The medium voltage devices simply clamp on the cable, and measure voltage and current without a connection to ground or a phase-to-phase connection. There is no penetration of cable voltage insulation. (It is not applicable to coax or multiple conductor configurations--only single unshielded cables.)

We first heard about this company at the Environmental Capital Network Forum in San Francisco last winter. At that time, they had planned to discuss only the first technology, but decided at the last minute to present the second one also. There has been a lot of progress since then.

As a result of recommendations from stakeholders at a workshop on removing technical, regulatory and institutional barriers to distributed power, held in December 1998, a Distributed Power Program was initiated at the Department of Energy to address these barriers.

Science Magazine's recent (July 30) issue is a special edition with a major series of articles on Energy. Here are the table of contents, abstracts, and full text of the lead articles, which I downloaded from their website.

Terry Peterson of EPRI sends out several notes a week to an email list, where he comments on current events in renewable energy. It's primarily for EPRI members, but temporary 'free preview' subscriptions are available and he's added my name to the list in anticipation of my supplying him reciprocal information.

The above two reports were submitted to staff by a collaborative effort of parties including utilities and manufacturers of distributed generation technologies as well as other interested parties. These reports were submitted in response to the Chairman's request, that staff strive to standardize and streamline existing interconnection requirements.

In simple terms, Media Fusion's Advanced Sub-Carrier Modulation™ process writes data within the electrical magnetic wave surrounding the power line, utilizing proprietary software and hardware. This then enables the electrical power grid to carry telephone, radio, video, Internet and satellite data to any destination at near light-speed.

There's an aggressive schedule to put together a DR standards document for submission to the IEEE Standards Board -- to have a final draft ready by March 2000. Overall, this is a huge undertaking. According to one estimate, there are at least 18,000 "combinations," considering the number of different kinds of distribution circuits, inverter types, size ranges, and "issues" to address.

Commercial buildings alone consume about 15% of all energy at a cost of $85 billion annually. Half of this consumption is wasted, compared to what is cost-effectively achievable. To realize these savings requires a careful examination of the process by which buildings are designed, built, commissioned, and operated, using a life-cycle approach.

A new lightweight, inexpensive, accurate carbon monoxide (CO) sensor and monitoring system has been developed by scientists LBNL and Quantum Group Incorporated (QGI, San Diego), under a cooperative R&D agreement (CRADA).

LBNL has begun a new and novel area of inquiry, exploring how energy relates to insurance-loss risks. The program is opening a number of fascinating new areas, and opening lines of communication between the insurance industry and the many different players in energy and environment.

In March 1999, Energy Minister John Battle set out the Government's blueprint for the future of renewables, reaffirming its commitment to developing the industry and boosting research and development expenditure to £43 million over the next three years.

Material Integrity Solutions, Inc., specializes in mechanical and structural analysis and design of complex components for a number of industries including power generation, gas transmission, electronics, and manufacturing.

This article by our friend Mark Mills appeared in World Climate Report, and again (modified) in the June 1 issue of Public Utility Fortnightly. A good reality check on the rhetoric of distributed generation. I especially like the point that there's no "Moore's Law" for electric power generation.