Here's the text of a brochure for an upcoming conference on Distributed Generation. It's put on by a company that does conferences, and they seem to have done a good job assembling the players in DG, and put together an interesting agenda.

As part of its response to this legislation, the Department of Energy issued a procurement through its State Energy Program office for up to $1.2 million in cost-shared projects, with the Department's share being 25% of the cost, awarded in the form of a grant.

In Order Nos. 888 and 889 and their progeny (1) , the Commission established the fundamental principles of non- discriminatory open access transmission services. Nevertheless, many issues remain to be addressed if the Nation is to fully realize the benefits of open access and more competitive electric markets.

A reminder that this weekly service is available from DOE. Anyone can request to be added to the email distribution list. (Only a small portion of the current list is shown in the note below.) Notice the coming availability on DOE's website.

The ESA has listened to its membership and is being responsive to what the membership says it wants from the ESA. In our survey of ESA members over the last few months, the number one thing you want from the ESA is promotion and a forum so that potential customers are aware of the value and opportunities for including energy storage.

Here's the preliminary agenda for the ESA's upcoming spring meeting, April 7,8 in Phoenix. I am tentatively planning to attend at least a part of the meeting. Hope to see you there.

Last Oct 8, Nortel and Norweb in the UK made a big announcement about a breakthrough in putting data over the powerline at up to 1 megabit/sec. UFTO Notes on Oct 8 and 22 supplied information that was available at that time.

Attached for your information are four draft papers that will be discussed by the DOE Task Force on Electric System Reliability at their meeting on March 10 at the ANA Hotel in Washington, D.C.

At our June meeting in SF last year, there was a strong consensus behind the idea to revisit some of the Labs that we first went to several years ago. I've already gone to Sandia, and am beginning to put the plans in place for other Labs.

Brookhaven National Lab and WR Grace issued a major joint press release last December (attached below) announcing the development of a new commercially available treatment process that changes the chemical makeup of chrysotile asbestos. This is the type of asbestos used in fireproof coatings on structural steel.

The electric power industry is in the midst of a complex transition to competition, which will induce many far-reaching changes in the structure of the industry and the institutions which regulate it. This transition raises many reliability issues, as new entities emerge in the power markets and as generation becomes less integrated with transmission.

Sandia has received funding to work with utilities interested in teaming with the solar industry to install solar systems in their territory. The team will provide technical expertise to the utility in selecting technologies and, if warranted, work with industry partners to improve their systems.

Have a look at the UFTO Website. There've been some changes.

This report details findings about technology and technology transfer opportunities at the Wright Laboratories that might be of strategic interest to electric utilities. It is based on a visit to the lab in June 1997 and subsequent contacts, as part of the UFTO multiclient project.