Home RemodelingIn Heat Springs, SC

CHARLOTTE, N.C. – Duke Energy has placed into service one of the nation’s most advanced green microgrids in the Madison County town of Hot Springs.

The Hot Springs microgrid consists of a 2-megawatt (AC) solar facility and a 4.4-megawatt lithium-based battery storage facility. The microgrid not only provides a safe, cost-effective and reliable grid solution for serving the Hot Springs area, but it will also provide energy and additional bulk system benefits for all customers.

This will include reliability services to the electric grid, such as frequency and voltage regulation and ramping support and capacity during system peaks.

“Duke Energy has numerous smaller microgrids on our system, but this is our first microgrid that can power an entire small town if its main power line experiences an outage,” said Jason Handley, general manager, Distributed Energy Group.

Hot Springs, with a population of just over 500, has limited rerouting options should an outage occur. During its testing phase, Duke Energy’s microgrid was able to pick up the town’s entire load from a black start without any help from the energy grid – using only the solar and battery storage to restore power. The microgrid served the town’s load while the company gathered data.

“Through energy storage and microgrids, Duke Energy can enable the integration of more renewables onto the grid and help improve reliability while keeping costs affordable for customers and the communities we serve,” added Handley.

Duke Energy worked with the technology company Wärtsilä, who supplied the battery energy storage system for the project. The microgrid utilizes Wärtsilä’s sophisticated energy management system, the GEMS Digital Energy Platform, for integrated control of both the solar and energy storage facilities.

“The Hot Springs inverter-only-based community microgrid is a great step forward for Duke Energy and our customers. This project has reduced the need for equipment upgrades in an environmentally sensitive area,” added Handley. “We are using lessons learned from this first-of-its-kind installation to take to our other microgrids under construction in Indiana and Florida. At a larger scale, microgrids bring more resiliency to the energy grid for our customers.”

Duke Energy has been active with microgrids and battery storage, with over 60 megawatts connected throughout Duke Energy’s regulated areas. In Asheville, Duke Energy operates a 9-megawatt lithium-ion battery system at a substation site in the Rock Hill community – near Sweeten Creek Road. In Haywood County, the company has a 3.8-kilowatt-hour lithium iron phosphate battery and 10-kilowatt solar DC microgrid installation serving a communications tower on Mount Sterling in the Smoky Mountains National Park.

About Duke Energy

Duke Energy (NYSE: DUK), a Fortune 150 company headquartered in Charlotte, N.C., is one of America’s largest energy holding companies. Its electric utilities serve 8.2 million customers in North Carolina, South Carolina, Florida, Indiana, Ohio and Kentucky, and collectively own 50,000 megawatts of energy capacity. Its natural gas unit serves 1.6 million customers in North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Ohio and Kentucky. The company employs 28,000 people.

Duke Energy is executing an aggressive clean energy transition to achieve its goals of net-zero methane emissions from its natural gas business by 2030 and net-zero carbon emissions from electricity generation by 2050. The company has interim carbon emission targets of at least 50% reduction from electric generation by 2030, 50% for Scope 2 and certain Scope 3 upstream and downstream emissions by 2035, and 80% from electric generation by 2040. In addition, the company is investing in major electric grid enhancements and energy storage, and exploring zero-emission power generation technologies such as hydrogen and advanced nuclear.

Duke Energy was named to Fortune’s 2022 “World’s Most Admired Companies” list and Forbes’ “World’s Best Employers” list. More information is available at duke-energy.com. The Duke Energy News Center contains news releases, fact sheets, photos and videos. Duke Energy’s illumination features stories about people, innovations, community topics and environmental issues. Follow Duke Energy on Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram and Facebook.

A wintertime heat wave has temperatures soaring well above average in Charlotte and throughout the Carolinas this week.

But the official start of the next season is weeks away, meaning there’s still a chance wintry weather could creep back into the region.

Once spring does arrive in earnest, the Farmers’ Almanac forecast calls for plenty of April showers across the southeast U.S., including in the Charlotte area, and varying temperatures across different regions of the country.

Here’s what to know about the Farmers’ Almanac’s predictions for spring 2023 in Charlotte:

The first day of spring 2023 is March 20.

The Almanac predicts “near normal spring temps” for the southeast U.S. for spring 2023, including in Charlotte.

It’s also calling for “tons of showers” in the region.

Nationwide, the Almanac predicts “a wet and cool season for most places, with spring taking its sweet time to arrive.”

