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NATURAL GAS: More than 90 environmental organizations call on the governors of Connecticut, Massachusetts, New York and Rhode Island to oppose the expansion of a major natural gas pipeline through the states. (WBUR)
ALSO:
SOLAR:
GRID:
UTILITIES:
EMISSIONS: Residents in a Pittsburgh-area town voice concerns about emissions from a longstanding coke plant as regulators consider whether to renew its operating permit. (Inside Climate News)
WIND:
ELECTRIC VEHICLES:
COMMENTARY:
SOLAR: A Minnesota solar nonprofit matches socially conscious investors’ cash with lower-income homeowners to spread the benefits of clean energy in a Minneapolis neighborhood. (Energy News Network)
ALSO: Solar output is poised to steadily grow in South Dakota after the state’s first utility-scale project came online in late 2023. (PV Magazine)
ELECTRIFICATION: A proposed ordinance would make Chicago the first major Midwestern city to ban natural gas hookups in most new construction. (Grist)
POLITICS: Nebraska lawmakers advance a bill that would end nonpartisan elections to the state’s two largest public power districts as supporters decry outside political contributions to clean energy supporters. (Lincoln Journal Star)
PIPELINES:
CLEAN ENERGY: Michigan’s sweeping new climate and renewable energy laws will help increase the amount of federal clean energy funding that flows to the state, experts say. (Michigan Advance)
UTILITIES:
STORAGE: Indiana regulators approve plans for a 200 MW battery storage facility that’s expected to come online by the end of the year. (Vincennes PBS)
WIND: North Dakota regulators are holding a hearing today on plans for a 200 MW, $316 million wind project in the heart of the state’s coal country. (North Dakota Monitor)
EFFICIENCY:
BIOGAS: Minnesota county officials will hold public hearings in the coming weeks on plans for a $13.9 million renewable natural gas pipeline. (West Central Tribune)
COMMENTARY:
One installation at a time, a solar nonprofit that matches socially conscious investors’ cash with lower-income homeowners is spreading the benefits of solar in North Minneapolis.
Solstar was formed three years ago by solar entrepreneur Ralph Jacobson following his retirement from IPS Solar, the pioneering Twin Cities’ solar company he founded three decades ago earlier.
In his entire career, “I hardly ever had Black customers or Black subcontractors,” Jacobson recalled.
Solstar is a collective effort for clean energy leaders in North Minneapolis to address those racial disparities.
Jacobson, 71, works his network to persuade wealthy individuals to invest in residential solar installations. Kristel Porter, a well-known community activist, recruits low- or moderate-income homeowners who are interested in having solar on their homes. J.T. Thomas of the Black-owned Go Solar Construction trains and supervises students who help install the projects.
Solstar takes care of applications for all of the available incentives. Homeowners pay nothing and immediately benefit from a lower monthly electricity bill.
“It’s a no-brainer,” said Jacques Beech, who signed up with Solstar and now has solar panels on the roof of the 2,700-square-foot ranch home he shares with his wife and two kids.
His electricity bill so far has dropped by around $100 a month.
The model is working, though slower than Solstar’s founders would have hoped. The nonprofit initially wanted to finish 24 projects in its first two years. Instead, it’s completed ten and expects to hit the two dozen mark later this year.
“We found it has been harder than expected and needed a different skill set,” Jacobson said.
Among the challenges were managing investors, timing projects around incentives, convincing skeptical homeowners the offer wasn’t too good to be true, and keeping trainees employed in the still sporadic industry.
Solstar’s financing is complex. The nonprofit pays for installations by attracting investors and offering them a modest rate of return. Three major equity investors take advantage of the tax credits and depreciation on the projects. Solstar’s microlenders do not get tax credits but instead receive 3.5% on investments ranging from $5,000 to $50,000.
Solstar investors reduce their taxes by taking advantage of the 30% tax credit and a six-year depreciation schedule on solar projects. After exhausting tax incentives, Solstar plans to sell the solar systems to their commercial and residential customers at a significantly reduced price. Clients hosting Solstar panels on their roofs receive discounts on their electricity by as much as 20% and, in some cases, more.
Jacobson reduces his costs by taking advantage of other programs. Every project is sized up to 120% of the client’s electricity use, the highest amount allowed under Xcel Energy’s Solar Rewards incentive program. Solar Rewards pays more per kilowatt hour for participating low-income households. A production incentive from the city of Minneapolis’s Green Zone program adds another layer of support.
