By Kennedy Maize The Department of Energy has asked the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to federalize and streamline the connection of large data centers to the interstate transmission grid. DOE last week (Oct. 23) sent FERC a 16-page draft notice of proposed rule making, asking the commission to enact the new, unprecedented rule by the … More DOE wants FERC to take over large data center grid connections

By Kennedy Maize “Plethora, noun, pleth·​o·​ra ˈple-thə-rə: an ample amount or number: abundance, profusion … Grand Cayman offers a plethora of bustling restaurants, ritzy resorts and comfortable condos …—Susanne Cummings … a world whose credibility is threatened by the meaningless plethora of material goods it goes on producing.” That definition from the venerable Merriam-Webster fits the circumstances behind what has been occurring for … More How to track the rise and possible fall of the SMR empire

By Kennedy Maize Donald Trump’s seemingly visceral hatred of offshore wind is well known. He’s also opposed to terrestrial wind projects. Less noticed: It turns out Trump’s wind ire has strange partisan implications. Trump’s hatred of offshore wind dates to 2011 when he objected to a planned offshore project as he was developing a major … More The partisan punches in Trump’s wind power policies

By Kennedy Maize The Trump administration’s latest attempt to sell federal “clean, beautiful coal,” has again failed to find a buyer, this time in Utah. It’s the third Interior Department western coal lease flop this month. Other October Bureau of Land Management coal sales collapsed in Montana and Wyoming. Interior’s Bureau of Reclamation announced last … More Trump coal leasing program hits repeated brick walls

By Kennedy Maize The U.S. Supreme Court Tuesday (Oct. 14) refused to hear an appeal from a tiny West Virgina coal company to a Federal Energy Regulatory Commission ruling in favor of a large natural gas company. It’s a dispute over whether mining on the coal company’s land could endanger a Columbia Gas Transmission Co.’s … More SCOTUS, D.C. Circuit hand FERC wins and a loss

By Henry Sokolski The whispering campaign against the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), an international pact that aims to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons, has begun. Several US officials recently asked me, “What good is the NPT?” The developing world uses it to gang up on us to push disarmament. China and Russia use it to argue against forward-deploying American nuclear weapons. … More Guest Commentary: Should the U.S. Walk Away from the NPT?

By Kennedy Maize President Trump professes to love coal and has expressed his ardor through executive orders, in his “One Big Beautiful Bill Act,” and through actions at the Departments of Energy and Interior. Given coal’s history over the past couple of decades, are those agency actions likely to make a significant difference in coal’s … More DOE, DOI push Trump’s “clean, beautiful coal” agenda

By Kennedy Maize In December of 1996, Federal Reserve Board Chairman Alan Greenspan, commenting on the effect of the “dot-com bubble” on the stock market, coined the term “irrational exuberance.” Some observers of the hype over an end to the decades-long doldrums of U.S. nuclear power are casting a gimlet eye at the claims. Could … More Alan Greenspan and the nuclear revival

By Kennedy Maize White House actions going back to April and put into place last week combine to complicate the bureaucratic lives of two major independent energy regulatory agencies: the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission and the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission. The two agencies are faced with a need to detail how they plan a regulatory … More Trump’s regulatory double whammy hits FERC, NRC

By Kennedy Maize Biden administration $7,500 tax subsidy for purchasing electric vehicles, which helped propel a boom in EVs, expired at the end of September at the hands of the Trump administration. Trump has long professed a distaste for the new automotive technology sweeping the world. Ironically, Trump’s ire at EVs seemed to be tempered … More As federal EV subsidies vanish some state programs persist