“Spring will be unusually active over the nation’s heartland with frequent heavy-to-severe thunderstorms predicted,” it says. “Such adverse activity will be confined chiefly to the Southeast states during March, then will spread north and west April through June.”

The Farmers’ Almanac, which boasts that it produces “a longer range weather forecast than any other source available,” bases its forecasts on “a specific and reliable set of rules that were developed back in 1818” that have been adapted into “a formula that is both mathematical and astronomical.”

“The formula takes into consideration things like sunspot activity, tidal action of the Moon, the position of the planets, and a variety of other factors,” the group says. “The only person who knows the exact formula is the Farmers’ Almanac weather prognosticator who goes by the pseudonym of Caleb Weatherbee.”

It claims that its “forecasts are 80% to 85% accurate,” but some researchers have questioned that figure.

One study, by Penn State meteorologist Paul Knight, called into question the secrecy behind the Farmers’ Almanac’s system.

“If you want to use that for some kind of planting purpose or guidance, more power to you,” Knight said in his report. “And if it works for you, great. But will it work regularly? No.”

On Thursday, a plump Punxsutawney Phil made his annual Groundhog Day appearance in front of hundreds of adoring fans to furrcast six more weeks of winter. It’s not exactly a bold prediction for the oversized squirrel: He has predicted a longer winter 78 percent of the time in his career. But you don’t need Phil, arguably the most famous “weather-forecasting” groundhog, to predict when the next season will arrive this year. (Also, he’s only right about 40 percent of the time.)

In many areas around the country, people can already see signs that spring is ahead of schedule. The arrival of these signals vary around the country, but the onset of warmer winter temperatures can push the development of plants and animals sooner in the season than normal.

The South typically experiences spring earlier than other regions, but even this year’s season is “20 to 25 days early” there, said Alyssa Rosemartin, an ecologist with the USA National Phenology Network, which tracks plant and animal observations through citizen scientists. “It’s never been that early before, so it is remarkable.”

Western Texas, southern Arkansas, southern Louisiana and eastern Mississippi are all experiencing their earliest spring in 40 years of records from the phenology network, although growth has slowed with a recent cold spell. Spring in Alabama, Georgia, North Carolina and South Carolina arrived 1-2 weeks earlier than average.

In southern Louisiana, early signs of spring include flowering American elms, leaves sprouting from herbaceous thistles and a surge of pollen from bald cypress trees, said Julie Whitbeck, an ecologist at Jean Lafitte National Historical Park and Preserve. There and across the Gulf Coast, red maples have begun to bloom, with helicopter-like fruit decorating their branches with crimson.

Other places are also experiencing early springlike flourish, according to the phenology network. Red alder trees began budding in Oregon and British Columbia in January, its earliest appearance in 14 years of records. Tulip trees in Indiana are flowering more than a month ahead of schedule. Forsythias are breaking leaf buds in Maine, an event that hasn’t been observed on record before March. Quaking aspen trees in Minnesota are producing flower buds, which typically isn’t seen until mid-February to mid-April.

Data suggest these spring signals are the result of consistently mild temperatures since a pre-Christmas intrusion of Arctic air across the country. Many locations east of the Rockies experienced their warmest January on record, according to the Southeast Regional Climate Center. Average temperatures as much as 6 to 10 degrees above normal set records from McAllen, Tex., on the Rio Grande to Houlton, Maine, on the Canadian border.

Heat accumulation is one of the main ways to predict life cycle transitions in plants and animals, according to the phenology network. Many plants and animals need to experience a certain level of sustained warmth to trigger budding or egg hatching, which researchers measure using “growing degree days.” Growing degree days essentially measure the warmth needed to allow an organism to grow.

For an early spring to arrive, it would mean the plants and animals experienced more warmth than usual, more quickly achieving their required number of growing days.

On the other hand, cooler temperatures could push back the development of plants and animals, as seen in California and Arizona, which are lagging about a week later than normal.

It’s not just plants responding to the early warmth — some animals are also already declaring an early spring. Gina Lloyd, citizen science coordinator at the Barataria Preserve south of New Orleans, said she began to hear the chorus of calls from frogs known as spring peepers in late January — sounds that denote the beginning of their breeding season and are associated with heavy spring rains.

This year’s early spring signs follow a larger warming trend in recent decades. Analysis shows winters are warming faster than any other season in the United States. Over the past 50 years, average winter temperatures have warmed by at least one degree Fahrenheit in every state; 70 percent have seen increases of at least three degrees. The length of winter is also shrinking across the globe, studies show.

