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FOSSIL FUELS: President Biden bans the sale of new federal drilling leases off much of the Pacific and Atlantic coasts and the eastern Gulf of Mexico, but experts say the order is unlikely to slow production as it leaves out the western Gulf, where production is at an all-time high. (E&E News)
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ELECTRIC VEHICLES:
TRANSPORTATION: The first congestion pricing plan in the United States goes into effect in Manhattan after a judge declines New Jersey’s request to halt the program at the last minute. (New York Times)
EFFICIENCY: Republican-led states challenge new federal energy efficiency standards for residential construction, saying they would increase homebuilder costs and exceed Congress’ authority. (Iowa Capital Dispatch)
BIOFUELS: Advocates urge Massachusetts policymakers not to lean too heavily on biofuels in their plans to decarbonize the state’s heating systems, saying there are too many questions about the possible impacts. (Energy News Network)
OVERSIGHT: Montana’s Supreme Court finds state regulators and NorthWestern Energy skirted environmental laws by failing to account for a proposed natural gas plant’s potential greenhouse gas emissions, but allows the now-operational facility to continue running. (Daily Montanan)
OIL & GAS:
MINING:
SOLAR: Nevada regulators direct NV Energy to incorporate additional benefits of distributed solar and storage into its resource plans, drawing praise from the clean energy industry and advocates. (news release)
GRID: A Colorado study finds major transmission expansions are necessary to realize the solar generating potential of the rural San Luis Valley in the southern part of the state. (Alamosa Citizen)
UTILITIES: Pacific Gas & Electric say reduced operating costs and a federal loan should help the utility stabilize or even lower California customers’ bills in 2025 (Sacramento Bee)
STORAGE: California’s grid operators plan to keep the existing natural gas fleet online even though increasing battery storage capacity is displacing some fossil fuel generation. (RTO Insider, subscription)
COMMENTARY:
Environmental and community advocates in Massachusetts argue that making too much room for biofuels in a pending state plan to decarbonize heating systems would slow the transition from fossil fuels and cause more pollution than a plan that prioritizes electric heat pumps.
As the state works on the creation of a Clean Heat Standard, a report released last month by Greater Boston Physicians for Social Responsibility raises questions about the effects using biodiesel in fuel-oil heating systems could have on air quality and public health, saying there is not enough information available about the pollutants released in the process.
Advocates say there is no such uncertainty about electric heat pumps, which create no direct emissions and should therefore be heavily favored in the new state policy.
“We absolutely think the thumb should be on the scale of electrification,” said Larry Chretien, executive director of the Green Energy Consumers Alliance. “If they give credit to biofuels, it ought to be conditional.”
Oil heating is much more prevalent in the Northeast than in the rest of the country. In Massachusetts, 22% of households are heated with oil, as compared to less than 5% nationwide. Moving homes and businesses off oil heat, therefore, is an important element of the state’s plan to achieve net-zero emissions by 2050, which sets a target of reducing emissions from heating by 93% from 1990 levels in that timeframe.
The process of developing a Clean Heat Standard began when then-Gov. Charlie Baker convened the Commission on Clean Heat in 2021. In 2022, the board recommended the creation of the standard, which was also included in the state’s Clean Energy and Climate Plan for 2050, released later that year. A stakeholder process began in 2023, and in the fall of that year the state released a draft framework for the standard that included the expectation of issuing credits for some biofuel use.
The program is expected to require gas utilities and importers of heating oil and propane to provide an increasing proportion of clean heating services like home heat pumps, networked geothermal, and other options, or buy credits from other parties that have implemented these solutions.
Whether the other options that qualify as clean heat will include biofuels — fuels derived from renewable, organic sources — has been a matter of contention since the idea for the system was first raised.
Climate advocates have tended to oppose the inclusion of much, if any, biofuel in the standard. Though biodiesel creates lower lifetime greenhouse gas emissions than its conventional counterpart, the recent Greater Boston Physicians for Social Responsibility report contends that there are many unanswered questions about how burning biodiesel impacts public health.
