EGEB: Beer brewed with renewables, Nebraska battery storage, another British record for no coal use, and more

In today’s EGEB:

• An Anheuser-Busch solar project to brew all beer with renewable-generated electricity.
• Nebraska city gets a large scale battery to store solar power.
• An offshore wind bill is reintroduced in Congress.
• An attempt to change the definition of renewable energy in California fails.
• Another “without coal” record in Britain.

Electrek Green Energy Brief: A daily technical, financial, and political review/analysis of important green energy news.

Anheuser-Busch, which earlier this year announced that its Budweiser brand was brewed solely with wind power in the US, says it will brew all of its US beer brands with 100% renewable electricity, due to a new solar agreement.

Anheuser-Busch will purchase 100% renewable electricity upon the completion of a new 2,000 acre, 222 MWac solar facility in 2021, besting the company’s goal of 100% renewable electricity by 2025 in the US. The official announcement offers more information on how it’s going to work:

Through a power purchase agreement (PPA) signed between Anheuser-Busch and Recurrent Energy, a leading utility-scale solar developer in the U.S. and a subsidiary of Canadian Solar, Anheuser-Busch will purchase the renewable electricity credits from the energy delivered to the grid by the new solar energy facility being built in Pecos County, Texas.

Nebraska Battery

South Sioux City, Nebraska is set to become a “demonstration site” to store power from the city’s solar park, Sioux City Journal reports. NextEra Energy is installing a large-scale battery to store up to 1.5 megawatts of power.

The $1.8 million project is mostly supported by state funds and tax credits, and it will be located near the solar project, which provides “roughly 5 percent of the city’s 45 megawatt electricity usage” for about two-thirds the cost of the remaining electricity.

Offshore Wind Bill

The Offshore Wind Jobs and Opportunity Act was reintroduced to Congress this week by a number of Democrats. As per a press release, the legislation aims to create a federal grant program that would:

…assist colleges and universities, state and local governments, unions, and nonprofits develop curricula, internships, health and safety programs, and other activities deemed appropriate by the Secretaries of Energy, Labor, Interior, and Education to advance an offshore wind workforce. The bill prioritizes grants to community colleges, organizations that service minority populations, and those helping workers from other industries transition to the offshore wind industry.

The bill was announced last year, but never seemed to get anywhere. Now, with more states setting offshore wind goals, perhaps it can gain a little more momentum.

Dam Blocked

California was considering a bill to include hydropower from large dams in its current definition of renewable energy, an idea that drew some criticism as the state moves toward its renewable goals — specifically, toward its 2030 goal of 60% renewable electricity.

(Hydropower will count as renewable energy in the state after 2045. It can be a bit confusing, but the reason to exclude hydropower, for now, has long been to boost solar and wind projects, and not rely on existing energy sources to meet short-term goals.)

Anyway, that effort looks to be over for now, as the bill didn’t earn enough support to be presented for a vote in the state Senate, The Mercury News reports.

UK Coal Watch

Another record for Great Britain, as its longest run without using coal to generate any electricity ended at just over 18 days on Tuesday. Maybe a month next time? Renewables still have a way to go, however:

This #Coal free run ended at 18 Days 6 Hours 10 Minutes.

This is the longest run without coal for Great Britain since 1882.

Generation during this time was met by: Gas 40%, Nuclear 20%, Wind 13%, Imports 11%, Biomass 8%, Solar 7%, Large Hydro <1%, Storage <1% pic.twitter.com/CcGZzqFLpe

— Coal – GB Grid (@UK_Coal) June 4, 2019