CRYPTOMINING: New York authorizes a two-year ban on new permits that would let  cryptocurrency mining companies power their operations at fossil fuel plants and mandates a study of the industry’s climate impact. (New York Times)

GAS:
• In New York, a mid-Hudson city considers banning gas-fired heating and cooking appliances in new buildings. (Times Union)
• Neighbors of a Baltimore row home smelled gas before an explosion that seriously injured three, including an elderly rescuer. (WCVB)

MINING: Geologists locate a massive concentration of rare earth elements and trace metals — including minerals used in electric vehicle and wind turbine manufacturing — in a northern Maine mountain. (Portland Press Herald)

GRID:
• Roughly 85,000 Maryland residents lost power yesterday evening when a private plane crashed into a transmission tower near Washington, D.C. (CBS News)
• A Maine island likely won’t have power for months after the community’s power transmission cable failed. (News Center Maine)
• A New York town’s planning board schedules a hearing to consider a 60 MW battery storage facility on Long Island farmland. (East End Beacon)

CLIMATE:
• A Maryland island community leans on its faith as it rejects buy-out and relocation offers despite tidal flooding and the threat of increased hurricane activity. (Daily Times)
• A Vermont lakeside resort says its popular ice skating trail is becoming harder to maintain for tourists because of warming temperatures and meteorological inconsistency. (Yale Climate Connections)

SOLAR: A western New York county’s development agency extends a commercial solar moratorium as it analyzes whether tax breaks granted to such projects benefit residents. (Olean Times Herald)

PIPELINES: Two Massachusetts communities ask regulators to postpone a virtual gas pipeline project hearing until an environmental assessment can be reviewed, and to instead host several in-person sessions. (Mass Live)

AFFORDABILITY:
• Two Connecticut municipal utilities say their customers won’t face the same rate hikes the state’s investor-owned utilities have implemented because of how their power purchase agreements are structured. (CT Post)
• New Hampshire utility regulators reject Eversource’s request to help the utility make decisions during an upcoming power auction. (NHPR)
• Green power aggregation contracts are helping Massachusetts’ municipal utilities offer lower supply prices than the state’s investor-owned utilities. (Boston Globe)

TRANSIT: Massachusetts legislators work to remove safety oversight of Boston’s transit agency away from the state public utilities department. (Boston Herald)

BIOENERGY:
• A research project endeavors to remove sulfur from biodiesel made from fats, oils and grease at a sewage plant in western Connecticut. (news release)
• University of Maine researchers create a blueprint to bring more women into the state’s bioenergy and forestry industries. (news release)

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Bridget is a freelance reporter and newsletter writer based in the Washington, D.C., area. She compiles the Northeast Energy News digest. Bridget primarily writes about energy, conservation and the environment. Originally from Philadelphia, she graduated from Emerson College in 2015 with a degree in journalism and a minor in environmental studies. When she isn’t working on a story, she’s normally on a northern Maine lake or traveling abroad to practice her Spanish language skills.