“Given the sheer amount of doubt, there’s more research that should clearly be done before these fuels are subsidized by the state government,” said report author Carrie Katan, who also works as a Massachusetts policy advocate for the Green Energy Consumers Alliance, but compiled the report as an independent contractor for the physicians group.
The physicians’ report notes a study by Trinity Consulting Group that found significant health benefits to switching from fossil diesel to biodiesel for building heating. The physicians’ report, however, questions the methodology used in that study, claiming it cherrypicks data and fails to cite sources.
Katan’s report also notes that the health impacts of biofuels can vary widely depending on the organic matter used to create them, and points out that most of the research on burning biofuels is focused on the transportation sector.
Climate advocates also argue that embracing biofuels in a Clean Heat Standard would unnecessarily prolong the transition to electric heat pumps while encouraging the continued burning of fossil heating oil. Typically, a heating oil customer using biodiesel receives a blend that is no more than 20% biofuel. Providing credit for that fraction of biofuel would therefore improve the economics of the entire heating oil system, contrary to the overall emissions reduction goals of the policy, Chretien said.
“We’re trying to create a system that is rewarding steps towards greenhouse gas reduction,” he said.
Advocates of biofuels, however, say they are confident that existing science makes a solid case for the health and environmental benefits of biodiesel.
“There’s a decades-long body of work showing the overall benefits to public health of biofuels, specifically biodiesel,” said Floyd Vergara, a consultant for Clean Fuels Alliance America, a national trade association representing the biodiesel, renewable diesel and sustainable aviation fuel industries.
Vergara, who was involved in the Trinity Consulting study, called out in the physicians’ report, also defended the methodologies and sourcing of that paper.
Further, he said, though biodiesel is typically limited to 20% in current blends, it is quite possible to run a heating system entirely on biofuel, with just a few tweaks to the equipment. These conversions could yield immediate reductions in emissions, he said, rather than waiting for the slower process of replacing thousands of heating oil systems with electric heat pumps.
The difference could be particularly acute in low-income or other traditionally disadvantaged neighborhoods, where many residents can not afford to make the switch to heat pumps, he said.
“You’re getting those benefits immediately, and you’re getting them while the states are pursuing zero-emissions technologies,” he said.
State environmental regulators expect to release a full draft of the clean heat standard for public comment sometime this winter.
NUCLEAR: Maryland-based Constellation Energy signs a $1 billion deal to provide nuclear power and energy efficiency services to 13 federal agencies, marking the first time the U.S. has used a major energy purchase to support nuclear power as a clean energy source. (Reuters)
ALSO: An energy company threatens to sue federal regulators for denying its proposal to expand an Amazon data center located at a nuclear plant in Pennsylvania. (E&E News, subscription)
CLIMATE:
OFFSHORE WIND:
EFFICIENCY: Massachusetts’ newest energy efficiency plan targets rental properties, covering the entire cost of weatherization in some cities and protecting tenants against rent hikes intended to pay for more efficient heating equipment. (Boston Globe)
SOLAR:
FRACKING: Scientists find contamination in freshwater mussels consistent with the chemical signatures of wastewater produced by fracking in western Pennsylvania. (Inside Climate News)
TRANSPORTATION: A New Jersey judge agrees to hear a request for a last-minute restraining order against New York’s plan to impose a congestion price on cars entering parts of Manhattan starting this weekend. (4 New York)
ELECTRIC VEHICLES: Hearing from building owners concerned about the risk of fire from indoor e-bike charging, New York City expands an initiative allowing multifamily buildings to apply for sidewalk space to install charging cabinets. (Streetsblog)
CLEAN ENERGY: A University of Maryland researcher receives $7.8 million to develop and test a system that uses fermented ocean microbes to power marine sensing devices for scientific or national security applications. (Maryland Today)
