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The end of every year is a great time for taking stock of what the year has broughtincluding in terms of cleanenergy in the power sector. As it turns out, 2024 has provided a whole lot of cleanenergy progress as fodder for that stock-taking. Offshore wind also made important progress, even with some strong headwinds.
The simple fact is that ditching fossil fuels for low-cost cleanenergy resources is good for the planet, good for the US economy, and good for public health. The studies the DOE reviewed also found that transmission investments would provide a host of benefits beyond access to cleanenergy. How are we doing on that?
Replacing gasoline with electricity greatly reduces the carbon emissions from driving. Based on where electric vehicles (EVs) have been sold, driving the average EV in the US produces global warming emissions equal to a hypothetical 94 mile per gallon gasoline car, or less than a third of the emissions of the average new gasoline car.
Minnesota needs substantial investments now to build toward an equitable cleanenergy future. The bad news is, they have to find a compromise between two vastly different cleanenergy bills—by Monday. The science is clear: Limiting the adverse effects of climatechange requires rapid reductions in emissions now.
As one example of these rising costs, Californians’ electricity bills have been skyrocketing over the past few years. The new rate structure guidance lowers electricity bills on average for lower-income households and those living in regions most impacted by extreme weather events.
The most consequential vote to advance a cleanenergy future won’t be happening in Washington, D.C., It will be happening in the (virtual) boardroom of the Midcontinent Independent System Operator (MISO), which has authority over the bulk electric transmission system across much of the Midwest. or your state capital next week.
California’s Central Valley consistently experiences the country’s worst air quality, and climatechange is poised to make air quality even worse. In a region known for its exceptional agricultural productivity, climatechange is quickly amplifying a dangerous type of climate risk in California’s Central Valley: air pollution.
The fuel, commonly known as natural gas, now powers the biggest portion of US electricity generation—more than 40 percent. It has also grown to be the largest source of carbon pollution from the US power sector, even as zero-carbon renewable energy has been growing by leaps and bounds. of that fuel.
Residential electricity rates for many Californians have increased significantly over the last year, making it more expensive to charge an electric vehicle (EV) at home. It’s still cheaper to recharge an EV than buy gasoline, but those savings have been eroded by surging electric rates. to $9.54.
And yet, technological innovation is not what’s standing in the way of significant and necessary near-term climate progress. These pieces are critical to unleashing necessary change—regardless of the technologies at hand—yet are too often overlooked. Now we need to rapidly accelerate the cleanenergy momentum already underway.
Extreme heat and heatwaves are growing more frequent and more severe because of climatechange. While climatechange is making our days hotter, the fingerprints of climatechange are even clearer for nighttime temperatures than for daytime temperatures.
Last week was a big one for cleanenergy in Michigan. First, Union of Concerned Scientists and the Michigan Environmental Justice Coalition released a new report on how Michigan and other states can achieve 100-percent renewable energy standards that benefit all communities. No new gas plants. The Path Ahead.
Much of our electricity system is 50 to 70 years old, yet current plans for domestic manufacturing, electric vehicle fleets, community solar gardens and more cleanenergy all depend on a modern grid. New demands for electricity and the need to reduce climate-changing emissions are driving new grid planning efforts.
Achieving climate goals requires significant investments in cleanenergy, transportation, and other climate technologies to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and remove carbon from the atmosphere. What is Equitable Climate Infrastructure Investment?
Cleanenergy solutions are readily available to help ensure that these failures dont reoccur, and long-range transmission lines are one of the key components of these solutions. Increasing the countrys long-range transmission capacity will allow much more renewable and energy storage capacity to come onto the grid.
This June, I had the opportunity to testify at the Pennsylvania House Environmental Resources and Energy Committee’s hearing on “Hydrogen Hubs and ClimateChange.” My name is Julie McNamara, and I am a senior analyst and deputy policy director for climate and energy at the Union of Concerned Scientists.
Statement by Alienor Rougeot, Senior Program Manager, Climate and Energy, on Ontario’s claims regarding the federal CleanElectricity Regulations. The federal government’s proposed regulations to reduce emissions in electricity generation are achievable without breaking the bank.
is a serious blow to the EPA’s ability to fight climatechange—and could have dangerous repercussions beyond this case. The timing of the decision feels especially harsh, as the nation is in the throes of the “ Danger Season ” for hazards such as heat waves, drought, wildfires and hurricanes, all worsened by climatechange.
Climatechange is propelling these weather events to grow faster and stronger than ever before. Other climatechange impacts are accelerating as well. Many scientists thought these high ocean temperatures would be years away, but the realities of climatechange are not a distant threat.
Rising prices of methane gas used for power and heating, exacerbated by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, are contributing to soaring electric and heating bills across the country. And between 2010 and 2020 across all economic sectors, the share of US primary energy consumption from methane gas increased from 25 to 34 percent. .
Nearly all of the alliance members have a renewable electricity standard (RES), which requires utilities in their jurisdiction to increase their use of renewable energy to a particular percentage by a specific year. We found that states have technically feasible and highly beneficial ways to achieve 100-percent renewable energy.
Since the beginning of 2022, electric vehicle sales in the United States have been downright electrifying. Last year, US drivers bought more than 800,000 new electric vehicles (EVs), 65 percent more than in 2021, even as overall car sales declined. Given the climate crisis, which seems to worsen every day, the sooner the better.
