The U.S. Energy Department on Feb. 4 announced up to $20 million in funding to lower the cost of geothermal energy development through faster drilling technologies that will speed up project development. The agency aims to lower the cost of geothermal drilling by significant amounts, which can account for more than half of a project’s…...
The Massachusetts Department of Public Utilities on Feb. 2 approved a three-year energy efficiency plan filed by the state’s electric and gas utilities for the period of 2022-2024. The energy savings targets set forth in the plan are designed to better align the Mass Save programs with the state’s climate goals. The program has a…...
The U.S. Energy Department on Feb. 2 signed a memorandum of understanding with the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), Housing and Urban Development (HUD), in conjunction with the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico to promote new actions that will speed up efforts to strengthen the electrical resilience of the island. The proposed initiatives further President Biden’s…...
Revisions to rules governing competitive retail electricity markets are focused on strengthening customer protections while exploring ways to expand access to these markets. Recent actions include efforts to open retail electric competition in Arizona, Connecticut’s investigation into supplier offers, and Maine’s update to marketing standards for retail electric services.
The California Independent System Operator Corp. on Feb. 1 released a 20-year transmission outlook that discusses long-term infrastructure requirements to reach the state’s target of generating 100 percent electricity from carbon-neutral sources by 2045. The draft plan is based on the assumption that about 120 gigawatts will have to be added to the grid by…...
Georgia Power on Jan. 31 filed its 2022 Integrated Resource Plan with the Georgia Public Service Commission, proposing to close all of its coal assets by 2035. The company intends to retire a total of 12 generation assets producing more than 3,500 megawatts by 2028. To assist this asset transformation, the utility is planning to…...
The Maryland Energy Administration on Feb. 1 announced new funding for microgrids, robust power systems, resilient hubs, and other distributed energy resource networks to provide reasonable, consistent, and feasible energy to domestic and commercial consumers that are vulnerable to power outages. In 2021, the agency funded the Resilient Maryland and Resiliency Hub programs to create…...
The Western Energy Imbalance market generated $739 million in benefits in 2021, the highest annual benefits achieved since the market launched in 2014, according to a Jan. 31 press release from the California Independent System Operator Corporation. This brings the cumulative benefits of the real-time energy market close to the $2 billion mark. The previous…...
The Biden Administration on Jan. 31 announced new actions, in accordance with the Methane Emissions Reduction Action Plan, which was unveiled in Glasgow during the U.N. climate conference in November 2021. The plan introduces a number of innovative actions to deal with methane emissions, a key driver of climate change, and support a clean energy…...
The U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia on Jan. 27 invalidated the Interior Department’s Gulf of Mexico oil and gas lease sale citing failure to accurately consider greenhouse gas emissions that would result from the auction. The sale, Lease Sale 257, held in November 2021, offered about 80 million acres, the largest offshore…...
The Kansas Corporation Commission on Jan. 28 approved a settlement agreement allowing Black Hills Energy to recover $87.9 million in deferred costs related to natural gas service provided during the winter storm Uri in February 2021. The storm affected the south-central U.S., causing widespread outages and forcing natural gas processing plants to shut down. As…...