By Kennedy Maize In a little-noticed proceeding, the Department of Energy in October again moved to centralize and federalize electricity generation. In a letter to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, DOE attacked FERC’s policy of recognizing the right of Indian tribes to veto hydropower projects on tribal land. The DOE letter on tribal authorities, including … More Tribal sovereignty and DOE’s latest electric power grab

By Kennedy Maize Construction Work in Progress (CWIP,  pronounced “quip”) is a nasty spawn of utility accounting, encouraging sloppiness, sloth, and avarice in building practices. That’s the take in a new study by the conservative Manhattan Institute, “The Hidden Tax on Your Power Bill.” “Construction Work in Progress, or CWIP, is the most influential energy … More CWIP: “FERC candy” and pernicious accounting practices

By Kennedy Maize President Donald Trump has launched a national industrial policy backing artificial intelligence in a self-proclaimed race against China for world AI dominance. It’s called the “Genesis Mission” (not to be confused with the 1997 Sci Fi Channel TV series Mission Genesis). Trump on Thanksgiving week (Nov. 24) promulgated Executive Order 14303, “Launching … More AI: Trump’s “Manhattan Project”?

By Kennedy Maize Just as the White House is proclaiming a national artificial intelligence industrial policy to challenge China, the frenzy for AI may be waning. Proliferating predictions of a bursting AI bubble are entirely speculative, such as a recent warning from the Bank of England. Real evidence is now increasing that the inflated expectations … More The AI bubble may be in bad trouble

By Kennedy Maize Donald Trump wants Americans to use more energy. In their cars. In their homes. On the job. President Trump and Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy in the gaudy oval office on Wednesday (Dec. 3) announced a roll-back on fuel efficiency standards for cars and light trucks, the Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) rules. … More Trump’s energy efficiency dead end

By Kennedy Maize The Trump administration’s implicit “coal’s costs don’t count” policy advances. The Department of Energy has expanded its assault on electric consumers in the upper Midwest in order to keep a dead coal plant walking. The Environmental Protection Agency has kicked a hazardous and toxic coal ash can down the road to beyond … More In Trumplandia where coal is king, DOE and EPA genuflect

By Kennedy Maize Last July, President Trump announced he had reached a massive trade deal with Japan that would lower the tariffs he had imposed on the country. In return, Japan would, among other concessions, make a “massive” $550 billion investment in the U.S., although the details were sketchy. In September, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick … More Donald J. Trump and the artifice of the deal

By Kennedy Maize Most of the headlines at the end of the United Nation’s 30th “Conference of the Parties” to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change in Belem, Brazil, to address global warming and climate change were similar. They highlighted COP30’s studied lack of jeremiads against fossil fuels in the conference report. The … More COP30 ends, not with a bang but a whimper

By Kennedy Maize Baltimore-based Constellation Energy is dueling in Annapolis with its estranged, erstwhile parent, Chicago-based Exelon Corp., over building new electric generation and storage in the “land of pleasant living,” (a slogan coined in the 1960s by a Baltimore brewery). The two energy giants are wrangling over the possibility of new generation needed in … More Generational dispute roils Maryland

By Kennedy Maize The western electricity landscape looks like it is moving toward a long-anticipated future as a west-wide regional transmission operator. It’s led by California and the state legislature’s seminal passage in September of legislation, AB 25, that created the framework, based on the California Independent System Operator’s (CAISO) Western Energy Imbalance Market. According … More Western ISO finally headed toward reality?