TRANSITION: Environmentalists question Duke Power’s reliance on gas and unproven nuclear and hydrogen technologies as the utility pitches North Carolina regulators on its preferred plans to replace coal-fired electricity plants. (WRAL)

ALSO: Residents and officials of a West Virginia county that once was the heart of Appalachia’s coal industry pin their hopes on tourism despite wariness about creating another single-industry economy. (Mountain State Spotlight)

SOLAR:
• An Arkansas county moves closer toward its goal of replacing 90% of the power it buys from Entergy with solar arrays. (Arkansas Democrat-Gazette)
• A Texas solar panel manufacturer presses the Biden administration to do more to help domestic solar panel makers compete against Chinese imports. (San Antonio Express-News)
• A cable company adds a 400 kW solar array to provide 20% of its electricity needs at an Oklahoma facility. (Tulsa World)

ELECTRIC VEHICLES: Georgia partners with a real estate company to plan a state network of electric vehicle chargers. (Capitol Beat News Service)

NUCLEAR: An executive of an Oregon-based company that makes small nuclear reactors sees potential in West Virginia and the Ohio Valley, but says utilities probably won’t be early adopters of the technology. (Huntington Herald-Dispatch)

COAL: West Virginia regulators cite a coal company for mining beneath a neighborhood without notifying residents, resulting in sinkholes and damage to buildings. (Charleston Gazette-Mail, subscription)

EMISSIONS: Virginia Tech and six other institutions use EPA funding to seek a low-cost technique to measure hazardous air pollutants. (Roanoke Times)

CLIMATE: A North Carolina community sees heavy rainfall lead to flooding that accumulated at a wastewater treatment plant, one mile from the site of a 2017 pipeline leak. (Winston-Salem Journal)

UTILITIES: A Texas municipal utility files a settlement with state regulators that lowers its rate increase request made a year ago. (El Paso Times)

POLITICS: North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper signs a state budget that includes funding for flood resilience, as well as $1.5 million to provide cost-share assistance to hog farmers to install anaerobic digesters to produce biogas. (Coastal Review)

COMMENTARY:
• A 2013 framework laid the foundation for Georgia to become a top solar state for large installations, and now the state should expand its net-metering pilot program to become a leader in rooftop solar, too, writes a state regulator. (Savannah Morning News)
• Georgia’s prowess in attracting electric vehicle manufacturers has positioned it to be a major economic player as the U.S. transitions to EVs, writes a clean energy advocate. (Savannah Morning News)

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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.