Energy

According to Google, the deal will help “unlock the full potential of AI for everyone”:

The grid needs new electricity sources to support AI technologies that are powering major scientific advances, improving services for businesses and customers, and driving national competitiveness and economic growth. This agreement helps accelerate a new technology to meet energy needs cleanly and reliably, and unlock the full potential of AI for everyone.

Power outages affect more than 3.3 million customers in Florida, out of the 11.5 million customers tracked by poweroutage.us (which collects data from utilities). Milton made landfall as an “extremely dangerous category 3 hurricane” Wednesday night.

Correction: It is 11.5 million customers, not 11.5.

The 320-mile line would connect the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) power grid to other states for the first time. Unlike most states that send each other electricity in times of need, the Lone Star state has historically been isolated. That made it more vulnerable to power outages during extreme weather like deadly Winter Storm Uri in 2021.

An Oregon gas company said it could clean up its act by turning to “renewable natural gas” made from organic waste. Years later, it’s selling customers just as much fossil fuel gas as it did before, according to a ProPublica investigation.

Fossil fuel giants have used AI for years to increase production. Now, Microsoft sees the generative AI boom as an opportunity to boost profits for itself and oil and gas companies it wants to strike deals with, Karen Hao reports for The Atlantic. Microsoft’s own greenhouse gas emissions are growing with its focus on AI, taking the company further away from its climate goals.

It popped up quickly with little transparency around its potential impact on the power grid, air quality, or water resources, local advocates say. The Elon Musk-led company is reportedly running gas generators without a proper permit. Local utility officials reportedly signed NDAs.

“We have been deemed by xAI not even valuable enough to have a conversation with,” says KeShaun Pearson, who grew up a few miles from the facility and is president of the local nonprofit Memphis Community Against Pollution. “To not even be included in conversations about what is transpiring in our own backyards.”

Does it look good on me?

EcoFlow’s new $129 Power Hat is possibly the most uncomfortable hat I’ve ever worn — but if it can keep my phone charged while running around IFA in the blistering 90-degree heat in Berlin, it might be worth it.

The company says the hat can charge a 4,000mAh smartphone in a few hours. It’s surprisingly lightweight but unsurprisingly unattractive.

The modular Solix X1 already announced for the US is now available in Europe in single- or three-phase configurations. LFP battery capacities start at 5kWh and expand to 180kWh with up to 36kW of power output. That’s enough to juice any device — even your EV — for hours, days, or indefinite operation when integrated with solar.

Think Powerwall, but not from Elon Musk.

The South Dublin County Council rejected the proposal, Bloomberg reports. Google reportedly didn’t provide sufficient information about “how the proposal will impact the power supply once operational.”

New data centers being built with the boom in AI have raised concerns about straining the power grid. Ireland is a hot spot for that construction, where data centers already use more electricity than urban households.

Roughly half of customers lost power yesterday. As of this morning, more than 30 percent of customers are still without service, according to power utility Luma Energy.

It shows how vulnerable the US territory’s grid is after Hurricane Maria hit in 2017 and left residents without electricity for up to 11 months. In July, Puerto Rico filed a $1 billion suit against fossil fuel companies.

They’re on different sides of a debate over how to counteract pollution from data centers’ energy use, Financial Times reports.

Amazon and Meta are part of a lobby group that wants more lax standards for renewable energy certificates, which can pose similar risks as carbon offset credits. Google, meanwhile, backs a different strategy for bringing more renewables online wherever data centers operate.

SunPower helped kick off a solar boom in the US, Canary Media explains. But the company was hit hard by soaring interest rates and faced allegations of mismanagement, CNBC reports. Solar companies in the US have grappled with inflation and supply chain kinks pushing up projects costs in recent years, and have struggled to compete with more affordable panels made in China.

AES has given its Atlas solar robot some AWS smarts and redubbed it “Maximo.” It helped complete an Amazon-backed solar farm in Louisiana and is now moving on to Bellefield, California, home of the largest solar-plus-storage project in the US. According to Amazon, it can “reduce solar installation timelines and costs by as much 50 percent:”

Besides automating heavy lifting, Maximo can also perform in nearly any weather or lighting condition, which is especially useful for the Bellefield project, which is located in a sandy desert area known for extreme heat. Once Maximo arrives there later this year, the robot will work alongside crews to lift hundreds of heavy solar panels into place.