by Jessica Wagner | Jul 3, 2024 | Awards
In 2024, Michaels Energy participated in the Inc. Magazines Best Workplaces program and in turn earned the title. This program measures a wide range of research-validated workplace factors that impact employee engagement and satisfaction. Inc. Magazine’s Best...
by Jessica Wagner | Jul 3, 2024 | Awards
Michaels Energy was awarded a spot on the Inc. 5000 Fastest Growing Private Companies in the United States in 2023. In 2023, Michaels achieved 103% growth, putting the company over 100 employees for the first time! To qualify, companies must have been founded and...
by Jeff Ihnen | Jun 25, 2024 | Energy Rant
1984 This year is our company’s 40th anniversary. Michaels Engineering launched on Friday, March 23, 1984. What else was going on in 1984? Apple launched the Macintosh, the first computer on sale with a mouse and a graphical user interface; sale price: $2500,...
by Jeff Ihnen | Jun 18, 2024 | Energy Rant
I attended the Mid-America Regulator Conference in Minneapolis last week. This post features issues of the day presented by utilities, commissioners, intervenors, technology providers, and sundry stakeholders. Load Growth Back in the day, we canoed the rivers and...
by Jeff Ihnen | Jun 10, 2024 | Energy Rant
One of many sources of information that fuel my brain to write this blog is the American Energy Society’s Energy Matters newsletter. The newsletter features many items I don’t find elsewhere, and impressively, they seem unbiased – it is what it is. Power Generation...
by Michaels Energy | Jun 5, 2024 | The Big Why
When I was asked a while back to be a guest writer for this blog, it’s not surprising that my ideas kept drifting toward Evaluability Assessments. Anyone who has worked with me knows that I’m a planner and I like to be prepared. (Dare I say over-prepared.) Full...
by Jeff Ihnen | Jun 4, 2024 | Energy Rant
A recent Realclearwire.com article noted that since 2021, the cumulative effect of persistent inflation has reduced Americans’ purchasing power by 19%. Since 2021, grocery prices have increased by 21%, gasoline prices have increased by 47%, shelter costs have...
by Jeff Ihnen | May 28, 2024 | Energy Rant
I have detected a pattern unfolding across multiple large energy efficiency portfolios: commercial and industrial prescriptive programs are struggling mightily. Why is this? My hypothesis was that we cycled through two or three rounds of lighting upgrades: From T-12...
by Jeff Ihnen | May 21, 2024 | Energy Rant
A couple timely articles and posts have dropped since I reintroduced virtual power plants (VPPs) last week. First, I’ll share a LinkedIn post from Matt Golden, CEO of Recurve. He wrote: “VPPs being defined as dispatchable loads only, is just plain wrong....
by Jeff Ihnen | May 14, 2024 | Energy Rant
Virtual power plants (VPPs) represent a considerable slice of the clean energy race these days, and for a good reason: policy continues to favor intermittent renewable energy supply over baseload nuclear and dispatchable natural gas assets. Load needs to follow...
