Henry Harrell"s Blog: July 29 Green Energy News

Headline News:

Throughout Vermont, customers are signing up for a program that will allow them to power their homes while disconnected from the grid. The projects are part of a bold experiment aimed at turning homes, neighborhoods and towns into virtual power plants. Behind this movement is the local electric company, Green Mountain Power. [New York Times]

CEO Mary Powell of GMP (Jacob Hannah | The New York Times)

When Tesla’s Gigafactory was first announced, it was shared that it would be able to produce more batteries than the rest of the world could build at the time combined. Now, in an update, Tesla shared that when it is running at full capacity, the Gigafactory will produce more batteries than the rest of the world combined – by a factor of 2! [CleanTechnica]
The western US is ablaze as the wildfire season has gotten off to an intense start. More than 37,000 fires have burned more than 5.2 million acres nationally since the beginning of the year, with 47 large fires burning across nine states as of Friday. The fire season comes earlier and lasts longer than it used to, partly due to climate change. [Climate Central]
A report by Health and Environment Alliance has assessed the subsidy spending and health costs of seven economically powerful countries. India spent $16.9 billion on fossil fuel subsidies in 2013 and 2014, but health costs to meet the burden of diseases linked to air pollution are eight times the fossil fuel subsidies, at $140.7 billion. [Times of India]
New York banking giant JPMorgan Chase announced it plans to switch all its facilities to 100% renewable power by 2020. In Texas, 75% of JPMorgan Chase’s facilities will run on wind energy by the end of this year. That covers 584 branches and 8 million square feet, including a new 1.2 million-square-foot Plano campus. [Dallas News]

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