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CLEAN ENERGY: The U.S. Interior Department finalizes a rule that will cut fees as much as 80% for solar and wind projects on federal land as it celebrates a milestone of permitting more than 25 GW of renewable projects under President Biden. (The Hill, Reuters)
ALSO: An Indigenous researcher says tribes need application support, better access to information, and resources to build better infrastructure, to in addition to funding to adopt clean energy. (Grist)
CLIMATE: While the world’s biggest companies are making stronger climate commitments, an analysis finds they’re still insufficient to meet Paris Agreement goals. (Grist)
GRID: About 2.6 TW of power projects — 95% of them solar, battery and wind developments — were waiting to connect to the U.S. grid at the end of last year, up 27% from the year before. (Utility Dive)
SOLAR:
HYDROGEN: Xcel Energy says plans for an Upper Midwest hydrogen hub are jeopardized by proposed federal tax credit rules that would bar utilities from diverting existing clean energy generation to power hydrogen facilities. (Star Tribune)
OIL & GAS: Oil companies challenge a federal regulation requiring former owners to clean up abandoned offshore oil and gas infrastructure along California’s coast, potentially leaving taxpayers to pick up the multimillion-dollar bill. (E&E News)
COAL:
EMISSIONS:
EFFICIENCY: Advocates push the U.S. Energy Department to speed up its updating of appliance efficiency standards. (Utility Dive)
ELECTRIC VEHICLES: Michigan is offering millions of dollars in funding to bolster research on recycling materials from electric vehicle batteries. (IPR)
UTILITIES: Questions still abound about the Tennessee Valley Authority CEO’s decision to replace a Tennessee coal plant with a gas plant and pipeline without public approval by the TVA board, and despite warnings from the U.S. EPA that the environmental review underlying the project was inadequate. (WPLN)
COMMENTARY: Utilities are overstating the urgency of their need for new power to meet increasing demand, and should pause to consider alternatives to gas, two clean electricity advocates write. (Utility Dive)
CLEAN ENERGY: The U.S. Interior Department finalizes a rule that will cut fees as much as 80% for solar and wind projects on federal land as it celebrates a milestone of permitting more than 25 GW of renewable projects under President Biden. (The Hill, Reuters)
ALSO: An Indigenous researcher says tribes need application support, better access to information, and resources to build better infrastructure, to in addition to funding to adopt clean energy. (Grist)
CLIMATE: While the world’s biggest companies are making stronger climate commitments, an analysis finds they’re still insufficient to meet Paris Agreement goals. (Grist)
GRID: About 2.6 TW of power projects — 95% of them solar, battery and wind developments — were waiting to connect to the U.S. grid at the end of last year, up 27% from the year before. (Utility Dive)
SOLAR:
HYDROGEN: Xcel Energy says plans for an Upper Midwest hydrogen hub are jeopardized by proposed federal tax credit rules that would bar utilities from diverting existing clean energy generation to power hydrogen facilities. (Star Tribune)
OIL & GAS: Oil companies challenge a federal regulation requiring former owners to clean up abandoned offshore oil and gas infrastructure along California’s coast, potentially leaving taxpayers to pick up the multimillion-dollar bill. (E&E News)
COAL:
EMISSIONS:
EFFICIENCY: Advocates push the U.S. Energy Department to speed up its updating of appliance efficiency standards. (Utility Dive)
ELECTRIC VEHICLES: Michigan is offering millions of dollars in funding to bolster research on recycling materials from electric vehicle batteries. (IPR)
UTILITIES: Questions still abound about the Tennessee Valley Authority CEO’s decision to replace a Tennessee coal plant with a gas plant and pipeline without public approval by the TVA board, and despite warnings from the U.S. EPA that the environmental review underlying the project was inadequate. (WPLN)
COMMENTARY: Utilities are overstating the urgency of their need for new power to meet increasing demand, and should pause to consider alternatives to gas, two clean electricity advocates write. (Utility Dive)
GRID: The New England grid operator’s newest transmission study finds the region has to spend up to $26 billion over the next 26 years to bulk up its transmission network — a large sum but roughly comparable to spending in recent decades. (CommonWealth Beacon)
ALSO: Two Connecticut municipalities sue to stop a state-approved transmission line expansion, calling the plan an “aesthetic eyesore and an unjust blight.” (Only In Bridgeport)
SOLAR:
COAL: Federal energy analysts believe April coal exports will be slashed by about a third because of the Francis Scott Key Bridge collapse and subsequent Port of Baltimore closure. (The Hill)
