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NetZero Insider stories this week underline the critical role states play in the U.S. clean energy transition ― and will continue to play regardless of who is in the White House or controls Congress in 2025.
Our Amanda Durish Cook filed two great stories from Minnesota, one highlighting the growth of a clean energy workforce in the state and the other digging into Xcel Energy’s new integrated resource plan, which commits the utility to putting more solar and storage online, while limiting it to one new natural gas peaker, instead of two.
Getting more storage on the grid also is a priority in Rhode Island, where New England correspondent Jon Lamson reports on the state’s Energy Facility Siting Board vote to take over permitting on large energy storage projects to deal with local opposition.
Lamson covered a webinar looking at the need for bidirectional transmission to bring hydropower from Quebec to the New England states. Such projects could lower energy costs for consumers and provide more renewable energy and resilience across the region.
New Jersey correspondent Hugh Morley listened to a public hearing where the state’s Board of Public Utilities laid out its case for a coordinated approach to planning transmission for offshore wind projects ― with one link connecting multiple OSW projects ― but many residents raised concerns about safety.
And K Kaufmann reported on Maryland’s predicament, using five times more power than it generates, importing electricity every hour of every day last year, and way behind in planning new transmission so the state can get more renewable energy projects online.
James Downing caught David Rossner, one of FERC’s new commissioners, at a Washington, D.C. event, talking about his commitment to effective management of the U.S. energy transition, including careful consideration of what and where infrastructure will be needed as the system evolves over the next 20 years.
Now less than a month away, the upcoming election once again is a major focus.
On the IRA beat, even major oil companies are telling Donald Trump that some of the tax credits and incentives in the Inflation Reduction Act — like for carbon capture — should be protected from the GOP candidate’s pledge to put a hold on the law’s clean energy funding as soon as he’s in office, according to a report in Quartz.
Vice President Kamala Harris has soft-pedaled climate policies in her campaign speeches, but an analysis from E&E News finds climate policies woven throughout her economic plan, for example, a call for “clean iron and steel.”
Inside Climate News looks at GOP congressional candidates in swing districts who have reliably voted with the Republican majority opposing climate legislation but now “paint themselves green” due to rising concerns about climate change and extreme weather events in their districts.
No such strategies for Virginia’s Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin. Even as he surveyed the damage from Hurricane Helene in southwestern Virginia, Youngkin deflected any questions about climate change as a distraction and “politicizing” the restoration efforts and rebuilding of communities still to come, the Virginia Mercury reports.
Youngkin’s approach has come with a cost to the state. A second VM article notes Virginia has lagged on incentives to train the workers it will need to attract clean energy manufacturing ― both in semiconductor chips and electric vehicles ― for continued economic growth. Industry is partnering with local colleges to fill the training gap.
Read on for more key stories.
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