COAL: The private equity firms that now own a large, polluting Ohio coal plant say in regulatory filings that the facility “will continue to operate for so long as they are legally able to do so on an economic basis.” (Ohio Capital Journal)
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NUCLEAR:
UTILITIES: Xcel Energy customers will see a temporary 5.2% electric rate hike in 2025 as the utility requests a larger increase to help pay for grid improvements and its transition off fossil fuels. (Star Tribune)
CLEAN ENERGY: The $700 billion in tax credits expected from the Inflation Reduction Act will motivate $2 trillion in private investment and produce trillions of dollars in net benefits, according to a study commissioned by the American Clean Power Association. (Utility Dive)
PIPELINES:
POWER PLANTS: Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer signs a bill creating long-term tax incentives for large data centers, including for facilities built on former power plant properties. (Michigan Advance)
EFFICIENCY: While federal tax rebates for residential heat pumps may go away under the Trump administration, both red and blue states could continue incentive programs based on their popularity, experts say. (MPR News)
COMMENTARY: The head of Indiana’s recently created green bank says the organization will provide low-cost financing for small clean energy projects and help ease energy cost pressures amid rising inflation. (Indiana Capital Chronicle)
OFFSHORE WIND: An offshore wind developer tables a planned wind farm after Connecticut failed to join Massachusetts and Rhode Island in agreeing to buy power from the project. (WBUR)
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CLIMATE:
FOSSIL FUELS: Neighbors of a former refinery site in Philadelphia worry about the potential environmental and health impacts of plans for a warehouse and life sciences complex and liquefied natural gas and butane storage. (Inside Climate News)
TRANSMISSION: Maryland legislators have at least four bills in the works to modify or stop a widely opposed transmission line through the state — a plan that has drawn state policymakers’ attention away from other energy and climate issues this year. (WBAL, Maryland Matters)
GRID: Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro files a federal complaint against PJM, arguing that the grid operator’s market rules are “currently failing” and will result in soaring electricity prices. (Reuters)
TRANSPORTATION: New York’s plan to impose an extra toll on drivers in some parts of Manhattan is set to go into effect this weekend despite a pending legal challenge from New Jersey. (Gothamist)
ELECTRIC VEHICLES:
UTILITIES: A Spanish energy company purchases the parent company of electric utilities in Connecticut, Maine, and New York in a $2.5 billion deal that critics say will reduce transparency and accountability. (Maine Public)
STORAGE: Maine recommends that the state public utilities commission procure 200 MW of battery capacity to manage storage and deployment of solar and wind power and avoid costly grid upgrades. (Portland Press Herald, subscription)
OIL & GAS: Oil and gas companies move to expand pipelines across Virginia as the rapidly growing number of data centers strain energy demand and existing infrastructure. (Virginia Mercury)
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TRANSITION: A Texas electric cooperative will convert a coal-fired power plant into a solar and battery facility, aided by more than $1.4 billion in federal funding to support clean energy and maintain rural jobs. (Texas Tribune)
GRID: The private company that oversees Puerto Rico’s power grid announces it’s restored power for 98% of its 1.47 million customers after a blackout knocked out power across the island on New Year’s Eve. (Associated Press)
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ELECTRIC VEHICLES: A Virginia lawmaker will again introduce a bill to establish funding incentives for companies to build electric vehicle charging stations in rural parts of Virginia. (Cardinal News)
OVERSIGHT: A clean energy nonprofit sues Georgia regulators for allegedly violating an open records law after the state fails to turn over public records from a state board member who the group claims used her personal email and cellphone for public business. (Atlanta Journal-Constitution)
CLIMATE: A family’s experience with Hurricane Helene and its aftermath illustrates how climate-exacerbated extreme weather disproportionately affects undocumented residents. (NPR)