BUILDINGS:
NUCLEAR:
STORAGE: Pennsylvania’s utility commission issues new battery storage guidelines for utilities that allow them to use non-wires distribution reliability projects and possibly own them on a case-by-case basis. (Utility Dive)
UTILITIES:
CLEAN ENERGY: A town in Massachusetts’ Berkshires region is undertaking weatherization measures, installing electric vehicle chargers and installing solar arrays to achieve net-zero by 2050. (Berkshire Eagle)
TRANSIT: Rhode Island’s public transit agency says piloting no fares on its most popular bus route increased ridership by nearly 100,000 riders but cost it $2.7 million, calling the cost unsustainable. (Rhode Island Current)
EQUITY:
GRID: Utilities in Georgia, the Carolinas and Tennessee want to build gigawatts of new natural gas-fired power plants to meet escalating power demand from data centers and factories, potentially jeopardizing state and federal climate goals. (Canary Media)
ALSO:
TRANSITION:
SOLAR:
WIND: Louisville Gas and Electric and Kentucky Utilities begin using a single wind turbine to study its capabilities, along with a lithium-ion battery and 44,500 solar panels. (Spectrum News)
POLITICS:
OIL & GAS:
HYDROGEN: A hydrogen company buys the last available water rights to Texas’ Nueces River, sparking concern about drinking water availability in the nearby city of Corpus Christi. (Inside Climate News)
CRYPTOCURRENCY:
WORKFORCE: Students at a Virginia technical high school follow line workers from a local electric cooperative to learn more about trade jobs. (WHSV)
UTILITIES: West Virginia regulators launch an investigation of how utilities notify customers when there’s an outage or other service interruption. (WV Metro News)
EMISSIONS: U.S. EPA officials are reportedly mulling changes to a landmark power plant emissions rule first proposed a year ago and will likely give utilities more time to add carbon capture equipment to gas facilities. (E&E News)
ALSO: The U.S. Senate passes a bill that would invalidate a Transportation Department rule aimed at cutting highway emissions, though President Biden would veto the measure if it passes the House. (Politico)
CLIMATE:
GRID:
PIPELINES: The U.S. Justice Department weighs in on the Line 5 dispute for the first time, arguing that Enbridge has been trespassing on tribal land in Wisconsin but that a previous court order failed to consider all of the implications of shutting down the pipeline. (Wisconsin Public Radio)
OHIO: FirstEnergy made a previously unreported $1 million dark money gift to benefit the campaign of Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine’s eventual running mate, who later worked to win support for the state’s power plant bailout legislation, according to newly revealed company emails. (Energy News Network/Floodlight)
HYDROGEN:
NUCLEAR:
COAL: Federal energy analysts believe April coal exports will be slashed by about a third because of the Port of Baltimore closure. (The Hill)
SOLAR: Residents in a rural Illinois village west of Chicago hope to overturn local restrictions on rooftop solar that were previously enacted because of aesthetic concerns. (Energy News Network)
OFFSHORE WIND: Maine lawmakers reject a proposal from the governor to exempt offshore wind hub development on Sears Island from adhering to sand dune protections, obscuring the project’s path forward. (Bangor Daily News, Portland Press Herald)
ALSO:
SOLAR:
GRID:
STORAGE:
CARBON CAPTURE: In Pennsylvania, lawmakers advance a Republican bill establishing a regulatory framework for underground carbon dioxide-storage wells to support federally backed hydrogen hubs, but critics say it doesn’t include enough liability guarantees from involved companies. (Associated Press)
ELECTRIC VEHICLES: Nearly 200 electric vehicles were reportedly stalled overnight waiting for their turn at one rural Vermont charging station after the eclipse. (WCVB)
NUCLEAR: Wiscasset, Maine, officials say they’ll negotiate with the owners of the former Maine Yankee nuclear power plant about how much revenue the town will receive after a state law closed a tax exemption for the facility. (Bangor Daily News)
TRANSIT: A district court judge will soon decide whether New York has to go back to the drawing board with its Manhattan congestion tolling plan or whether it doesn’t need an environmental impact statement. (NJ Advance Media)
UTILITIES: Pennsylvania utility regulators unanimously vote to investigate a 16% rate hike request from Columbia Gas of Pennsylvania. (Penn Live)
BUILDINGS: The Efficiency Maine Green Bank will use a $15 million federal grant to support energy loans and deploy heat pumps to small businesses, homes, schools and elsewhere. (Mainebiz)
WORKFORCE:
COMMENTARY: In Vermont, the Burlington Electric Department’s general manager and a conservation program manager write that the U.S. EPA’s new final rule for vehicle emissions is a win for the state and planet. (VT Digger)