The United States brought to COP27 in Egypt the historic Inflation Reduction Act , which Congress passed this summer, as evidence of our renewed participation with the rest of the world on climate action.?. Connecticut has an Office of Climate Planning. Rhode Island has the Executive ClimateChange Coordinating Council.
On January 26, the Minnesota House of Representatives passed House File 7 —the 100% CleanEnergy Bill. Now it’s on to the state Senate, where the question is: Will this be the year Minnesota sets a path toward 100-percent carbon-free electricity?
I’m going to let you in on a little secret: Without power grid modeling tools, the transition to cleanelectricity would be an absolute mess. Luckily, we don’t have to resort to guesswork because we have sophisticated grid modeling tools that help guide the transition to cleanelectricity. Surely that would not end well.
The Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) included a major—forthcoming—refresh for one of the biggest policy drivers of the nation’s cleanenergy transition to date: tax credits subsidizing the deployment of cleanelectricity resources. What’s “clean,” and how is it measured?
Extreme weather, which is increasing due to climatechange , can degrade the electricity system and cause these failures. Power outages are costly, can have extreme impacts on both the health and safety of a population, and can happen at any point in the process of electricity generation, distribution, and usage.
There’s good news in the recently released official data on electricity generation in the United States in 2022: renewable energy has continued to grow, coal power has continued to drop, and renewables are now firmly ahead of coal for the first time ever. They offer a lot of good news about cleanenergy progress.
Last year, Congress passed the most ambitious climate bill ever enacted, the Inflation Reduction Act. The legislation committed nearly $400 billion to support, among other things, wind and solar power, battery storage, electric vehicles, and other cleanenergy technologies that will make a significant dent in US heat-trapping emissions.
As electric vehicle charging stations sprout like mushrooms along our roads and clusters of new wind turbines come online, these two cleanenergy solutions to the climate crisis are becoming more commonplace. But beyond more electric cars and solar panels, what can everyday people do?
For the rural communities living in or near national parks, electricity was a commodity. Something I really care about is to make sure the benefits of cleanenergy are reaching everyone in our society,” García said. Back home in Colombia, García’s family is witnessing the consequences of a fossil fuel-centered energy system.
Bidirectional EVs Could Be the New Standard Electric vehicles (EVs) should be a clean transportation and a cleanenergy solution. This could let drivers use these batteries to power critical appliances during emergencies, their homes during power shutoffs, or even the grid when electricity demand is high.
And, as it turns out, the infrastructure used to produce, store, distribute, transmit, and burn gas leaks like a sieve , making gas as bad as coal for the climate. Gas, which now generates 40 percent of US electricity, is considered by some to be critical to maintain grid reliability. That discrimination is still evident today.
Fossil gas power plants currently provide the largest source of electricity generation and capacity in the United States. To meet our climate goals and reach net zero emissions by 2050, most studies show that we need to dramatically reduce gas use for generating electricity, heating homes and businesses, and running industrial processes.
The decision focuses on EPA’s authority under a specific section of the Clean Air Act. But a closer read suggests more sweeping, longer-term implications for incentivizing the development of cleanenergy projects nationwide. The Court ruled that EPA lacked the authority under the Clean Air Act to issue the Clean Power Plan.
Indeed, the Intergovernmental Panel on ClimateChange (IPCC) has just warned us of the decisive fate that this decade represents to act on climate for us and all the species that we depend on. States have technically feasible and highly beneficial paths to achieving 100 percent renewable energy. by 2035 is needed.
Minnesotans are facing concurrent crises of climatechange, high energy prices and inflation, and the inequitable public health impacts of fossil fuel air pollution. Renewable energy will help with all of that—but we need a grid that is designed for wind and solar instead of having to rely on expensive coal and gas plants.
6 is still driving up Ohioans’ electricity bills—and undermining the state’s prospects for a cleanenergy future. 6 went into effect, Ohio ratepayers have paid more than $182 million to subsidize two 67-year-old coal-fired power plants operated by the Ohio Valley Electric Corporation (OVEC). Since H.B. But thanks to H.B.
The Department of Energy’sEnergy Information Administration (EIA) is one of the go-to sources for reliable information about the US power sector. They just released their 2022 “Annual Energy Outlook” (AEO), which is a big deal: it tells us where electricity is headed over the next 30 years. Carbon emissions remain high.
With its passage out of a key committee in the House of Representatives last week, the CleanElectricity Performance Program (CEPP) is a step closer to reality, as part of the powerful budget reconciliation bill (the Build Back Better Act). The bill, and that provision, still have a ways to go to get through Congress, […].
The bad news is that we’re not yet on track to avoid dangerous climatechange. climate policy. Climate policy has been boosted by dramatic changes in the economics of cleanenergy. Cheaper renewable energy attracts private investment and makes limits on fossil fuels more feasible.
Last year’s Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) included a clean hydrogen production tax credit (known as “45V”) that is one of a slew of new incentives intended to help catalyze the next and necessary phase of advancing the nation’s cleanenergy transition as a whole. The costs will be too great otherwise.
Wider repercussions, including the inequitable impacts of rising food and energy prices and the potential for a food crisis hitting vulnerable populations around the world, must also be urgently addressed by global leaders. Multiple crises colliding with climatechange.
When thinking about global emissions, don’t picture an individual—point your finger at powerful corporations, specifically the 88 companies that are largely responsible for climatechange. The best solution: Replace fossil fuels with renewable energy. The same solutions will fix the energy crisis and the climate crisis.
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