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COMMENTARY: A Virginia legislative commission’s report confirms the booming data center sector will triple power demand over the next 15 years, threatening not just the state’s emission reduction goals, but its ability to produce that much power even without them, writes a columnist. (Virginia Mercury)
OIL & GAS: An Arizona county votes to reverse its zoning designation that cleared the way for a proposed natural gas peaker plant near homes following stiff opposition from residents and advocates. (Arizona Republic)
PUBLIC LANDS: The Biden administration proposes banning new oil and gas and geothermal development on 264,000 acres of federal land in the Ruby Mountains in Nevada. (news release)
UTILITIES:
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CARBON CAPTURE: The U.S. EPA greenlights a developer’s proposal to inject and sequester captured carbon in a southern California oil field. (Californian)
POLITICS: Wyoming’s Freedom Caucus-dominated legislature prepares to consider legislation relating to nuclear waste, enhanced oil production, coal severance taxes and utility wildfire liability limits. (WyoFile)
TRANSITION: A nonpartisan research firm finds complex federal grant applications hinder Wyoming coal communities’ ability to access energy transition funds. (Inside Climate News)
CLEAN ENERGY: A study finds clean energy-generated power exceeded California’s electricity demand during a record-breaking 98 of 116 days last spring and summer without experiencing significant outages. (Electrek)
EMISSIONS: Colorado regulators consider proposed rules aimed at curbing landfills’ methane emissions. (CPR)
The last time President Donald Trump took office, Illinois had just passed the Future Energy Jobs Act (FEJA), creating an ambitious renewable electricity mandate, solar incentive programs, green job training and equity provisions to propel the state’s clean energy economy.
That progress is offering both a blueprint and a source of hope for Illinois clean energy and environmental justice advocates as they try to keep the state’s clean energy transition on track during a second Trump presidency.
“The state policy is designed to be responsive to a lack of federal climate leadership, to the need for Illinois to step up into a position of climate leadership,” said Vote Solar deputy Midwest program director John Delurey, who added that since the 2024 election “I’m at the point where I can channel my existential dread into state-based action.”
Illinois lawmakers expanded on FEJA with the Climate & Equitable Jobs Act (CEJA) in 2021, and advocates expect another state energy bill in 2025 to prioritize energy storage and otherwise further clean energy goals, including planning for the mandatory closing of almost all fossil fuel generation by 2035.
“With CEJA we’ve mapped out an ambitious climate plan, and we’re in a strong position to further those goals even under a Trump administration,” said Madeline Semanisin, Midwest equitable building decarbonization advocate for the Natural Resources Defense Council. “This is not the first Trump administration. States and cities are more prepared this time to accelerate initiatives at the state and city level.”
That’s not to say the state won’t be affected by a president who is hostile toward clean energy policy. Several federal tax credits and grants that have helped accelerate progress in Illinois could be at risk under Trump, and a rollback of federal environmental regulations or enforcement could prolong pollution from coal ash, power plants and other sources.
James Gignac, Union of Concerned Scientists lead Midwest senior policy manager for the Climate & Energy program, said he thinks of the state’s clean energy outlook in terms of headwinds and tailwinds, which will continue to shift based on economic and political factors beyond the state’s control.
“States for many years have not been able to rely on the federal government for climate action, whether due to politics or the Supreme Court,” Gignac said. “The election results will make it harder to achieve the goals that Illinois has established. It doesn’t fundamentally change the energy policy path that the state is on, it just makes it even more urgent that state legislators pass additional policies.”
Federal funds from the Inflation Reduction Act, Bipartisan Infrastructure Law and other federal programs have helped Illinois and individual cities and counties carry out their clean energy goals. Illinois was awarded more than $430 million in a Climate Pollution Reduction Grant for implementation of the state’s goals on industrial decarbonization, clean energy, clean transportation and freight, climate-smart agriculture, and building energy efficiency.
