Southeast Energy News is one of five regional services published by the Energy News Network. Today’s edition was compiled by Mason Adams.

Share this newsletter | Manage subscriptions | Support our work

OVERSIGHT: A policy analyst with an Appalachian advocacy group explains why Virginia lawmakers are moving to yank regulatory power from a pair of citizen boards after one blocked a proposed Mountain Valley Pipeline compressor station. (Energy News Network)

ELECTRIC VEHICLES: A Vietnamese automaker announces plans to build an electric vehicle factory in North Carolina, spurring a nearby railroad company to invest in a related auto ramp. (Associated Press, Chatham Journal)

Sponsored link
State Energy Conference of North Carolina
Receive continuing education credits, learn about new energy solutions and best practices, and connect with other energy industry professionals at the 2022 State Energy Conference of North Carolina, April 26-27. Attend in-person or virtual.

Learn more and register at www.NCenergyconference.com

SOLAR:
• Developers of North Carolina apartment complexes complain about a state law prohibiting owners of multifamily developments from installing solar panels and selling the energy directly to tenants. (Winston-Salem Journal)
• North Carolina falls from second to seventh in solar energy capacity from 2015 to this year, with an installer blaming the drop on a decrease in solar farms and other large-scale installations. (Daily Tar Heel)

OIL & GAS:
• An energy company announces plans to build a liquified natural gas facility in a Mississippi city on the Mississippi River. (Vicksburg Daily News)
• A chemical company discovers a spill of a corrosive chemical used to refine crude oil in a Virginia city known for a legacy of toxic dumping. (Progress-Index)

PIPELINES:
• Tennessee lawmakers advance legislation to remove local control over pipeline projects, with some exceptions. (Tennessee Lookout)
• A federal court upholds a panel of judges’ decision that is delaying construction of the Mountain Valley Pipeline. (S&P Global)

WIND:
• Wind farms across Texas and New Mexico provide about 40% of an energy company’s power, and officials see potential for more. (KCBD)
• An energy company breaks ground on a 300 MW wind farm in Oklahoma. (Renewables Now)

NUCLEAR: Kentucky, West Virginia and other states explore the idea of expanding nuclear power, but previous projects in Georgia and South Carolina have been delayed by cost overruns or canceled altogether. (S&P Global)

POLITICS:
• U.S. Sen. Joe Manchin hires a former natural gas lobbyist to work on the Senate’s Energy and Natural Resources Committee as he continues to negotiate a climate package. (Business Insider)
• In their latest session, Virginia lawmakers upheld landmark clean energy laws while also pulling environmental regulatory power from two citizen boards. (Bay Journal)

Sponsored link
21st Transmission & Distribution Summit
4-6 April 2022 | Boston, MA, USA

The summit effectively unites energy experts in an exclusive networking environment providing the opportunity to pre-schedule one-on-one business meetings with key industry executives. Find more via https://bit.ly/3sa8SHE.

COAL:
• Dominion Energy agrees to study how it can make a hybrid coal plant in southwestern Virginia more economically viable as the Sierra Club calls for its closure by 2023. (Virginia Mercury)
• West Virginia Gov. Jim Justice signs into law a bill to use $50 million in taxpayer money to create an insurance company to cover reclamation liabilities for bankrupt coal companies. (Charleston Gazette-Mail)

COMMENTARY:
• An earlier change in phrasing about the overlap between energy efficiency and conservation on a federal government website could have opened the door for Duke Energy to utilize metering technology to reduce peak demand for South Carolina customers, a clean energy advocate writes. (Energy News Network)
• Virginia environmental groups celebrate a federal court’s decision upholding the denial of a compressor station permit. (Appalachian Voices)

More from the Energy News Network: Midwest | Southeast | Northeast | West

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.