OIL & GAS: As crews rush to contain a 126,000-gallon oil spill from an offshore pipeline off the Southern California coast, questions arise over officials’ slow response to initial reports of the spill. (Los Angeles Times)

ALSO:
• Navajo Nation residents call for better air quality monitoring in a Utah oil field after a family is sickened by an oil and gas facility hydrogen sulfide leak. (Salt Lake Tribune)
• U.S. Sens. John Hickenlooper and Michael Bennet, both Colorado Democrats, urge the Biden administration to extend methane-emission rules to abandoned oil and gas wells. (Durango Herald)
• Public hearings on New Mexico’s proposed ozone-pollution regulations wrap up, with environmentalists criticizing the rules as too weak and industry claiming they will cost too much. (NM Political Report)

GRID:
• Congress’ bipartisan infrastructure bill would allow the Bonneville Power Administration to borrow $10 billion to upgrade its aging power grid. (Spokesman-Review)
• Heavy, wet snow leaves thousands without power in Alaska’s interior. (Fairbanks Daily News-Miner, subscription) 

HYDROPOWER: Federal regulators next spring will begin limiting releases of warm water from Lower Snake River hydroelectric dams to protect fish. (OPB)

COAL:
• Xcel Energy considers converting a soon-to-close western Colorado coal plant into a grid-heated molten-salt energy storage facility and its cooling ponds into a trout hatchery. (Colorado Sun)
• A Colorado county explores methane capture from an abandoned coal mine to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, but first must overcome the lack of federal regulations for such projects. (Aspen Daily News)

LITHIUM: Federal officials propose endangered species protections for a wildflower that grows only on the planned site of a Nevada lithium mine. (Associated Press)

NUCLEAR: An Oregon environmental group opposes an Energy Northwest proposal to install a small modular reactor near its existing full-size reactor at Hanford nuclear reservation in Washington. (Tri-City Herald)

HYDROGEN: As New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham accelerates efforts to make the state a hydrogen hub, conservationists raise questions about the environmental impact of the fuel’s production. (Albuquerque Journal)

COMMENTARY:
• This weekend’s major oil spill off California’s coast is further proof the U.S. needs to end coastal oil drilling, an editorial board writes. (Los Angeles Times)
• An advocate and a county commissioner urge Arizona regulators to approve a utility’s plan to provide $150 million to communities affected by the coal industry’s decline. (AZ Mirror)
• A former U.S. Interior Secretary calls on the Biden administration to implement a 10 mile no energy-leasing zone around Chaco Culture National Historical Park in northern New Mexico. (Writers on the Range)

Jonathan hails from southwestern Colorado and has been writing about the land, cultures, and communities of the Western United States for more than two decades. He compiles the Western Energy News digest. He is the author of three books, a contributing editor at High Country News, and the editor of the Land Desk, an e-newsletter that provides coverage and context on issues critical to the West.