None of this is easily absorbed by investors or clients. Jacobson quickly discovered interested investors, but many would require multiple conversations and several weeks of consideration before betting on his new program.
Eventually, crowdsourcing cash paid off. “I certainly developed a bit of a following, a little community of maybe 70 to 75 people, who have put money into these projects,” he said.
One of those is Eric Pasi, a former partner at IPS Solar who now runs the community solar company Enterprise Energy. He saw an opportunity to move solar beyond helping reduce energy bills of middle- and upper-class clients to a BIPOC mixed-income neighborhood.
“We love projects like this because for a modest investment the impact for these projects is so great,” said Pasi, who is also a board member of Fresh Energy, which publishes the Energy News Network.
After Solstar began knocking on doors of North Minneapolis residents in early 2021, Jacobson discovered the annual budget for Xcel’s Solar Rewards program had already run out of money for the year. Porter kept marketing Solstar and speaking to potential clients to prepare installations for 2022 and 2023.
The Solar Rewards issue was just the start of problems. “I didn’t realize we were going to run into as many potholes as we ended up running into,” Porter said.
Some homeowners sat on the fence, not making a final decision for months. At least four who signed up in 2023 delayed solar projections because they needed new roofs after an August hail storm.
Trying to pay professional contractors and their trainees became expensive and “tricky and financially just too much,” Porter said.
Solstar eventually broadened the contractor pool beyond Go Solar to finish projects within the Solar Rewards deadlines. If a project does not meet deadlines, Solstar would have to reapply for Solar Rewards the following year “and go through the whole process again,” Porter said.
Other projects were slowed when Xcel laid off several employees who were familiar with Solstar and its model.
Solstar’s job training pipeline has also run into hurdles. Thomas onboards students from training programs offered by the city of Minneapolis and partnering institutions such as the Regional Apprenticeship Training Center. Four students who received classroom training then worked with Thomas on Solstar projects.
Some students struggle with getting transportation to installation jobs, he said. Training is often scheduled so far in advance that job opportunities may not be immediately available when students finish their classes.
Many students can’t spend a month or two waiting for a job, Thomas said, and when a job emerges, they may not be available because they are already working.
“It’s taken a while to ramp up, but now it seems like the jobs are trickling in and we’re getting the processes down,” he said. “Hopefully, as we go on to it next year, it will be a little more seamless.”
Still, according to attorney Jeremy Kalin, the program’s approach and hard-won success means that other nonprofits could use the same approach. His firm, Avisen, has worked with similar programs in Maryland and others are starting in Arizona, Georgia and New Mexico.
The difference between Solstar and those initiatives is that Jacobson recruited wealthy investors who could take advantage of the tax credits and depreciation. Nonprofits in other states will use the Inflation Reduction Act’s “direct pay” option rather than rely on investors. The act allows nonprofits and government agencies to receive tax credits as cashback from the IRS.
Nonprofits using direct pay did not have a way to “monetize the depreciation deduction,” but “they have a simpler task because finding tax credit investors with the right kind of taxable income is hard,” Kalin said.
Jacobson has not determined whether Solstar will continue the same structure or lean into direct pay. He said several early investors in Solstar and a separate initiative he helps lead in the Red Lake Indian community want to continue participating in Solstar.
Early customers like the program. Beech said he would have never made such a significant investment with such a long payback without the program. “It’s not a cost-effective thing, unless you just have the money, which I don’t,” Beech said. “This is an affordable way to do it.”
After completing the first iteration of Solstar, Jacobson wants to start another limited liability company and start recruiting 24 more homes and small businesses. “If White people can build wealth by owning solar, then I guess Black people should be able to build wealth by owning solar, too,” he said.
