The U.S. is poised to become a net exporter of natural gas by pipeline for the year for the first time ever following a 24 percent jump in shipments to Mexico in 2018 and a build out of new cross-border links set to expand the capacity for flows heading to the southern neighbor.
More than half of U.S. states with competitive retail energy markets face proposals for stricter oversight rules from lawmakers, including measures to phase out the industry altogether, as efforts mount to put in place more consumer protections. Just five months into most states’ legislative sessions, over two dozen proposals have emerged to toughen rules around billing and marketing practices, licensing and registration and contractual terms.
Nevada, Washington, Maryland and Puerto Rico are the latest states and territory to strengthen targets for clean energy, showing how momentum is building across the U.S. for policy makers to break away from fossil fuels over the next couple of decades. These new standards brings to five the number of states and territories that are in the advanced stages of hiking renewable goals so far this year.
U.S. wind power has more than tripled over the last decade, surpassing hydropower to become the nation's single-largest source of renewable capacity, and that's due in no small part to federal tax incentives. The industry is now poised to enjoy one last hurrah from the tax program as the expiration of the credits this year is setting in motion a rush to build about 11 gigawatts of new projects, accounting for the largest expansion of the sector since 2012.
Regions across the U.S. that have long served as strongholds for conventional, non-renewable generating capacity — from Georgia and Michigan to Tennessee — are now starting to accelerate the phase out of the legacy assets in favor of sourcing power from wind and solar, showing just how far-reaching the shift to renewables is spreading.
In this update, fossil-fuel rich New Mexico is the latest state to join the 100-percent-clean-energy club, a strong sign of the momentum building for pro-renewable policies across the U.S. New Mexico’s Democrat-led House charted a course for the state to obtain all of its power from carbon-free resources by 2045, with intermediate goals of 50 percent by…...
A decade into the nation's vast solar expansion, pitched battles continue to play out from the Northeast to the Midwest over how to set payouts for surplus supplies from the rooftop solar systems, throwing the future growth of the technology into question. Still, other states in the Northwest to the mid-Atlantic are studying how to chart a path forward.
Fossil-fuel rich New Mexico may be among the more unlikely states to join the 100-percent-clean-energy club, but it did just that in March, in the strongest sign yet of the momentum building for pro-renewable policies across the U.S. New Mexico's Democrat-led House charted a course for the state to obtain all of its power from carbon-free resources by 2045, with intermediate goals of 50 percent by 2030 and 80 percent by 2040, following passage of the Energy Transition Act.
U.S. states are plowing ahead in setting market compensation rules for battery technology, laying the foundation for future growth of the fast-maturing technology in retail and wholesale markets. While progressive states California, New York and Massachusetts are charging ahead in how to value the resource, others are still grappling with how to regulate a system that fails to fit squarely in any one box and that raises a range of jurisdictional and ownership questions.
The spread of advanced meters across the U.S. has come a long way, with over half of the nation's 152 million electricity consumers now hooked up to the devices. But further deployment of the technology, seen critical for a more responsive and reliable grid, is at risk amid heightened scrutiny from regulators, who are increasingly bowing to concerns over the costs to consumers.
Obstacles that have long thwarted the rapid growth of solar that sunny Texas has always promised -- the deregulated market and a dearth of renewable incentives -- are posing less of a hindrance in the face of cheap power purchase contracts. Texas, which leads the nation in wind-powered generation, accounting for more than a quarter of the U.S. total, is rapidly emerging as a solar power house. Falling costs, retirements of fossil-fueled generation, and demand growth have been instrumental in driving solar growth in the region.
Policy changes are occurring faster than ever before, confounding efforts by utilities to plan for the future, causing a paralysis in decision making. The task of identifying all possible scenarios over a longer horizon is becoming more demanding as state renewable energy standards are changing more frequently. Utilities are grappling with the influx of distributed energy resources and new renewable generation under various state programs, coupled with the need to maintain fossil generation to manage the intermittency of these sources.