State public utility commissions are a major focus for NetZero Insider reporters, and this week, we have two stories digging into the challenges facing the people charged with ensuring their states have reliable electric systems and reasonable rates.

New Jersey correspondent Hugh Morley sat down with Christine Guhl-Sadovy, president of the New Jersey Board of Public Utilities, for an in-depth discussion of the BPU’s priorities, which include getting as much clean energy on the state’s grid as possible as Gov. Phil Murphy (D) prepares to leave office.  

And New England reporter Jon Lamson sat in on Raab Associates’ New England Electricity Restructuring Roundtable, where regulators from Massachusetts, Maine and Connecticut dug into the need for an independent transmission monitor to oversee the development, and price tags, of projects aimed at upgrading or replacing existing wires. 

Washington, D.C., correspondent K Kaufmann listened into an Energy Innovation webinar on the intersection of grid reliability and clean energy resources as the industry and Trump administration continue to push for more baseload, natural gas generation. The message from a panel of industry experts: concerns about demand growth may be overblown, and renewables and storage can provide reliable power.  

The state-level focus continues in our curated content, where Canary Media reports on a Duke Energy study, which found that low-income customers, who live in older, less-efficient housing, may pay more for electricity per foot in their homes, compared to more well-off customers. A Duke Energy pilot program seeks to help with the higher bills and connect customers with energy-efficiency resources, but better outreach is needed, advocates say. 

Grist also goes local with coverage of farmers and small business owners in rural communities who were awarded small grants from the Inflation Reduction Act to help them install solar and other energy-efficient equipment to cut their electric bills. But the Trump administration has frozen the promised funds, and now grant recipients who already have invested in solar and other upgrades are uncertain if they will be reimbursed as expected. 

Another Canary Media story digs into how New England lawmakers are seeking to cut the region’s notoriously high utility bills by calling for rollbacks of clean energy and energy efficiency programs that are only a small part of monthly bills and would actually help consumers cut their energy use and their bills.   

Meanwhile, South Carolina lawmakers have proposed a bill that would promote research into next-gen nuclear, make it easier for new generation ― in particular, natural gas ― to connect to the grid, but make it more difficult for small and medium-sized solar projects to gain local approvals, according to WSOC-TV, a North Carolina station. 

Texas may be following suit, Canary reports, with a bill that would require 50% of new generation in the state to be from dispatchable resources other than battery storage ― meaning, again, natural gas. The Republican-supported bill would upend Texas’s longstanding, and successful, competitive electricity market, “and it looks a lot like the government picking winners and losers.” 

Speaking of winners and losers, EPA no longer sees its mission as protecting the country’s air and water from hazardous pollution or low-income communities overburdened with industrial emissions, according to The New York Times. A memo from Administrator Lee Zeldin says the agency will “not shut down any stage of energy production,” focusing instead on lowering “the cost of buying a car, heating a home and running a business.” 

The NetZero Insider Policy and Impacts newsletter will keep following these stories.