Illinois was also awarded $156 million in federal Solar for All funds to bolster solar and equity goals including workforce training, residential solar deployment, and community engagement.
Illinois advocates and experts said they expect federal funds that have already been awarded to be paid out, and they don’t expect the Trump administration and Republican-dominated Congress to make major changes to the IRA or infrastructure law, especially given the financial impact those laws have had in Republican-dominated areas.
“We have seen hundreds of thousands of dollars for small businesses and farmers” paid out through the federal Rural Energy for America Program (REAP), not to mention federal IRA funds, that “overall are benefitting Republican districts” during the Biden administration, noted Angela Xu, Illinois Environmental Council municipal engagement manager.
Even if new federal funding windfalls are not available in the future, advocates say the funds awarded during the Biden administration will have lasting impact, combined with state-level programs and funding sources that will continue, and market forces that are making clean energy increasingly competitive.
“President-elect Trump has indicated his intention to roll back IRA programs, but keep in mind that when President Trump was elected last time, he and the Republican-led Senate and House were hellbent publicly on rolling back Obamacare, and that didn’t happen,” said Environmental Law & Policy Center executive director Howard Learner.
“The IRA has supported smart, sensible renewable energy development in red states and blue and purple states,” he added. “There’s no question if President Trump tries to cut back and constrain the IRA, it will have some impact on the pace of renewable energy development and other climate change solutions. On the other hand, it’s very hard to keep better technology from growing. When new technologies come to the market and they are better and cleaner and economically sensible, they tend to accelerate and capture more market share.”
Illinois Shines, the program creating lucrative Renewable Energy Credits for distributed solar, is funded through ratepayer payments — so it is not dependent on federal funding. That doesn’t mean it is immune from federal action, since the federal Investment Tax Credit and the global solar market influence the viability of projects in Illinois.
“There are levers they can pull, through an act of Congress they can change the ITC, which is an important part of the value stack for renewables,” said Delurey, of Trump and his allies in Congress. “And they could deploy tariffs which make the landscape a lot more complicated. The U.S., thanks to the IRA, is making its way towards onshoring and bringing a lot of manufacturing back stateside, but we’re not quite there yet.”
If the tax credit is reduced or solar panels get more expensive because of tariffs, Illinois’s incentives “would probably have to be adjusted accordingly,” Delurey said, with bigger incentives for each project.
“It would just mean fewer megawatts and kilowatts in Illinois. We’d still be deploying solar, but it is sensitive to the price of clean energy.”
Advocates agree that the Biden administration’s Justice 40 mandate, that 40% of the benefits of many federal climate and other programs go to disadvantaged communities, is likely to be ended or ignored by the Trump administration.
Lower-income and marginalized communities could also be affected by understaffing, delays or rollbacks in federal programs like LIHEAP, which provides energy bill assistance, and energy efficiency rebates for low-income households.
“We can put things in state legislation that supports these communities,” including in the Illinois energy bill being drafted for introduction in 2025, Semanisin said. “Justice 40 is a framework we can incorporate in state legislation as well, to prioritize people who have been historically underserved.”
During his first administration, Trump made significant rollbacks to coal plant wastewater protections, and to the 2015 federal rules governing the storage and cleanup of coal ash. Both are big issues in Illinois, where eight coal plants are still operating, and coal ash is stored in 76 ponds, landfills and other sites, according to an Earthjustice analysis.
Earthjustice senior attorney Jenny Cassel said experts anticipate Trump will again try to weaken the Clean Water Act and coal ash protections. Meanwhile it’s likely the EPA under his administration will do little to enforce the coal ash regulations, which was largely the case before the Biden administration made coal ash a priority.
Illinois passed its own state coal ash rules in 2019, after lobbying by activists who wanted to make sure the rules were at least as strong as federal rules and covered legacy ponds not included in federal rules at the time. In 2024, the federal rules were expanded to cover legacy ponds as well as historic ash and coal ash landfills, but that provision is being challenged in federal court. The state rules do not cover ash historically dumped or scattered around, and they also do not cover inactive coal ash landfills.