OIL & GAS: Federal officials approve the construction of a deepwater oil export facility off the Texas Gulf Coast that will be the largest oil export terminal in the U.S. (Houston Chronicle)
ALSO:
STORAGE: Federal investigators cite an electric vehicle battery plant in Georgia for safety violations after a recent fire in which employees “suffered potentially permanent respiratory damage.” (Atlanta Journal-Constitution)
NUCLEAR:
EMISSIONS:
SOLAR:
BIOMASS: Mississippi officials agreed to give more than $24 million in incentives to wood pellet producers in an effort to revitalize struggling rural areas, only to see a global debate erupt around the industry and its biggest company file for bankruptcy. (Mississippi Today)
OVERSIGHT: South Carolina regulators move to pass sweeping legislation that overhauls how the state regulates utilities to help clear the way for a planned natural gas-fired power plant, while renewable energy companies lobby for changes to encourage more solar development. (Utility Dive)
GRID: Texas solar and battery installations are growing so much that federal energy officials say there’s less need for natural gas generation during the day. (U.S. Energy Information Administration, PV Magazine)
COAL ASH: Duke Energy announces a new rail yard and loading dock at a retired coal-fired power plant in North Carolina to assist with disposal of about 1.3 million tons of coal ash. (Greensboro News & Record)
UTILITIES: The Tennessee Valley Authority names a new executive leader for its east region, which includes eastern Tennessee, northern Georgia, western North Carolina and southwestern Virginia. (news release)
ELECTRIFICATION: A new Department of Energy program aims to help manufacturers develop next-generation heat pumps that can replace large buildings’ rooftop heating and cooling systems and save U.S. businesses as much as $5 billion annually. (Utility Dive)
ALSO: Clean energy advocates and professional cooks continue to work to electrify restaurant kitchens and homes in Berkeley, California, even after a court shot down the city’s natural gas-hookup ban. (Guardian)
ELECTRIC VEHICLES:
OIL & GAS:
EMISSIONS:
GRID:
NUCLEAR: Experts are divided on whether Georgia Power’s costly, long-delayed expansion of its nuclear Plant Vogtle heralds a new era for nuclear power development or will discourage future investment in the power source. (Grist)
SOLAR: New York officials confirm Tesla’s Buffalo solar panel factory uses panels made by a competitor on its roof, not its own product. (Investigative Post)
CLIMATE:
ELECTRIC VEHICLES: An appeals court upholds the U.S. EPA’s decision to allow California to set its own electric vehicle sales mandates and tailpipe emissions limits. (Reuters)
ALSO: A California program allowing electric and hybrid vehicle drivers to use carpool lanes without passengers is set to expire this fall, affecting more than 400,000 motorists if it isn’t renewed. (NBC San Diego)
ELECTRIFICATION: Berkeley, California advocates and professional cooks continue to work to electrify restaurant kitchens and homes after a court shot down the city’s natural gas-hookup ban. (Guardian)
UTILITIES: A Colorado county says Xcel Energy inadequately alerted the public to a planned outage aimed at reducing wildfire hazard during severe winds last weekend. (Colorado Sun)
OIL & GAS:
POLLUTION: The U.S. EPA proposes allowing Wyoming to amend a haze reduction plan to factor in the partial conversion of a coal plant to natural gas, which would settle a long-running dispute between the agency and the state. (E&E News)
TRANSMISSION: Arizona advocates, residents and tribal nations continue to challenge a segment of the SunZia transmission project under development through a river valley, saying it will harm ecological and cultural sites. (Inside Climate News)
WIND: Wyoming advocates and local officials push back on state lawmakers’ efforts to increase taxes on wind power generation, saying it would stifle the industry’s growth. (Inside Climate News)
SOLAR:
CLEAN ENERGY:
BIOFUELS: California researchers predict growing demand for aviation biofuels will drive land-use changes that could offset the fuels’ emissions benefits and take farms out of food production. (AgWeb)
CARBON CAPTURE: A California company proposes a pilot project at a Washington state port that would enhance ocean water’s ability to capture and store carbon dioxide. (Peninsula Daily News)
MINING: A company submits a plan to restart a long-idled uranium mill in southern Utah. (news release)
COMMENTARY: A Wyoming columnist praises environmentalists and climate deniers for their unsuccessful joint effort to kill a costly coal-friendly carbon capture mandate. (WyoFile)
Just about every week, Shawn Grant, who works for Salt Lake City-based Rocky Mountain Power, gets an inquiry from another utility looking for information about the company’s Wattsmart battery program.
