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01 / 05
How the World’s Biggest Plane Would Supersize Wind Energy

Wall Street Journal | Air Transport

How the World’s Biggest Plane Would Supersize Wind Energy

“Mark Lundstrom, an MIT-trained rocket scientist and Rhodes scholar, has spent more than seven years with an engineering team designing the WindRunner, a gargantuan cargo plane. If completed, it will be the largest plane by length and cargo volume.

The plane’s purpose is to carry wind turbine blades the length of football fields. The blades, among the world’s longest, are currently used only for offshore projects because of transportation limitations onshore. Opening vast swaths of land to the largest turbines could transform wind energy, which has seen a slowdown in new U.S. onshore projects and price turmoil for offshore projects.

The result would be land-based wind power installations with a blade tip reaching about 300 feet higher than the current average.”

From Wall Street Journal.

S&P Global | Energy & Natural Resources

US DOE Finalizes Rules to Speed Transmission Permitting

“Under the program, the DOE will coordinate efforts across eight other agencies to prepare a single environmental review document for transmission developers seeking federal approvals. The program also establishes a two-year timeline for the permitting process.

‘The CITAP program gives transmission developers a new option for a more efficient review process, a major step to provide increased confidence for the sector to invest in new transmission lines,’ the DOE said in a fact sheet.

A second final rule creates a categorical exclusion — the simplest form of review under the National Environmental Policy Act — for transmission projects that use existing rights of way, such as reconductoring projects, as well as solar and energy storage projects on already disturbed lands.”

From S&P Global.

New Scientist | Energy Production

Nuclear Fusion Experiment Overcomes Two Key Hurdles

“A nuclear fusion reaction has overcome two key barriers to operating in a ‘sweet spot’ needed for optimal power production: boosting the plasma density and keeping that denser plasma contained. The milestone is yet another stepping stone towards fusion power, although a commercial reactor is still probably years away.”

From New Scientist.