented communication devices, including cellular radios, have … been found in some batteries from multiple Chinese suppliers,” the report said. Security risk Chinese companies are the biggest manufacturers of power inverters, used by manufacturers of solar panels, wind turbines and other types of renewable power components around the world.  The devices raise security concerns because Chinese companies are required by law to cooperate with their government’s intelligence agencies, giving those agencies control over Chinese-made inverters that connect to foreign grids, security experts told Reuters.  That could enable the Chinese government to skirt firewalls and switch off the inverters remotely, or change their settings, destabilizing power grids, damaging energy infrastructure and triggering blackouts, the Reuters report said.  “That effectively means there is a built-in way to physically destroy the grid,” one of the unnamed sources told Reuters.  One such incident occurred in November, when solar power inverters in the U.S. and

Several solar companies – including Hanwha Qcells, Trinasolar and LONGi – have recently announced breakthroughs in tandem solar cell technology, combining traditional silicon photovoltaic technology with perovskite to increase efficiency. Perovskite is inexpensive compared to silicon, but has less stable chemistry, which has historically presented scalability and commercialization challenges. However, Qcells announced May 14 that its tandem solar cells have reached a key stability milestone, achieving “successful stress test validation for its tandem modules according to both [International Electrotechnical Commission] and [Underwriters Laboratories] certification standards.” “These tests also complied with tandem-specific requirements for power measurements, making them a key first in the industry,” Qcells said. “The standard-compliant execution of the stress tests and measurements has been independently confirmed by TÜV Rheinland.” A tandem solar cell uses stacked layers of different materials to capture a wider range of the solar spectrum, allowing modules to bypass the Shockley–Queisser limit, a theoretical limit which prevents cells that only use one material from absorbing any more than 30% of the solar energy that shines on them. “The tested cells and modules are typical devices from our [research and development] pilot line in Germany and have been fabricated by exclusively using processes that are feasible for mass production,” said Fabian Fertig, head of tandem R&D at Qcells Germany, in a company release. “This result is laying the groundwork for future commercialization of this exciting technology.” Qcells was founded in Germany and is headquartered in South Korea but has substantial investments in the U.S., including a panel manufacturing facility in Cartersville, Georgia.  Chinese company Trinasolar announced March 28 that it had developed the “world’s first industrial-standard solar PV module delivering over 800W of maximum power,” in the form of perovskite/silicon tandem solar cells with an industrial standard size of 210mm and a peak power output of

The Port of Aberdeen boosted turnover by 10.5% to £50.7 million in 2024, despite headwinds facing the energy sector. Chief executive Bob Sanguinetti said that, with the right policy and investment support, the UK’s oldest port “can become an international hub for offshore wind”. He said the energy market has shifted due to the impact of the North Sea windfall tax, AKA the Energy Profits Levy (EPL) on oil and gas operators’ profits. Services firm DeepOcean decommissioned the North Sea’s largest subsea isolation valve – a 440 tonne safety device used in oil and gas operations located next to BP’s Miller oil field – offloading it onto a quay at the port’s South Harbour in 2024. However, Sanguinetti warned that consenting delays to offshore wind projects are hampering the energy transition. “While this new operational landscape is exciting, it also remains uncertain, and this uncertainty shapes our outlook for 2025 and beyond,” he said. “While our foundations are strong, the market is changing. Oil and gas activity – which accounts for almost two thirds of our revenue – is being impacted by the EPL and wavering investor confidence, while delays to consenting and grid connections are affecting timelines for offshore wind.” The Port of Aberdeen said in a statement that revenue performance and “careful cost management” drove growth in its full year of operations after opening the £420 million Aberdeen South Harbour in September 2023. The number of vessels arriving at the port rose by 2.6% to 7,128 in 2024. Passenger numbers rose by 2.8% during the period to 207,317, as the port said its diversification strategy across energy, trade and tourism “continued apace” in 2024. Cruise traffic was more than one million gross tonnes of vessel throughput, bringing 24,000 guests to the region. This came as the port increased

In case you missed it, the Department of Energy issued a notice to Harvard University this week terminating approximately $89 million in grant funding from DOE’s Office of Science and Advanced Research Projects Agency – Energy due to the University’s policy of racial discrimination. This cancellation from DOE resulted in an immediate savings of $7 million to the American taxpayer and was issued in coordination with the Joint Task Force to Combat Anti-Semitism’s letter to Harvard University announcing the termination of $450 million in grants from eight government agencies in addition to $2.2 billion that was previously frozen by the Trump Administration. Excerpts of DOE’s letters to Harvard President Dr. Alan Garber are below: DOE understands that Harvard University (Harvard) continues to engage in race discrimination, including in its admission process, and in other areas of student life, such as access to the Law Review at Harvard Law School. We are also aware of recent events at Harvard involving antisemitic action that suggest the institution has a disturbing lack of concern for the safety and wellbeing of Jewish students. Harvard’s ongoing inaction in the face of repeated and severe harassment and targeting of Jewish students has ground day-to-day campus operations to a halt, deprived Jewish students of learning and research opportunities to which they are entitled, and brought shame upon the University and our nation as a whole. Indeed, as the Harvard Presidential Task Force on Combating Antisemitism and Anti-Israeli Bias concluded, actions at Harvard during the 2023-2024 academic year resulted in widespread abuse of Jewish and Israeli students by an institution “that mainstreamed and normalized what many Jewish and Israeli students experience as antisemitism and anti-Israeli bias.” DOE maintains a firm policy of not supporting entities, individuals or actions that engage in discrimination or which promote and condone, by action or

During Mental Health Awareness Week, the International Association of Drilling Contractors’ (IADC) boss Darren Sutherland offered advice for employers to support energy workers during a turbulent time for the industry. Speaking at the All-Energy conference in Glasgow, Sutherland addressed recent industry tensions. “We are facing difficult times, especially in the oil and gas sector, and now renewables are starting to see headwinds as well,” the IADC North Sea Chapter vice chair said. His words came soon after the announcement of mass job cuts at Harbour Energy, financial difficulties for Aberdeen’s major service firms, businesses closing their doors, and a trend of North Sea players merging their UK operations. “I think the key thing is communication,” Sutherland continued, adding “people have a higher propensity for the truth than we give them credit for”. “Open communication from leadership about what’s happening and what’s going on is definitely key.” He spoke about the importance of “having that space for people to be able to speak and talk through their challenges” as they grapple with the impacts of the uncertainty facing the energy industry. “Then again, the other thing that we need to be doing is preparing our workforces for these future challenges,” Sutherland explained. He touched on the importance of ensuring workers are prepared for the worst case scenario. He asked attendees at the ‘Challenges and Successes of Addressing Mental Health in the Energy Industry’ panel how many of them had spoken with a financial adviser. “I’m not talking about your company budget, I’m talking about your bank funds,” Sutherland said. One member of the audience, and Sutherland’s fellow speaker, Alex Morton, of the Marine Safety Forum, raised their hands. He explained that during a time of peak inflation, his business brought in a financial adviser. “It’s about giving back some of those