BIOENERGY: Environmental advocates say the calculations used to project climate benefits from biogas captured at industrial feedlots are often misleading, overlooking the impacts of the livestock operations themselves. (Inside Climate News)

CLIMATE:
• A new study finds that the Virginia’s sweeping Clean Economy Act will only cut emissions 26% by 2050, partly because it focuses only on the state’s largest electric utilities. (Greentech Media)
• A growing shift in Florida’s electorate to accept climate change and worry about its consequences may result in action even in an increasingly Republican state legislature. (WLRN)
• A utility regulation commission in Orlando, Florida, approves a clean-energy plan to end net carbon emissions by 2050, but critics worry it will also stop energy efficiency measures and incentives for rooftop solar. (Orlando Sentinel)

***SPONSORED LINK: Whether you’re aware of it or not, clean energy is working for you right now.  Support NCSEA’s efforts to continue building a clean energy future that works for all North Carolinians  by giving a tax-deductible donation before December 31. www.energync.org/cleanworks .***

SOLAR:
• Edelen Renewables says it will redevelop nearly 1,800 acres of a reclaimed coal mine in eastern Kentucky for a solar farm. (WYMT)
• A Con Edison official says an 80 MW solar farm in southern Virginia should be complete by spring, with more projects likely in the works. (Gazette-Virginian)
• A northeastern North Carolina county board unanimously rezones 611 acres to allow construction of a solar farm. (Roanoke-Chowan News-Herald)

REGULATION: West Virginia Republicans applaud the U.S. EPA for declining to tighten soot regulations, despite an agency report in January finding thousands of premature deaths could be prevented. (Charleston Gazette-Mail)

WIND: Dominion Energy uses the installation of two turbines off Virginia’s coast as a first step toward a larger commercial wind energy project that could see 180 turbines in service by 2026. (WDVM)

ELECTRIC VEHICLES: Tesla CEO Elon Musk moves to Texas after fighting with California regulators over coronavirus restrictions that have kept the company’s Bay Area factory closed. (Associated Press)

OIL & GAS: The president of Oklahoma’s oil and gas trade association says 2020 has been a historically bad year for the industry. (Tahlequah Daily Press)

EFFICIENCY:
• San Antonio launches a pilot program to install “smart” sensors and updated technology in streetlights and traffic signals. (San Antonio Report)
• A conservative think tank chides Chattanooga in its annual “Tennessee Pork Report” for spending $6 million on efficient street lights before removing them and giving them back to the company over a dispute about their effectiveness. (Chattanooga Times Free Press)

TRANSPORTATION: Virginia leaders hope a passenger rail authority created earlier this year will result in more train ridership and a drop in transportation-related carbon emissions. (Virginia Mercury)

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UTILITIES: A Mississippi electricity cooperative uses a $200 million credit from the Tennessee Valley Authority to avoid rate increases and weather the pandemic, which has resulted in a 10% decline in commercial power usage. (Chickasaw Journal)

COMMENTARY: The U.S. Senate may take up President Trump’s nomination of new members to the Tennessee Valley Authority’s board during its lame-duck session, but if so, it should give them a straight up-or-down vote, writes a clean-energy advocacy group. (Southern Alliance for Clean Energy)

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Mason Adams

Mason has worked as a journalist since 2001, covering Appalachian communities and the issues that affect them. He compiles the Southeast Energy News digest. Mason previously worked as a wildlife biologist before moving into journalism by freelancing at Coast Weekly in Monterey, California, before taking an internship in 2001 at High Country News. He wrote for the Enterprise Mountaineer in western North Carolina and the Roanoke Times in western Virginia before going freelance in 2012. His work has appeared in Southerly, Daily Yonder, Mother Jones, Huffington Post, WVPB’s Inside Appalachia and elsewhere. Mason was born and raised in Clifton Forge, Virginia, and now lives with his family and a small herd of goats in Floyd County, Virginia.