NATURAL GAS: The U.S. Department of Energy pauses all approvals of new liquefied natural gas export facilities to further review their climate and other impacts, in a process expected to last up to 15 months. (E&E News, Politico)
ALSO: An Arizona judge clears the way for Salt River Project to expand a natural gas power plant near a historically Black community following a two-year legal fight and charges of environmental racism. (Arizona Republic)
GRID:
SOLAR: While most state and local regulations are clear that developers or owners of utility-scale solar projects must pay to decommission them, some rule complexities can fuel local opposition to projects. (Inside Climate News)
EMISSIONS:
OFFSHORE WIND: Federal agencies publish plans to protect a critically endangered whale species amid East Coast offshore wind development, a strategy that includes artificial intelligence and passive acoustic monitoring. (Associated Press)
CLIMATE:
ELECTRIC VEHICLES: Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm believes drivers will warm to electric vehicle adoption as costs come down and convenience benefits are realized. (ABC News)
NUCLEAR: An Ohio nuclear plant owner and federal regulatory staff oppose two citizen groups’ attempts to formally intervene in a request to extend the plant’s life through 2046. (Energy News Network)
BUILDINGS: National Grid picks a Boston public housing complex, the Dorchester neighborhood’s Franklin Fields Apartments, for the city’s first networked geothermal heating system. (Mass Live)
OIL & GAS: The Biden administration temporarily halts some permits for new liquified natural gas export terminals on the Gulf Coast as it instructs the Energy Department to consider their climate effects. (Louisiana Illuminator, Washington Post)
ALSO: LanzaJet opens a sustainable jet fuel refinery in Georgia, boosted by $18 million in federal funding and $50 million from a Bill Gates-led clean energy funding group. (Columbus Ledger-Enquirer)
EMISSIONS:
SOLAR:
ELECTRIC VEHICLES:
OIL & GAS: Texas regulators identify dangerous levels of a carcinogenic chemical in water erupting from an old oil well. (Houston Chronicle)
UTILITIES:
ACTIVISM: Young climate activists converge on Tallahassee to lobby the Florida legislature for worker protections, clean energy and other bills to address climate change. (Miami Herald, WUSF)
CARBON CAPTURE: A British power plant company announces it will open a new carbon capture business headquartered in Houston, Texas. (Power Technology, news release)
INFRASTRUCTURE: A Tennessee commission finds the state needs $68 billion in infrastructure improvements, with half of that just for transportation and utility infrastructure. (WBIR)
CLIMATE:
A Nuclear Regulatory Commission panel will hear arguments Tuesday about whether two citizen groups can challenge Energy Harbor’s application to extend the life of Ohio’s Perry nuclear plant through 2046.
The Ohio Nuclear-Free Network and Beyond Nuclear say they are worried about potential radioactive leaks into Lake Erie, as well earthquake risks that were not understood four decades ago when the plant was originally licensed. They also question whether the company adequately considered whether relicensing is necessary.
Both Energy Harbor and the NRC staff oppose the groups’ petition to intervene, which would give the anti-nuclear advocates a formal role as parties in the case, with the right to submit and challenge evidence at a hearing.
“The idea of having an adversarial proceeding is for us at least to have a chance to scrutinize the evidence more closely than the NRC staff might,” said Terry Lodge, an attorney in Toledo who represents the Ohio Nuclear-Free Network and Beyond Nuclear in the case.
However, it’s not unusual for the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s staff to seek to limit interventions, according to national experts on nuclear licensing cases.
In general, “the ways they construct their rules on hearings and standards are very restrictive,” said Diane Curran, an attorney who works on nuclear power plant issues and is not involved in the case. And companies that want to keep their plants running have had a winning track record for getting license renewals granted.
The environmental groups’ reply brief said they plan to withdraw their contentions about earthquake risks, which the NRC staff argued can be “addressed by ongoing regulatory processes.” Although new information came to light after the plant began operating, those risks presumably existed when the plant was first licensed. So, the staff said, they don’t belong in a relicensing case.
Beyond Nuclear and the Ohio Nuclear-Free Network argue that neither the renewal application nor its environmental report address the impacts of radioactive tritium or other radionuclides that can leak from the plant, including how they might interact with other contaminants in Lake Erie. Energy Harbor’s environmental report filed with its application notes that tritium was found in groundwater wells near the site in 2020 and 2021. The groups’ reply said they provided enough information to show there is an issue, whose merits would be decided later based on evidence at a hearing.
The groups also argued that Energy Harbor’s environmental report exaggerated the potential adverse consequences if the plant shuts down, and that understanding the actual consequences matters when it comes to considering alternatives that could avoid or mitigate environmental risks posed by the plant.
It’s unclear how much consideration the groups’ concerns will get if their petition to intervene is denied.
“The NRC’s technical review process includes multiple opportunities for the community near a plant to provide input on potential environmental impacts of license renewal,” said Scott Burnell, a public affairs officer at the commission. “The NRC technical staff consider this input to ensure our review appropriately addresses matters under the agency’s jurisdiction.”
But that consideration would not take place in the context of a public hearing, Lodge said. And there’s no guarantee about how deeply the staff would consider different issues in its back-and-forth communications with Energy Harbor. It’s “very optional,” he said.