“Climate change is increasing the chances of everything related to this: of warmer winters, of shorter winters, of earlier springs,” Rosemartin said.

(Side note: Phil should probably incorporate these climate findings moving forward. Based on Phil’s past predictions since 1887, he is more likely to predict a longer winter — forecasting an early spring only 15 percent of the time.)

This winter, many of the same areas along the Gulf Coast where early spring emerged were rocked by severe January thunderstorms, which are much more common in March and April. The storms — fueled by abnormally warm gulf waters — spawned destructive and deadly tornadoes. The National Weather Service’s Storm Prediction Center received 124 preliminary tornado reports last month, mostly in the South. The average January number is closer to 50.

Rosemartin said it’s possible that such destructive storms could bring more damage to budding plant tissues or branches that would otherwise still be dormant.

Still, research shows that while climate change is making winters warmer overall, intense cold snaps are still possible and winter could still bring frosty weather. Meteorological winter continues through the end of February in the Northern Hemisphere, and wintry weather can often occur even into March and April, when meteorological spring begins.

The first measurable snowfall of the season was observed early Wednesday along the Interstate 95 corridor, ahead of a brutal blast of cold expected in the Northeast on Friday and Saturday. In the southern United States, an intrusion of cold air is driving icy weather.

In Texas, winter storm and ice storm warnings covered most of the state on Wednesday, and temperatures were expected to remain below freezing for up to four days. It might not be clear until spring arrives in earnest what, if any, damage that might cause to early plant growth, said Courtney Blevins, Fort Worth regional forester for the Texas Forest Service.

“We don’t usually stay below freezing for more than a day or two,” he said. In past years, freezes have devastated crops that bud early in the South, driving fruit prices up.

In areas where mild January temperatures have kept the ground from freezing, that has allowed water to soak into soil and provide a growth signal for trees, Whitbeck said. It could also help protect those ecosystems from future cold snaps, she added. It takes longer to heat and cool hydrated soil than it does dry soil, so any drop in temperatures would need to be particularly harsh or lasting to freeze saturated ground.

In southern Louisiana, for example, there’s still a risk that such a harsh freeze could materialize. “The first three weeks of February are still fair game for a hard freeze,” Whitbeck said.

Even though there are signs of spring, winter may still bring some frosty weather. That’s a lot of nuance for a groundhog to predict.

Making it three coaches in three seasons, National Park College announced Diego Figueroa as its head men's and women's soccer coach.

The Nighthawks kicked off their inaugural season in 2021 under Kevin Tello, and played the 2022 season under interim head coach Grant Gartner, who departed for a coaching position in Spain.

Figueroa brings plenty of experience to the table, most recently coaching as an assistant at Pearl River Community College. Figueroa also spent time as the Nashville FC youth technical director, Aris FC director of player development and assistant director for the Tennessee Soccer Club's U-15 and U-19 boys and girls squads.

"I did coach my own team where players went on to play at Clemson, South Carolina and different top schools," FIgueroa said. "So I've had the sense of head coaching already but not at a college level where you have them 24/7. You're taking care of their grades and social life. That to me is the most exciting part of it. Right now I've been sitting in my office and they come in and out all day long. And with two programs it's like literally all day long."

Figueroa lived on campus at Pearl River and spent plenty of time forming close connections with players. He learned how to help his student-athletes battle the many different challenges they face as college athletes.

Being in charge of two different college teams at once can present its own set of challenges.

"It just requires more time," Figueroa said. "More time for each individual. More time for each team. But extremely doable, especially when you have an environment that is set up for success. I think that's something that again is going to be a challenge for myself but also my assistant as well who I'm bringing in. But I think we've been responsible and organized. That's probably going to be something we can take head on from the beginning."

Figueroa aims to bring a possession-based style of soccer to National Park.

"I want my team to enjoy the ball and my team to have fun, be creative and have that freedom to do what they want with the ball within the style that we implement and within the rules that I like to implement in the team," Figueroa said. "I want players to be able to kind of showcase themselves when they're on the ball."

Figueroa said National Park already has the players to play possession-based soccer, and throughout practice before the upcoming season he will implement different aspects of the game like pressing and reading defensive and attacking cues.

"Defensively, I'm extremely structured," he said. "I don't think without good defense you have a good attack."

