The FBI this morning arrested the Republican speaker of the Ohio House and four prominent GOP lobbyists in a $60 million federal racketeering conspiracy centered on the 2019 Ohio legislation to bail out economically failing Perry and Davis-Besse nuclear power plants. The U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Ohio is charging longtime House Speaker … More Ohio House speaker charged with racketeering, bribery in nuke bailout

A burgeoning utility bribery scandal in Chicago has tainted Exelon subsidiary Commonwealth Edison and threatens to topple the most powerful Democratic politician in Illinois, House Speaker Michael Madigan. Exelon has agreed to pay a $200 million fine as part of a plea deal filed with the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, … More ComEd admits bribing Ill. House speaker

A ploy by a surreptitious group of New England utilities to undercut solar net metering blew up and crashed at today’s Federal Energy Regulatory Commission like the Hindenburg explosion in New Jersey in May 1937. The commission unanimously dismissed a petition by New England Ratepayers Association that would have given FERC exclusive jurisdiction over state … More FERC dismisses net metering petition, adopts new PURPA rules

When Dominion Energy announced that it, along with Duke Energy, was killing the Atlantic Coast natural gas pipeline project, and the Richmond, Va., company was selling its midstream natural gas business to Berkshire Hathaway, Dominion also made a pitch that it would invest heavily in “renewable natural gas” (RNG) going forward. Dominion CEO Tom Farrell … More Renewable natural gas. What is it and what are the prospects?

A huge seasonal mayfly hatch last week shut down offsite power to one of the two power lines serving DTE Energy’s Fermi 2 1200-MW nuclear plant in Michigan on Lake Erie. The event at a switchyard supplying power to the plant caused the plant’s backup diesel generators to kick in, keeping power to the plant. … More Mayfly meltdown?

In a major surprise on Sunday, Virginia-based Dominion Energy and North Carolina-based Duke Energy, faced with a setback in federal court and falling natural gas prices, cancelled their 600-mile, $8 billion Atlantic Coast natural gas pipeline project. Shortly after that announcement, Richmond-based Dominion announced it was getting out of the competitive gas business, agreeing to … More Atlantic Coast gas project is dead, Dominion spins off mid-stream gas operations to Berkshire

The D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals has given the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission’s use of tolling orders to delay action on cases before the regulators a mixed decision. Challenges to the long-established FERC practice came this spring, when local landowners said the FERC rules, which essentially allowed natural gas pipelines to become fait accompli while … More DC Circuit slams FERC tolling orders, critics comment on FERC transmission incentives

Should the world’s subway systems become free people movers, in order to help the environment and low-income folks, at essentially low costs? That’s the argument from economist Lucas Davis at the University of California at Berkeley’s Haas School of Business. Based on his analysis of three large subway systems in Mexico for the Hass Energy … More Should subways be free?

How to deal with used nuclear fuel from reactors continues to confound the U.S. (and other nuclear power countries), a puzzle that has paralyzed policy makers and politicians for more than 70 years. Since the Trump administration pulled the financial plug on the over-40-year old, stalemated Yucca Mountain project in Nevada on political grounds, while … More Nuke waste disposal still in prolonged limbo

As economies start to reopen and the nation adjusts to the Covid-19 pandemic, how should electricity regulators respond? According to a white paper from the D.C. law firm of Wilkinson Barker Knauer, utility regulators should look to medium-term recovery steps, rate design rationalization, capital cost adjustments, decoupling sales and rates, and infrastructure and decarbonization. Written … More D.C. law firm offers utility regulatory advice on Covid-19 response