EMISSIONS: Oil refineries and petrochemical plants in Louisiana’s “chemical corridor” have been flaring at full blast since Hurricane Ida, while 15 state air monitoring stations are out of service. (NOLA.com)

OIL & GAS:
• Federal officials say they are responding to reports of oil and chemical spills in the Gulf of Mexico following the hurricane. (Associated Press)
• The U.S. loans 1.5 million barrels from the country’s oil reserve to an Exxon Mobil refinery in Louisiana to keep gasoline flowing after Ida. (Reuters)
• Louisiana struggles to navigate an emerging gasoline shortage after the storm knocked out power to two-thirds of the state’s gas stations and about half of its refineries, while demand surged for generator and vehicle fuel. (NOLA.com, CNN)
• Earthjustice sues the Biden administration, challenging its plan to open tens of millions of acres in the Gulf of Mexico for oil and gas exploration to comply with a court order. (Guardian)
• A Texas oil refinery suspends some operations because of a lack of oxygen supply due to increased medical demand during the coronavirus pandemic. (Bloomberg)

GRID:
• Entergy has begun restoring power to eastern New Orleans and to some oil refineries, but the utility can’t say how long it will take to get power back to the vast majority of the city. (Associated Press, Reuters, NOLA.com)
• Power should be mostly restored to Baton Rouge and surrounding parishes by next Wednesday. (Advocate)

CLIMATE: A small, struggling North Carolina town stands as an example of how extreme weather accelerated by climate change can push rural communities to the brink of insolvency and exacerbate a physical crisis into an existential one. (New York Times)

CARBON CAPTURE: The Port of Corpus Christi unveils plans to store carbon dioxide in geological reserves under the Gulf of Mexico. (Houston Chronicle)

ELECTRIC VEHICLES:
• A South Korean electric vehicle battery company plans to hire 6,000 workers after Georgia invested $2.6 billion to convince the company to locate in state. (WSB-TV)
• West Virginia elected and business leaders urge U.S. Sen. Joe Manchin to back a federal budget bill to get as many electric vehicles on the road as possible. (The Journal)
• A report finds that electrifying all of the Southeast’s cars would reduce consumer fuel spending by $42 billion annually and save the region $64 billion in imported gas and diesel fuel. (news release, Southern Alliance for Clean Energy)

SOLAR: Developer Clearloop begins construction of a 1 MW solar farm in Tennessee. (WBBJ)

WIND: The case against two men charged with defrauding investors over a failed Arkansas wind farm goes to a jury after a week of testimony. (Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette)

UTILITIES: A family who lost five members in a fatal June tubing incident in North Carolina sues Duke Energy to remove or make safety improvements to a dam that led to the deaths. (WRAL)

COMMENTARY: Virginia should reform electric co-op board elections to ensure fair procedures, including by ending rules that favor incumbents, writes a retired lawyer and electric co-op board member. (Virginia Mercury)

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.