Bentley Systems Inc., Exton, Pa., released an information model-based product for electrical substation design. Bentley Substation V8i integrates two- and three-dimensional tools and can shift from schematic line drawings to 3-D object views on the fly. Reports and bills-of-materials can be generated from the data as required. It draws on a database of more than 2 million electrical parts. Three-D modeling helps optimize site layout, integrates with Bentley’s Project Wise system and is priced at $15,000 a seat.
Work is to begin in mid-August on a $3.4-billion, 1,000-mile crude-oil pipeline from northern Canada to Superior, Wis., says Canadian owner Enbridge Inc., Edmonton, Alberta. Enbridge is burying a 36-in. pipe that will carry 450,000 barrels of crude oil daily, with a 326-mile U.S. route running from North Dakota to Wisconsin. The project will run parallel to another 20-in. pipeline that was constructed in 2009. The project was awarded to U.S. Pipeline, Houston, and Precision Pipeline of Wisconsin.
A clean-coal project abandoned by the Dept. of Energy last year is coming back to life with DOE’s Record of Decision and a cooperative agreement signed with the FutureGen Alliance. The ROD and agreement will allow the alliance to proceed with preliminary design, refine the cost estimate and develop a funding plan. DOE launched FutureGen in 2003 as a public-private partnership to engineer, construct and operate a near-zero-emissions, 275-MW powerplant fueled by coal at an estimated cost of $1 billion.
The U.S. Energy Dept. will award $57 million in economic-stimulus funding to support local, university and private smart-grid projects. About $47 million will supplement eight existing smart-grid demonstration projects now planned across the U.S., according to DOE. The remainder is going to local governments to fund modification of emergency- preparedness plans that will consider smart-grid technologies and renewable resources in transmission infrastructure. The awards are part of billions of dollars available for smart-grid projects under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. DOE also announced on July 20 it has chosen Virginia Tech University, Blacksburg, as the location of a smart-grid
To break the routine of cost and schedule overruns in Canadian nuclear construction, the operator of North America’s largest nuclear powerplant hopes to combine U.S. nuclear project management expertise with Canadian engineering and construction skills in a company to target construction in Ontario and elsewhere in Canada. It could be ready for business by next year. Photo: Bruce Power L.P. Sauger (center) is negotiating. The company is in “the formative stages,” says John Sauger, senior vice president for Bruce Power Ltd., Tiverton, Ontario. “The concept is a holding company, structured as a limited-liability partnership.” With managers from U.S. nuclear contractors
With an installed capacity of over 10,500 MW, India is currently the fifth-largest generator of wind power in the world. As it adds about 1,200 MW of wind capacity per year, the potential is far from depleted, but developers are faced with challenges in erecting the turbines in remote areas. Photo: Regen Wind Transporting large turbine blades to construction sites poses challenges. Unlike their Western counterparts, Indian developers often must find innovative means to transport large turbines through narrow, crowded roads to ill-equipped, hilly sites. “Non-availability of transport and cranes, lack of experienced manpower and infrastructure [lacking] such things as
The world’s first floating nuclear powerplant is currently under construction at a shipyard in St. Petersburg. It will be 144 m long and30 m wide and house two 35-MW reactors. It will supply power in remote areas. Upon completion in 2012, crews will tow the plant to the port of Vilyuchinsk on the Kamchatka peninsula, where it will supply power to a submarine base. Russia’s United Industrial Corp. (OPK) is building the FNPP at its Baltiiskii Zavod shipyard for owner Concern Energoatom, Ukraine’s state-owned nuclear utility. Russia has extensive experience with nuclear-propelled submarines and icebreakers, and the reactors on the
A new $308-million Dept. of Energy stimulus grant will advance a California clean coal full-scale demonstration project. The $2-billion Hydrogen Energy California (HECA) will feature Integrated Gasification Combined Cycle (IGCC) technology in Kern County. HECA will convert coal and petroleum coke (a byproduct of the refining process in the Los Angeles basin) and non-potable water into hydrogen and CO2. A methanol-based process will then separate the CO2 from the hydrogen. The hydrogen will be used to fuel a 390 MW power station. The CO2 will be piped to the Elk Hills Field oil reservoir where it will be injected for
Seemingly defeating the odds, the U.S. House of Representatives narrowly approved a landmark global-warming bill on June 26 by a 219-212 vote, setting the stage for further action on the bill. But while it has a fair amount of support from a wide range of groups and is a priority of the Obama administration, the bill faces a hurdle in the Senate, where Republicans and moderate Democrats could prevent its passage. The American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009, introduced by Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) and Rep. Edward Markey (D-Mass.), would reduce greenhouse-gas emissions by more than 80% by
Unable to find a buyer and facing expiration in 2010 of their operating permit, the owners of a controversial coal-fueled powerplant shuttered in 2005 will dismantle it starting late this year. The Mohave Generating Station near Laughlin, Nev., had operated since 1999 under a consent decree requiring air-pollution-control retrofits to improve visibility in the Grand Canyon. Photo: Babcock & Wilcox Co Decommissioning costs less than retrofitting to comply with consent decree. Decommissioning, to start in the fourth quarter, will be complete in two years at a net cost of $300 million after the sale of equipment, says Southern California Edison
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