SOLAR: Under pressure from customers, shareholders and employees, big box retailers are embracing solar power. (New York Times)
ALSO:
• A Virginia farming family is frustrated that its proposed solar project is facing high utility charges to connect to the grid. (Energy News Network)
• The Trump administration eliminates an exemption from solar tariffs for “bifacial” panels that absorb sunlight on both sides. (E&E News, subscription)
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BIOFUELS:
• The Trump administration plans to restore ethanol demand by upholding higher blending standards in 2020 and removing barriers to ethanol sales. (Associated Press)
• Minnesota senator and presidential candidate Amy Klobuchar calls the plan a “vague promise” to undo the damage already done to farmers, and “too little, too late.” (Radio Iowa)
PIPELINES:
• The U.S. Supreme Court will hear an appeal by Dominion Energy of a lower court ruling that stopped construction of the Atlantic Coast Pipeline. (Reuters)
• Pre-construction work on the Keystone XL pipeline is expected to start this month in South Dakota and Montana. (Rapid City Journal)
• New Permian Basin crude oil pipelines haven’t yet boosted U.S. crude exports, largely because of the ongoing U.S-China trade war. (Bloomberg)
OIL & GAS:
• Most large oil companies no longer deny the connection between fossil fuels and climate change but continue to invest in them anyway. (New York Times)
• The Trump administration opens up 725,000 acres of land in California’s Central Valley and Coast to oil and gas drilling, ending a prohibition on leases in the state. (Associated Press)
• A federal judge rejects the Trump administration’s request to either toss or transfer a challenge to greater sage grouse habitat management plans. (E&E News, subscription)
• Oil companies are pushing federal regulators to overturn a Washington state law to improve the safety of oil shipped by rail. (E&E News, subscription)
RENEWABLES: Utility customers in the MISO and PJM grid regions could save nearly $50 a year with more wind, solar and storage on the grid, according to a new report. (North American Windpower)
ELECTRIC VEHICLES:
• Massachusetts regulators reject a plan by National Grid to subsidize thousands of electric vehicle charging stations. (E&E News, subscription)
• Wisconsin regulators are among officials grappling with policy questions amid the expansion of electric vehicles. (Wisconsin State Journal)
• Ford Motor Co. plans to make electric vehicle models more appealing for drivers than what’s currently on the market. (E&E News, subscription)
TRANSMISSION: Renewable energy development in the Great Plains could be curbed if transmission capacity doesn’t expand, some experts say. (Oklahoman)
COAL:
• Critics in Appalachia say that retraining programs have a poor record in connecting dislocated workers, like coal miners, with local employment that pays a competitive wage. (Ohio Valley Resource)
• A northern Indiana city councilor tells federal regulators that dumping coal ash in unlined pits has devastated her community. (Times of Northwest Indiana)
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NUCLEAR: It’s unclear how the leading Democratic presidential candidates would stand on relicensing Duke Energy’s nuclear reactors. (HuffPost)
CLIMATE:
• With more carbon emissions than all of the other Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative states, Pennsylvania’s entry is the most significant change since the compact began in 2008. (InsideClimate News)
• New York City is considering turning Governors Island, a tiny patch off the tip of Manhattan, into a “living laboratory” to study the effects of climate change. (New York Times)