By Kennedy Maize National non-profit environmental law firm Earthjustice has sued the Interior Department over approval of an expansion of a notorious Montana underground coal mine. The suit this month (Mar. 3) in U.S. District Court for the District of Montana, Billings Division, charges that Interior’s Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement (OSM) in … More Greens sue DOI over Montana coal mine expansion
By Kennedy Maize The oil market has trumped President Trump’s repeated mantra that the key to national energy policy is “drill, baby, drill.” The Interior Department’s latest offering of drilling rights in oil-rich Alaska has failed, joining other flawed off-shore sales and failed on-shore coal sales in the Rocky Mountain west. DOI’s Bureau of Ocean … More Trump administration’s latest failed energy lease sale
By Kennedy Maize Private equity giant BlackRock and Swedish private equity firm EQT have assembled a consortium to buy AES Corp. (NYSE:AES) for $33..4 billion — $15/share in cash — taking the Arlington, Va., energy firm private. The price represents a 40% premium over the AES share price as of July 2025, when rumors of … More BlackRock and EQT buying iconic AES for $33.4 billion
By Kennedy Maize There’s a new leader in the nuclear power plant cost overrun derby, and it isn’t even in the clubhouse yet. Britain’s Hinkley Point C — being built in Somerset by France’s government-owned EDF — is now going to cost at least £49 billion ($65 billion) if it goes into service in 2030 … More Move over, Vogtle, and Olkiluoto too. Hinkley Point C is leading the nuclear news.
By Kennedy Maize In mid-February (Feb. 13) Texas giant engineering and construction company Fluor Corp. (NYSE:FLR) began implementing a financial plan it had long telegraphed: unloading its major investment in Oregon-based NuScale (NYSE:SMR), the most mature of the myriad wannabe developers of new, smaller U.S. nuclear power plants. As Nuscale’s largest shareholder, Fluor sold 71 … More A new start for NuScale?
By Kennedy Maize The Trump administration’s Department of the Interior faces serious challenges across its expansive jurisdiction, including federal lands in the west, offshore and onshore wind power, fire protection and firefighting, and the failing Colorado River system that serves some 40 million people with drinking and irrigation water and electric power in seven states … More Interior Department’s challenges in earth, wind, fire, and water
By Kennedy Maize While the Trump administration pursues rescuing the past of electric generation, solar and wind, with a big boost from batteries, are winning the future. The Department of Energy’s Energy Information Administration has released its prediction for new electric generation in 2026, headlined, “New U.S. electric generating capacity expected to reach a record … More Renewables winning the new generation sweepstakes
By Kennedy Maize The Trump administration’s push to support coal, despite the costs, is “running into reality,” according to a new analysis by the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis. IEEFA analysts Dennis Wamsted and Seth Feaster conclude,”The administration’s political support for ‘clean, beautiful coal’ keeps running into economic reality. Coal-fired generation costs continue … More Trump, coal, and the bite of economic reality
By Kennedy Maize The North American Electric Reliability Council told the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission yesterday (Feb. 19) that the high-voltage electric transmission system in major parts of the U.S. and Canada faces serious, long-term threats to reliability. Briefing FERC, NERC’s John Moura, director of reliability assessment, said the 2025 Long-Term Reliability Assessment report “is … More NERC calls for long-term reliability action now
By Kennedy Maize Michigan gas-and-electric utility Consumers Energy, a subsidiary of CMS Energy, is engaged in a complex and controversial dance as it attempts to spin off its entire fleet of 13 elderly hydroelectric projects to a private equity investor, which in turn might resell or shut the dams without state regulatory approval. The dams … More Michigan utility wants to unload its hydro