The school announced Figueroa as its head coach Feb. 1, so he is still meeting with players and determining the skill sets he has at his disposal.

"Right now we're still in an evaluation phase," Figueroa said. "I told them there will be a two to three week evaluation process where I am going to be doing some coaching and implementing my style because I want to see the response I get from my players. But it's a good time for me to evaluate the players as well to see if my style and what I want to implement is going to actually work. Right away I can see that it will."

Although Figueroa likes what he sees so far, the new head Nighthawk is still currently recruiting with the fall season still months down the road.

Recruiting on any level of college sports remains one of the most important jobs of a coaching staff, but on the junior college level, turnover is even faster at these two-year programs.

Figueroa is coming into a new location and will have to build connections throughout the community and surrounding areas.

"The biggest thing is going to be the connections that I have with other schools," he said. "Whether it's high schools (or) clubs. Getting connected with schools to start digging for recruitment. Just finding those players. I think it's become easier in the past where you have the connections. You know the people to reach out to, the expectations they have, the expectations they know I have of my players."

Away from the pitch, Figueroa's first year in Hot Springs will be spent getting to know soccer people in the community.

"What the soccer community looks like in Hot Springs as well," Figueroa said. "Because I do want to dig in big time into Hot Springs. Right away I've already noticed that it's not a massive soccer community. I myself want to help that grow."

Figueroa played college soccer at Belmont University and started for four years while being team captain three of those seasons.

In the past, the allure of being a Division I coach called to Figueroa, but he quickly realized he found his home on the junior college level.

"I played Division I, I want to coach Division I," Figueroa said. "It wasn't until last summer my wife and I took a trip to the UK and we talked and talked and talked. I just kept talking and catching myself on how much I enjoyed coaching the junior college game."

Figueroa truly enjoys helping players move on to four-year colleges, whether that is for soccer or just for academic purposes. He still reaches out to former players to see how they are doing.

"Talking last summer with my wife on this trip I don't know if I'm pursuing this DI because of the label," Figueroa said. "Like, 'Look at me I'm a Division I coach.' I think the answer was yes. I was perusing this because of the label. ... Now the biggest part of it is helping those student-athletes from freshman, sophomore year and then moving them on. I think that's the biggest benefit. That's the part that excites me the most. You help them grow for two years then move them on."

KISSIMMEE, Fla. (Feb. 17, 2023) – Already with a Hall of Fame career that has seen countless memorable moments on the water, 59-year-old B&W Trailer Hitches pro Mark Davis of Mount Ida, Arkansas, showed he still has a few more tricks left up his sleeve. Davis caught 13 scorable bass Friday, with his best five weighing 34 pounds, 10 ounces, to win the Knockout Round and advance to the final day of competition at the Major League Fishing (MLF) Bass Pro Tour Stage One on the Kissimmee Chain.

Davis’ total of 34-10 will give him a 10-pound cushion over second-place angler Ott DeFoe of Blaine, Tennessee, who weighed in five scorable bass totaling 24-10. Chris Lane of Guntersville, Alabama, sits in third place with five bass weighing 23-2, while Addison, Alabama’s Jesse Wiggins weighed in five bass totaling 21-8 to finish the day in fourth. Pro Andy Morgan of Dayton, Tennessee, added to the Toro Cut Line drama, Friday, as the Tennessee pro caught a 6-pound, 3-ounce largemouth as time expired to vault from 13th place into fifth, and bounce out the reigning Angler of the Year (AOY) Jacob Wheeler.

The final 10 anglers are now set, and competition resumes Saturday morning with the Championship Round. In the Championship Round, weight carries over from the Knockout Round and the angler with the heaviest two-day total will win the top prize of $100,000.

“Today was a heck of a day for me,” said Davis. “It wasn’t my biggest limit I’ve ever caught – I caught around 42 pounds on this fishery once, I think back in 2001 – but I’m very pleased to have caught 34 (pounds) today. You can never really be comfortable competing in Florida, but 10 pounds is a very nice lead.”

Davis spent the day targeting grass patches and lily pads on a spawning flat in Lake Kissimmee with a Texas-rigged blue craw with red flake-colored Strike King Ocho, with a 3/16-ounce Strike King tungsten weight.

“It was all new water for me today,” Davis said. “This morning on the ride down, I just felt like I needed to go and look at some new water. I pulled into an area that I hadn’t fished – I might have fished it at some point in my career, but it was new this week. I pulled up there and caught one almost 4 (pounds), then a 6-12, and I still didn’t quite have it figured out. But as the day went on I kind of got dialed into the bite, and once I got dialed in, it was game on.”