Meanwhile the implementation of the Illinois coal ash law has been extremely slow. The law requires each site to get an operating permit with pollution limits that can then be enforced, but so far only two permits at one coal plant site have been issued, Cassel said.
“We keep hearing excuse after excuse” from the Illinois EPA that issues the permits, Cassel said. “‘We don’t have enough people, they’re tied up in administrative hearings, conditions are changing,’ every dog-ate-my-homework excuse in the book.”
“At the federal level, there’s any number of potential ways they could attempt to roll back the [coal ash] rules, or weaken areas that haven’t been fully defined,” she added. “That’s certainly what they did in round one. Illinois will really have to step up into the vacuum of protectiveness we expect at the federal level.”
Chicago — site of the 2024 Democratic National Convention — has long been a target of Trump’s ire, and Chicago officials during his last administration and today are outspoken about countering Trump’s agenda.
Chief Sustainability Officer Angela Tovar said the city will continue its work on solar, electric vehicles and building decarbonization, as well as centering environmental justice in planning, zoning and enforcement decisions.
“So much of everyone’s local regulations hinge on things like the Clean Air Act and federal standards; there is going to be this question of federal preemption, what home-rule authority do we have?” Tovar said. “Those are still outstanding questions. Every rollback will present its own set of challenges for cities and states. What I am at least grateful for in being in the state of Illinois and the city of Chicago is we do have such robust climate leadership at the state and local level.”
The city’s environmental justice ordinance requires a holistic look at pollution — from traffic and other sources — when industrial development is proposed. That could help protect communities even if federal pollution limits are relaxed. The city has also launched an interdepartmental environmental justice working group, involving “every department that touches air, land and water,” as Tovar said.
The city program Green Homes Chicago funds energy efficiency upgrades for qualifying single- and multi-family homes, which could help fill the gap if federal home rebates are reduced, Tovar noted. Chicago Recovery Plan funding from federal pandemic relief and city bond issuances could help compensate for any funding that might be lost if IRA is undermined, she added.
“The role of cities and states becomes even increasingly more important right now,” Tovar said. “We have an ability to really demonstrate leadership in this moment. For cities like Chicago that have already made some progress, it’s up to us to ensure we’re sharing best practices and working together to really create those safeguards and fortify basic environmental and health protections at a local level. We’re certainly going to maintain our commitment, make sure we are rolling out our programs, and unwavering in our pursuit of environmental justice.”
NATURAL GAS: Bans on new natural gas hookups are moving ahead in states including Maryland, Massachusetts, and New York, despite a national wave of resistance to legal prohibitions on the fuel. (E&E News)
CLEAN ENERGY:
TRANSMISSION: The process of approving a much-contested 70-mile transmission line through three Maryland counties could take up to two years as opponents are likely to leave “no stone left unturned” in their attempts to stop the plan. (Baltimore Sun, subscription)
OFFSHORE WIND:
STORAGE: Some 30 planned battery farms are pending in Connecticut with the potential to add more than 4.3 GW of energy storage capacity to the grid. (Darien Times)
BIOFUEL: Creating sustainable biofuel could be a possible use of kelp grown by Connecticut’s expanding seaweed farming industry, as growers look for more markets for the marine plants. (CT Mirror)
SOLAR: Five new community solar projects come online in Maine, adding to the soaring number of such projects built since the state created a subsidy to boost their development. (Bangor Daily News, subscription)
GEOTHERMAL: Plans to expand a networked geothermal system in Massachusetts and build a new project in Vermont are among five plans splitting $35 million in federal funding for geothermal projects. (Energy News Network)
GRID:
UTILITIES: National Grid agrees to a $1 million settlement for not following proper procedures in the lead-up to natural gas-fueled house explosion in New York last year. (WSYR)
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