In Short : The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) has unveiled a groundbreaking initiative with a $3.5 billion investment to enhance the country’s electrical grid. This substantial funding aims to modernize the grid infrastructure, ensuring its resilience, reliability, and efficiency. By upgrading transmission lines, incorporating advanced technologies, and promoting renewable energy integration, this initiative plays a pivotal role in the transition to a more sustainable energy future. This historic investment underlines the government’s commitment to advancing clean energy and fortifying the nation’s energy infrastructure.
In Detail :
GRID: The U.S. Department of Energy announces $3.5 billion in electric grid infrastructure grants to 58 projects across 44 states — the largest-ever investment in the country’s electric grid.
POWER PLANTS: A group of Republican-led states, utilities, and fossil fuel industry groups files an emergency request with the U.S. Supreme Court to block implementation of the Biden administration’s “good neighbor” rule to reduce air pollution that drifts across state lines.
OIL & GAS: Ohio regulators annually log hundreds of chemical spills from oil and gas drilling, raising concerns among critics about plans to allow drilling for oil and gas under state park land.
ELECTRIC VEHICLES:
Striking UAW workers in Chicago at Ford’s longest-running manufacturing plant wonder if they will maintain job security if the plant does not take on electric vehicle assembly.
An ongoing debate about utilities’ role in building and operating electric vehicle chargers threatens to slow EV deployment and transportation emission-reduction targets.
Tesla CEO Elon Musk warns the company could face “enormous challenges” in ramping up production of its Cybertruck, including price cuts on other models that decreased revenue by 44% last quarter.
EFFICIENCY: The Biden administration announces $100 million in funding for an effort to create 1,500 super-efficient, low-income homes that produce enough renewable energy to offset all or most of their annual energy use.
SOLAR: South Korean company Qcells launches production at a Georgia complex that it says will build enough solar panels to generate 5.1 gigawatts of power yearly — almost 40% of existing U.S. solar panel capacity.
HYDROGEN:
Pennsylvania’s governor says a new hydrogen hub could make the Philadelphia region “the center of the clean energy universe” and create 20,000 union jobs.
Wyoming and New Mexico officials say they will continue to work together to establish a regional hydrogen hub even though the proposal was not selected for federal funding.
CLIMATE:
Developing nations oppose a U.S. proposal to put the World Bank in charge of a proposed climate “loss and damage” fund, saying that the program should instead be under the United Nations.
Worker advocates push for more protection against increasingly hotter temperatures even as they see setbacks, such as a Texas law that overruled local ordinances mandating water breaks for workers.
ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE: The U.S. EPA raises concerns about a proposed waste-to-energy plant’s pollution impacts on communities of color in Youngstown, Ohio.
COMMENTARY: The reaction to a climate protester being hit in the face after disrupting an event featuring Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg suggests people don’t understand the rationale for non-violent civil disobedience, journalist Emily Atkin writes.