Another impressive stat that showcases just how special Davis’ day was Friday – although his best five went for 34-10, his next best five scorable fish would have given him a limit for 23 pounds even and he would be in third place.

“I figure I’m going to have to catch at least 15 to 16 pounds tomorrow to have any chance at winning,” Davis went on to say. “One of the reasons I worked so hard today to catch as much as I could was because the weather is going to change. We’re going to have a stout north wind, and there is supposed to be a cold front coming in overnight. It could really turn the fish off, for everybody, so I felt like I needed to amass as much weight as I could, today.”

The top 10 pros from Friday’s Knockout Round that now advance to Saturday’s Championship Round on the Kissimmee Chain of Lakes are:

1st: Mark Davis, Mount Ida, Ark., five bass, 34-10 2nd: Ott DeFoe, Blaine, Tenn., five bass, 24-10 3rd: Chris Lane, Guntersville, Ala., five bass, 23-2 4th: Jesse Wiggins, Addison, Ala., five bass, 21-8 5th: Andy Morgan, Dayton, Tenn., five bass, 20-15 6th: Jeremy Lawyer, Sarcoxie, Mo., five bass, 20-15 7th: Mark Rose, Wynne, Ark., five bass, 20-5 8th: Jordan Lee, Cullman, Ala., five bass, 19-4 9th: Dylan Hays, Hot Springs, Ark., five bass, 18-14 10th: Brent Ehrler, Redlands, Calif., five bass, 18-11

Finishing in 11th through 40th place are:

11th: Jacob Wheeler, Harrison, Tenn., five bass, 18-9, $10,000 12th: Fletcher Shryock, Guntersville, Ala., five bass, 18-4, $10,000 13th: Stephen Browning, Hot Springs, Ark., five bass, 17-15, $10,000 14th: Andy Montgomery, Blacksburg, S.C., five bass, 17-7, $10,000 15th: Mitch Crane, Columbus, Miss., five bass, 16-10, $10,000 16th: Casey Ashley, Donalds, S.C., five bass, 16-8, $10,000 17th: Edwin Evers, Talala, Okla., five bass, 16-0, $10,000 18th: Jeff Sprague, Wills Point, Texas, five bass, 15-15, $10,000 19th: Cliff Pace, Petal, Miss., five bass, 15-13, $10,000 20th: Josh Butler, Hayden, Ala., five bass, 15-7, $10,000 21st: Takahiro Omori, Tokyo, Japan, five bass, 14-14, $10,000 22nd: Nick LeBrun, Bossier City, La., five bass, 14-2, $10,000 23rd: Alton Jones, Jr., Waco, Texas, four bass, 13-14, $10,000 24th: John Murray, Spring City, Tenn., five bass, 13-14, $10,000 25th: Bradley Roy, Lancaster, Ky., five bass, 13-13, $10,000 26th: Ryan Salzman, Huntsville, Ala., five bass, 13-6, $10,000 27th: Justin Lucas, Guntersville, Ala., five bass, 13-5, $10,000 28th: Dakota Ebare, Brookeland, Texas, five bass, 12-12, $10,000 29th: Keith Poche, Pike Road, Ala., five bass, 11-12, $10,000 30th: Britt Myers, Lake Wylie, S.C., five bass, 11-0, $10,000 31st: Randy Howell, Guntersville, Ala., five bass, 10-13, $10,000 32nd: Scott Suggs, Alexander, Ark., five bass, 9-11, $10,000 33rd: Gerald Spohrer, Gonzales, La., five bass, 9-10, $10,000 34th: Todd Faircloth, Jasper, Texas, five bass, 9-6, $10,000 35th: Bryan Thrift, Shelby, N.C., four bass, 7-7, $10,000 36th: Spencer Shuffield, Hot Springs, Ark., two bass, 7-5, $10,000 37th: Shinichi Fukae, Osaka, Japan, three bass, 6-9, $10,000 38th: Brett Hite, Phoenix, Ariz., three bass, 5-7, $10,000 39th: Adrian Avena, Vineland, N.J., two bass, 5-4, $10,000 40th: Russ Lane, Prattville, Ala., three bass, 5-4, $10,000

Overall, there were 359 scorable bass weighing 933 pounds even caught by the 40 pros Friday.