ELECTRIC VEHICLES: Tesla says a new battery under development could make its electric cars as cheap as gasoline models, and that the batteries could find a second life as grid resources. (Reuters) 

SOLAR:
• Tesla’s solar manufacturing plant in Buffalo, New York, remains closed as the company defies stay-at-home orders by reopening its California auto factory. (Greentech Media)
• General Motors plans to buy enough solar energy from a project in Mississippi to power its Tennessee assembly plant by late 2022. (Associated Press)

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OFFSHORE WIND: A new report says a planned transmission system to serve multiple offshore wind farms in New England could save consumers $1 billion. (reNEWS)

UTILITIES:
• Major Ohio utilities signal a positive financial outlook despite a drop in power demand during the pandemic, which critics say highlights policies that protect utilities from risk at the expense of ratepayers. (Energy News Network)
• In Virginia, Walmart blasts a proposal by Dominion Energy that would let customers buy renewable power from the utility, saying the program would charge an unreasonable premium and count co-fired coal and biomass. (Utility Dive)

SMART GRID: Illinois regulators are close to finalizing rules that will allow utilities to earn a return on cloud-computing investments. (Utility Dive)

COAL:
• A planned coal plant closure in North Dakota may signal a shift for electric co-ops, which have been slow to embrace clean energy. (InsideClimate News)
• The COVID-19 pandemic is exacerbating existing health issues and stretching thin resources in coal country. (U.S. News & World Report) 

COAL ASH: Tennessee environmental regulators admit the agency altered and deleted data from test results on dangerous radioactive metals in coal ash after the massive TVA spill in 2008. (Knoxville News Sentinel)

PIPELINES: Pipeline company EQM says it still sees a “narrow path” to complete the Mountain Valley Pipeline by late 2020, but analysts say they doubt that will happen. (Reuters)

OIL & GAS:
• Oil extraction and mining businesses had the most success in getting loans through the Paycheck Protection Program, according to a Census Bureau survey. (Associated Press)
• North Dakota wants to use federal coronavirus aid to plug abandoned oil wells, an idea that’s also being discussed in Pennsylvania. (Associated Press, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette)
• As Pennsylvania drafts new methane rules, a new analysis says releases are seven times greater than state reports indicate. (StateImpact Pennsylvania)

CLIMATE:
• California’s drop in pollution during the coronavirus pandemic could hurt the state’s climate programs by draining revenue from its cap-and-trade system. (Bloomberg)
• Former climate policy staffers for Washington Gov. Jay Inslee’s presidential campaign want congressional Democrats and presidential candidate Joe Biden to adopt pieces of Inslee’s comprehensive climate plan. (Washington Post)

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DIVESTMENT: Youth activists engage in the movement to have New York’s state pension funds divest their fossil fuel holdings and appear to be gaining traction. (InsideClimateNews)

COMMENTARY: An economist and consultant argue for eliminating an obscure tax rule that keeps some for-profit utilities from investing in solar. (Utility Dive)