“We want to do something. … How did you guys do it?’” Grant, the company’s customer innovation manager, says he’s often asked. “We’re always fielding those questions.”
The program pays customers with solar who opt to install battery storage systems for the ability to use that stored electricity to help balance flows on the electric grid.
For customers, the benefits come in the form of lower electric bills and backup power in case of an outage. For Rocky Mountain Power, which has 1.2 million customers in Utah, Wyoming and Idaho, the program allows the company to harness the collective power stored in those distributed batteries to shave electric demand when it spikes rather than calling for more generation from a traditional power plant, among other uses.
“We’re using every battery every day to reduce demand on the grid,” Grant said.
The concept is known as a virtual power plant, and grid operators, utilities, state regulators and lawmakers across the country are increasingly exploring the possibilities. They are seen as a cost-effective way to aid an electric grid that in many parts of the country is increasingly embattled by power plant retirements as well as difficulties building new, cleaner generation and the transmission lines they need — all at a time when huge projected electric demand increases loom.
“We’re now in this load-growth era,” said Robin Dutta, acting executive director at the Chesapeake Solar and Storage Association, a solar and storage industry group focused on Maryland, Virginia and Washington, D.C. “When you’re mitigating peak demand growth at the source, that’s perhaps the most cost effective way to modernize the grid.”
Nearly 800,000 American homes installed a new solar or solar and energy storage system in 2023, according to the Solar Energy Industry Association. That growth set a record, with about 6.8 gigawatts installed, a 12% increase from 2022. Electric vehicles, another potential grid resource as a store of energy, also broke a sales record last year, despite consumer uptake being slower than some expected.
“These are devices that people are buying anyway because they’re faster, better, cheaper and virtual power plants allows everybody to leverage these devices while putting some money back in the pockets of people that bought the thing in the first place,”said Brian Turner, a director at Advanced Energy United, a clean energy trade group
The U.S. Department of Energy found in a report last year that large-scale deployment of virtual power plants “could help address demand increases and rising peaks at lower cost than conventional resources, reducing the energy costs for Americans — one in six of whom are already behind on electricity bills.”
They’re not a new concept, the DOE noted, adding that most existing virtual power plants are so-called demand response programs. In Virginia, for example, the commonwealth for years has run a program that enrolls hundreds of public facilities (airports, universities, K-12 schools, municipal buildings, water treatment plants and others) that agree to reduce or shift their electric demand to relieve strain on the grid. The DOE report says deploying 80 to 160 gigawatts of virtual power plants by 2030 could save about $10 billion in annual grid costs and would “direct grid spending back to electricity consumers.” At that scale, virtual power plants could meet between 10 and 20% of peak electric demand. The Rocky Mountain Institute, a research nonprofit focused on sustainability, called virtual power plants “a valuable and largely overlooked resource for advancing key grid objectives,” including reliability, affordability, decarbonization and electrification, among others.
However, many states are starting to take notice of the potential:
Experts who study and run the nation’s electric grid are worried about the pace of the energy transition. Old coal and gas plant retirements are accelerating, driven by economics, state clean energy policies and utilities’ own decarbonization goals. At the same time, massive backlogs in the queues to connect new power resources — overwhelmingly wind, solar and battery projects — in the regional transmission organizations that run the grid in much of the country mean big delays in replacing that retiring power generation. And after roughly a decade of flat electric demand, load growth is projected by many experts to explode as a result of transportation, industrial and home heating electrification, as well as a surge in data center development, among other factors. Throw in the fact that the construction of new transmission lines, essential to get excess power to where it might be urgently needed, has also stagnated and a problematic picture emerges.
“Most utilities in the country are planning on pretty significant load growth,” said Turner from Advanced Energy United. ”They could plan to build a new peaker plant or they could plan to ‘build’ VPPs.”
That’s where utility incentives come into play.
Generally speaking, Turner said, utilities that operate transmission and distribution systems are more friendly to the idea. Companies that also own their own generation, – and make a sizable chunk of their income from guaranteed profits on building new plants – , might not like the idea of a program that erodes the business case for a pricey new facility.
“That’s why we have utility commissions,” Turner said. “They exist to say to the utility that virtual power plants are a cheaper option for the ratepayer and therefore you should implement it.”
However, even companies that might have resisted the idea are facing such dire electric-demand growth scenarios that virtual power plants may be attractive ways to get more flexibility out of the grid more quickly than building new generation.
“This is a way to get the capacity online faster and oftentimes cheaper,” Turner said. “Meeting that load growth is a real challenge in a lot of places.”
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