Singapore

The TCG 2032’s optimized spark plugs which resulted in electrical efficiency of up to 44.2% is just one of several innovations and developments by MWM.

Power generation in the Asia Pacific region expanded by about 1/3 over the first decade of the new millennium. Some developing countries in the region experienced much higher growth rates than others, while generation barely increased in the developed countries of the region.

The regional annual conference will run from May 17-18  in Marriott Beijing Northeast, Beijing China.

Indonesia President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono is not averse on building coal-fired plants to export electricity to Singapore.

ABB will work with FG Emvelo to build power plants in Northern Cape province, South Africa.

Polysilicon prices in December reached a low just above $26/kg, resulting in extremely low module costs for manufacturers.

The cost of solar usually comes as the barrier for a larger solar deployment. Fit and PPA driven by RPS have lead the path for the revolution in Renewable Energies leading wind to achieve more than 100 GW and PV more than 20 GW.

With intellections to reduce dependence on hydrocarbons and concerns over environments, Asian Power industry is currently demanding more green solutions to produce power.

World attention was recently focused on the climate change negotiations held during the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Durban, South Africa.

REC's group management and wafer and silicon division added new members as it moves from Oslo to Singapore and Munich.

In July 2011 Asian Power posted an article I wrote on the new paradigm for utility information security where you should assume your information systems can be breached and react accordingly. In this article I’d like to extend some added ideas for energy and utility executives to consider when trying to secure their information systems.

So what are we looking for? 1. Length. Your column doesn't need to be long. A minimum of 700 words is ideal. Keep it brief.

A few years ago, while working on a power sector roadmap, a conversation turned to the perceived problems created by a lack of a comprehensive energy sector policy. Surely power sector planning would be better, my friend suggested, with a clearer policy in place to guide the substantial investment decisions required to meet growth reliably and efficiently. In this time of resolution-making for the year just begun, what would a good energy policy look like?

The demand for energy, especially in Asia, is growing faster than in many developed regions of the world. Traditionally, power generation has relied on fossil fuels and hydroelectric applications. Nuclear energy, which also has developed over the last 50 years, is being introduced in new regions of the world while being phased out of others. All of these types of power plants are generally larger in scale, producing hundreds of megawatts. Traditionally, the main drivers for larger power plants have been higher efficiency and lower installation costs, but the way power projects are evaluated is becoming increasingly complex. With both “flexibility” and the integration of renewable energy becoming increasingly important, more efficient natural gas-fired distributed power applications are growing in popularity.

Siemens will supply the power block and other main components for the new combined-cycle power plant in Singapore.

In the US and even globally there is an increasing emphasis on improving the cyber security of the systems and components controlling such things as electric substations, control centers, gas pipelines, and the associated Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) systems. As an active observer of this industry for many years I can say that the cyber security of these systems is improving; however, there is a new gap or omission brewing. We are often asked to perform security assessments for energy and utility companies. As we do work at some customer sites we are continuing to note that the emphasis on cyber is certainly in place; however, the physical security of the infrastructure is being ignored. What we are concluding is a holistic security program is missing at some of these companies. What do I mean by holistic? Essentially holistic security is concerned with the whole security environment in an organization rather than simply focusing on single elements such as cyber, physical, administrative or technical security. In other words, security is viewed as a collection of interconnected and coordinated functions to protect assets and maintain reliability. Why is the holistic emphasis missing? The history of security for energy and utility enterprises has primarily been focused on “guns, gates and guards” until around 2008. Overall the security focus was really a military of police mindset. Cyber was very rarely considered. After 2008, in the United States and North America, the North American Electric Reliability Corporation (NERC) Critical Infrastructure Protection (CIP) standards were published and enforcement began with emphasis on protection of critical cyber assets that are important to the reliability of the bulk electric system. The enforcement included inspections and fines for non-compliance. A new emphasis on cyber security emerged; and as a result physical security was placed in a lower echelon. The observation we offer is based on our own experiences in the field. For instance, we see the singular focus on cyber at various global utilities we inspect. We have seen examples of where physical security is in decline and not being address at substations and generation facilities, including: External doors and locks are not adequately protected. There are gaps between the doors and door frames and the lock assemblies are not protected with simple metal plates. In several cases we’ve been able to open doors with simple plastic credit cards and gain access to critical cyber assets and copper. Door hinges are on the outside of the door frame. Because of this practice it would be easy to unscrew the hinges then simply lift the door out of the frame. Control building perimeters have unprotected windows in doors and walls. We’ve seen windows in doors that could simply be broken physically and then the door opened by reaching inside through the window break.