And while the commission must publish its proposed environmental impact statement for public comment, its rules also make it hard to raise issues after the fact. The NRC often treats various issues as “generic,” even though the law calls for a site-specific consideration, Lodge said.
“The NRC has basically constructed the rules around relicensing to make them a very pro forma process,” said Tim Judson, executive director for the Nuclear Information and Resource Service. Generally, the main focus is on whether a company has an adequate “aging management program, to be able to monitor and repair things as needed.”
Connie Kline, a member of the Ohio Nuclear-Free Network, said she was surprised that the NRC staff was “so virulent” in opposing the groups’ participation in the case and basically echoing Energy Harbor’s points. From her perspective, that’s worrisome, because the agency’s job is to regulate industry in order to protect the public.
“We call NRC, in many respects, a lap dog and not a watchdog,” Kline said.
Members of the public may listen to but not comment during the oral argument and prehearing on Jan. 30. A Jan. 22 notice from the NRC provided the dial-in number, but did not state the time to call. A separate Jan. 4 order says the proceeding will start at 1:30 p.m. Eastern time.
WIND: The Biden administration awards a northern California county $426.7 million to fund development of an offshore wind turbine assembly, construction and maintenance terminal. (Times-Standard)
SOLAR:
UTILITIES:
OIL & GAS: Alaska Gov. Mike Dunleavy calls on the state legislature to allocate another $4.5 million to boost a proposed liquefied natural gas pipeline and export project, but lawmakers are skeptical of the plan’s viability. (Northern Journal)
COAL:
ELECTRIC VEHICLES:
GEOTHERMAL: A Hawaii lawmaker proposes tackling rolling blackouts by tapping active volcanoes for geothermal power. (KHON2)
GRID:
OFFSHORE WIND: New Jersey regulators approve two new offshore wind farms as part of the state’s third solicitation: the 2.4 GW Leading Light and the 1.34 MW Attentive Energy 2 projects. (E&E News, Offshore Wind Biz)
ALSO:
POLICY: The question of how to pay for Maryland’s “comprehensive” climate plan is sure to be discussed during this upcoming legislative session, with no clear or easy answers in sight. (Maryland Matters)
CLIMATE:
MINING: A Pennsylvania nonprofit receives what is thought to be the largest grant the state has dispersed for abandoned coal mine cleanup, for a project near the Nanticoke Creek in the state’s northeast. (Bay Journal)
TRANSIT:
SOLAR:
Some environmental advocates are striking a new tone as they urge skeptical neighbors to see the larger climate benefits of a proposed port that would help build future offshore wind farms in the Gulf of Maine.
The fast-warming area of the North Atlantic is thought to have one of the world’s best wind resources in its deeper waters. Tapping into this huge renewable energy potential will likely require massive floating turbines, with a deepwater port to help construct and assemble them before they’re towed out to sea.
A state announcement on one of two potential port sites in the small Midcoast town of Searsport is expected in the coming weeks. Amid a record spate of destructive extreme weather events, conservation groups are stepping up calls for the public to back some version of the port project for the climate’s sake.
“The number one best thing to do for the environment is to get turbines in the water and start generating renewable energy,” said Nick Lund, the advocacy and outreach manager for Maine Audubon. “This is a larger question than just Searsport, because it really does affect all of us.”
Offshore wind is crucial to Maine’s goals for reducing its carbon emissions, Lund said, and offers a unique chance for the state to contribute its resources to the national and global fight against climate change.
Maine Audubon, which predates and is separate from the National Audubon Society, hopes to reframe the debate around the port and offshore wind in general as more than a “lesser of two evils,” he said.
“This type of turbine is not something that can be built elsewhere,” Lund said. “This is a real opportunity to generate a ton of energy completely locally. Other states, other countries don’t have this opportunity.”
Maine depends more on carbon-intensive fuel oil for home heating than any other state, importing it largely from Texas, Louisiana and Canada, according to federal data. The state has encouraged residents to switch to electric heat pumps and hopes to get 80% of its electricity from renewable sources by 2030.
But a boom in local solar projects has raised land-use concerns, and residents have repeatedly pushed back on transmission lines planned to bring Canadian hydropower or land-based wind from Northern Maine onto the regional grid. Some Maine fishing groups also oppose offshore wind development.
Lund said Maine Audubon is trying to turn toward saying “yes” rather than “no” to projects with a net benefit for the climate. The group has spent years developing habitat-minded siting guidance for solar developers, and executive director Andy Beahm wrote a newspaper commentary in 2023 urging support for offshore wind and calling climate change “the No. 1 threat to Maine wildlife and habitat.”
