ELECTRIC VEHICLES: After first using Volkswagen settlement funding for diesel school buses and other gas-powered vehicles, North Carolina’s governor floats a plan to use the remaining two-thirds largely on deploying electric vehicles and achieving the state’s climate initiatives. (Energy News Network)

ALSO:
• Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp announces an initiative to boost the state’s electric vehicle and mobility industry. (Capitol Beat News Service/Brunswick News)
• Utilities, startups and local governments partner to build fast-charging networks for electric vehicles across the Southeast that may end up outpacing EV sales. (Wall Street Journal)

SOLAR:
• Florida Power & Light places 2,000 customers who want solar power on a waiting list after 48,000 residential customers buy up all the available solar power in the state. (Florida Politics)
• A New York-based hedge fund with an appetite for renewables fuels seven of the 16 proposed solar projects in Louisiana seeking tax incentives. (NOLA.com)

OIL & GAS:
• The chair of a Houston-based liquefied natural gas company says the financial timing is finally right to build an export terminal using carbon capture in Louisiana. (Houston Chronicle)
• An eastern Kentucky judge-executive says the county government cannot regulate a gas company that unexpectedly shut off service to 100 households due to “numerous leaks and imminent threat.” (Appalachian News-Express)

WIND: The owner of a 60-tower Oklahoma wind farm hires a contractor to remove broken blades from seven towers and topple others. (The Oklahoman, subscription; Associated Press)

PIPELINES:
• Even after the cancellation of the Byhalia Connection pipeline, activists in Memphis, Tennessee, continue to mobilize over concerns about indefinite rights to access land along its route. (Truthout)
• An Oklahoma county commission considers a permit for a crude oil pipeline to a regional refinery. (Woodward News)

TRANSITION: A U.S. Senate committee advances a bill with federal funding to pay for energy infrastructure and the cleanup of abandoned mine lands. (The State Journal/WV News)

GRID:
• Texas’ grid manager says the grid should be able to withstand an expected surge in demand through a heat wave this week. (KZTV)
• A partnership between American Electric Power and an energy company begins soliciting public input on its plan to build an 80-mile transmission line in Oklahoma. (Tulsa World)

COAL: A coal train derails into the James River in Virginia. (WRIC)

INFRASTRUCTURE: A Virginia county considers a broadband internet expansion project that would involve a partnership between a broadband company, Dominion Energy and two electric cooperatives. (Winchester Star)

COMMENTARY:
• A Georgia family practitioner calls for electric cooperatives to pivot away from natural gas and its methane emissions that harm rural residents. (Savannah Morning News)
• Texas Gov. Greg Abbott’s order to revamp the state power grid by creating incentives for coal- and natural gas-fired power plants and penalizing renewables is “political, not practical,” writes an editorial board. (Odessa American)
• A projected increase in demand for coal in China and India shows that West Virginia shouldn’t stop supporting the fossil fuel, writes an editorial board. (WV News)
• A Republican-backed North Carolina energy bill would give more power to Duke Energy, which has often fought accountability, while eroding the authority of regulators, writes an energy justice advocate. (News & Observer)

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.