Welcome to the week. The U.S. Treasury Department’s revised rules for accessing wind and solar tax credits have arrived, right at Congress’ deadline. Things are about to get even tougher for clean-energy developers — Jeff St. John digs in.
Next up, Maria Gallucci reports on the explosion at Pennsylvania’s Clairton Coke Works, and how it highlights the need to clean up heavy industry.
Jeff also has a story on solid-state transformers, which could help seamlessly connect solar panels, battery systems, and other on-site generators. And I write about Puerto Rico’s ongoing grid crisis, and how hurricane season highlights the urgent need to tackle it.
Google and nuclear reactor company Kairos sign a first-of-its-kind power purchase agreement with the Tennessee Valley Authority. (Latitude Media)
COURTS
A group of 19 states and Washington, D.C., sues the U.S. Department of Energy, challenging a rule that puts a cap on the amount of grant money state-run clean energy and energy efficiency programs can use for “indirect” administrative and staffing costs. (E&E News)
In a new lawsuit, environmental groups allege the Trump administration handpicked five climate change skeptics to write the report underpinning the plan to repeal the EPA’s authority to regulate greenhouse gas emissions. (New York Times)
STORAGE
Minnesota regulators approve the state’s first standalone battery storage installation, a 150 MW project meant to store wind and solar power to be released during high demand periods. (MPR News)
ELECTRIC VEHICLES
Republican U.S. senators move to strip federal funding for the U.S. Postal Service’s transition to an EV fleet to save taxpayer money, though industry observers say the move would have the opposite effect. (Associated Press)
UTILITIES
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton announces an investigation into several utility companies whose power lines were blamed for 2024 wildfires that burned more than 1 million acres. (KFDA)
POLITICS
Republican lawmakers who voted for the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which included subsidies for fossil fuel development, have accepted more than $105 million in fossil fuel industry donations. (The Guardian)
Senate Democrats argue that the EPA’s rollback of Solar for All funding is illegal in a letter to EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin. (E&E News)
CARBON CAPTURE
The Trump administration offers a disjointed approach to carbon capture, boosting tax incentives for the industry under the One Big Beautiful Bill Act while withdrawing federal grants for carbon capture and other decarbonization projects. (E&E News)
OFFSHORE WIND
New Hampshire Gov. Kelly Ayotte signs a law removing the development of “speculative and intrusive offshore wind projects” from the mission of the state energy innovation office. (NHPR)
FOSSIL FUELS
U.S. officials reportedly considered asking to use Russian icebreakers to support Alaskan gas development ahead of this weekend’s summit. (Reuters)
Several historically Black neighborhoods in Chesapeake, Virginia, turn to state officials to express safety, air pollution, and noise concerns about Virginia Natural Gas’ plans to build a compressor station after the city council approved the project. (WHRO)
EFFICIENCY
RMI expects heat pumps to continue outselling gas furnaces even as the One Big Beautiful Bill Act ends federal incentives for energy-efficient upgrades. (Utility Dive)
COMMENTARY
Two former FERC commissioners call for accelerating transmission construction to boost grid capacity in the long term, while also instituting grid-enhancing technologies to address immediate needs. (Utility Dive)
WHITE PAPER
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