Around the same time, the National Audubon Society put out a report supporting transmission build-out for climate reasons despite potential impacts to birds. Environmentalist Bill McKibben also wrote that summer that “some NIMBY (not in my backyard) passion will need to be replaced by some YIMBY (yes in my backyard) enthusiasm — or at least some acquiescence” in order to fight the climate crisis equitably.
In an interview soon after his commentary was published, Beahm acknowledged that localized energy development may feel new to many Mainers: “Maine is highly dependent on others for our energy,” he said. “As a consequence, we haven’t had to see a lot of the power infrastructure from our communities.”
But his group and others are increasingly arguing that this needs to change. If Maine can’t tap into its offshore wind potential, it could see far more land used for solar, Lund said — or could help drive fossil fuel growth in already overburdened environmental justice areas of Appalachia and the Gulf South.
“If we say no to everything here,” Lund said, “someone else, someone with less power — their land is being developed.”
It will take a rare kind of port to help build and deploy turbine assemblies that are expected to be taller than the Washington Monument, with blades and installation vessels more than 400 feet long, according to a 2021 port feasibility study by the state Department of Transportation.
“Those locations in Searsport are, by far, the sort of best available — certainly in Maine and in New England,” Lund said. “Without a deepwater port, we’re simply not going to have floating offshore wind in the time that we need.”
The state has zeroed in on two potential wind port sites in Searsport: Mack Point, a piece of shoreline that now partly houses a Sprague Energy oil and cargo terminal; and Sears Island, a state-owned conservation area popular for birding and outdoor recreation.
Sears Island is one of the largest undeveloped islands in Maine, managed by a 2009 conservation easement that set about a third of its area aside for a potential future port. The island was unsuccessfully eyed for a nuclear plant, a coal plant, a container port and an LNG terminal in decades past, according to a state committee that overcame “years of acrimony and controversy” to negotiate the easement.
The 2021 study listed Sears Island as a preferable wind port site, partly because building one at Mack Point would require costly dredging. But some Mainers have pushed back hard against the idea of this use for part of DOT’s Sears Island set-aside, with officials predicting protest “sleep-ins” if they go this route.
A state working group has spent more than a year considering ways to minimize Mack Point’s potential cost and dredging issues — with buy-in from the site’s current owner, Sprague — and recent editorials in Maine newspapers have supported it as a better choice over Sears Island.
“Locating the offshore wind port at Mack Point consolidates industry in a single location and removes unused physical remnants of outdated energy production that offshore wind intends to replace with clean, renewable, more sustainable energy production,” Sierra Club Maine director Pete Nichols wrote in the Portland Press Herald on Jan. 18.
Lund said Maine Audubon agrees that Mack Point is the preferable site, and that choosing it could help the state avoid costly legal challenges. “And,” he said, “I’m better with delay than I am with not getting it built at all — that’s really the worst outcome.”
He said his group is most interested in seeing the project move forward, and in working to mitigate and offset any environmental impacts wherever it’s located.
CLEAN ENERGY: States bring in hundreds of millions of dollars each year in fossil fuel revenues, paying for schools and roads that will need to find other funding sources as states transition to renewables. (Axios)
EQUITY: As many as 1.5 million U.S. families could lose access to home heating assistance funds if Congress doesn’t include an additional $2 billion in aid in next year’s budget. (The Hill)
CLIMATE: House Republicans argue that the SEC’s upcoming rule requiring businesses to submit climate-related disclosures oversteps the agency’s authority based on a recent Supreme Court ruling. (Utility Dive)
NUCLEAR:
GRID: The North American Electric Reliability Corp. details a three-year plan for creating reliability standards for inverter-based resources including wind, solar and battery storage. (Utility Dive)
ELECTRIC VEHICLES: The Biden administration still needs to specify which parts of electric vehicle charging station construction can be paid for with newly detailed federal tax credits. (Canary Media)
SOLAR:
NATURAL GAS: Renewable energy advocates raise concerns about storing liquefied natural gas next to power plants, saying it doesn’t make sense to invest in gas as the country moves to renewables. (States Newsroom)
COAL: A Wyoming law requiring utilities to consider retrofitting aging coal-fired power plants with carbon capture rather than retiring them is increasing utility bills and could end up costing ratepayers billions of dollars. (WyoFile)
COAL ASH:
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