CLIMATE: San Diego decides it will no longer invest its financial reserves in the fossil fuel industry because it contradicts the city’s climate goals. (San Diego Union-Tribune)
TRANSITION: Xcel Energy agrees to pay a Colorado county $25 million annually for five years after the 2035 shutdown of its Comanche coal power plant to offset lost property tax revenues. (Pueblo Chieftain)
UTILITIES:
• An Arizona appeals court finds utilities’ tariffs do not shield the companies from lawsuits when their negligence harms people or property. (Arizona Daily Star)
• Rocky Mountain Power’s Idaho ratepayers will see a 1.4% rate increase intended to upgrade the grid and increase renewable energy deployment if Idaho regulators approve the increase. (news release)
• Pacific Gas & Electric launches a 100-home virtual power plant pilot program incorporating smart meters with solar and battery storage in northern California. (Energy & Environment Leader)
• Orange County, California officials approve rate plans for the county’s first community choice energy program, but still haven’t released costs of the plans. (Voice of OC)
GRID: Severe wind storms topple utility lines and take out power to several southeast Alaska communities and an airport, canceling the regular milk run. (KSTK)
TRANSPORTATION:
• Nevada regulators authorize NV Energy to spend $100 million over the next three years to build electric vehicle charging infrastructure along major travel corridors and incentivize EV deployment. (news release)
• A California energy firm plans to build a solar electric vehicle charging station manufacturing facility in Fresno that will employ more than 200 people by 2025. (Business Journal)
• A California nonprofit originally launched to build electric vehicle charging infrastructure in low-income communities pivots to helping members of those same communities buy EVs. (San Diego Union-Tribune)
NUCLEAR:
• Southern California Edison begins the decade-long process of dismantling the shuttered San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station. (NBC San Diego)
• The U.S. Department of Energy launches an effort to find communities willing to host interim spent reactor-fuel storage facilities after the Obama administration took Nevada’s Yucca Mountain repository off the table. (news release)
OIL & GAS: California officials reopen the state’s southern coast to fishing nearly two months after an offshore oil pipeline spill sullied the waters. (Los Angeles Times)
WIND: A massive wind facility proposed near a World War II-era Japanese American incarceration camp draws opposition from detainees and their descendants. (High Country News)
LITHIUM: Environmental advocates urge the Biden administration to consider structural inequities and historical trauma when reviewing mining projects, potentially affecting Nevada’s Thacker Pass lithium project that two tribes oppose. (E&E News)
COMMENTARY: A former California official says the state’s sale last month of its first ever climate-certified bond, guaranteeing a major infrastructure project aligns with climate goals, is one of the Newsom administration’s biggest accomplishments. (CalMatters)