The bid to take over South Carolina’s battered state-owned electric generation and transmission public power system, Santee Cooper, gets “curiouser and curiouser”, to steal from Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland. According to the always aggressive, sometimes snarky, statewide political news blog FITSNews (motto: “Unfair and Imbalanced”), Florida-based NextEra Energy’s CEO James Robo has made South … More South Carolina nuclear debacle ‘curiouser and curiouser’

More news from the South Carolina nuclear fiasco, the gift that keeps on giving for energy reporters. The state Public Service Commission has reversed itself and concluded that the former SCANA Corp., lead utility on the failed V.C. Summer nuclear project (and now a division of Dominion), lied about progress at the nuke in order … More SC nuke fiasco in the news again

Rookie Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), bright, brash, and ambitious, has the left bank of the Potomac abuzz with her nascent “green new deal” (GND). Before even being sworn in to the 116th Congress, she launched a proposal to commit the U.S. to 100% renewable energy within 10 years, along with an economic stimulus including a … More Green New Deal: Not quite what meets the eye?

Facing potentially devastating liabilities from California’s Camp Fire in November, Pacific Gas and Electric has dumped its CEO and, this morning, announced it will file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. Yesterday, the company said CEO Geisha Williams, who headed the troubled San Francisco utility for less than two years, was stepping down immediately. PG&E said … More PG&E unloads CEO, will file for bankruptcy

Pressed by congressional Democrats and national environmental groups to stay away from anything that comes before the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission that smells of the Trump administration’s ill-fated attempt to rescue a foundering coal industry, new Commissioner Bernard McNamee says “maybe.” In a letter to Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto (D-Nev.) this week, McNamee said that … More FERC’s McNamee on fuel recusals: Will he or won’t he?

Among the victims of late last year’s devastating Camp Fire in California, which killed some 86 people, could be the state’s largest investor-owned utility, Pacific Gas & Electric. The San Francisco-based company is facing charges that its power lines may have caused the horrific Northern California wildfire, potential criminal charges, possibly billions of dollars for … More Whither PG&E in the Camp Fire aftermath?

Virginia-based Dominion Energy has completed its takeover of South Carolina’s investor-owned utility, SCANA Corp., and the operating utility SCE&G. SCANA bet the company on a new two-unit nuclear power plant at its existing V.C. Summer nuclear station. SCANA lost. The State newspaper commented that the troubled power company “lost $5 billion and, now, its independence … More SCANA bet the company on new nukes…and lost

When Sean Casten is sworn in as a freshman Democrat in the House of Representatives tomorrow (Jan. 3), he will bring on-the-ground, practical experience in energy conservation and efficiency to the 116th Congress. He founded and ran several successful firms helping industrial energy users figure out how to use waste heat and power generation and … More Casten brings real-world energy experience to the 116th Congress

In a move that will surprise many in Washington, the Trump administration’s Environmental Protection Agency is going to back away from wholesale changes to the Obama administration’s Mercury and Air Toxics regulations, according to Bloomberg News in a report today. Instead, the EPA will make some regulatory definition changes that could make it harder to … More Realism undoes another part of Trump’s coal rescue mission

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission today adopted a proposal to change its required analysis of horizontal market power for many sellers seeking market-based rates in the organized wholesale markets it supervises. Chairman Neil Chatterjee called the notice of proposed rulemaking a “small but important step.” In a press release, FERC said the proposal “safeguards the … More FERC to ease way for market-based rates