Colorado greenlights Xcel Energy’s clean heat plan

ELECTRIFICATION: Colorado regulators approve Xcel Energy’s plan to cut its natural gas distribution network’s methane emissions through efficiency and electrification programs. (Colorado Sun)

ALSO: California lawmakers introduce legislation that would allow utilities to voluntarily pay to electrify entire neighborhoods one by one instead of maintaining and replacing aging natural gas distribution networks. (Canary Media)

UTILITIES: NV Energy proposes adding more than 2,000 MW of new solar and battery storage and 400 MW of gas-fired peaking capacity to meet expected load growth resulting from rising population, electrification and data center development. (Utility Dive)

GRID:

• The federal Bureau of Land Management advances the proposed Greenlink West transmission project designed to carry solar and wind power across Nevada. (E&E News, subscription; news release)
• Tribal nations and advocates appeal a district court’s dismissal of their bid to block construction of a segment of the SunZia transmission project through culturally and ecologically significant lands in Arizona. (E&E News, subscription)
• The Biden administration awards Washington $5 million to help extend electricity service to more than 200 residents in the northeastern part of the state. (NW News Network)

CLIMATE: The Biden administration awards nearly $19 million to California and Washington state to fund climate resilience occupational and stewardship training programs. (news release, Los Angeles Times)

OIL & GAS: 

• Regulators continue to investigate abandoned Permian Basin oil and gas wells that inexplicably have begun spewing contaminated water. (Inside Climate News)
• Two Wyoming oilfield employees file lawsuits accusing three companies of negligently causing separate explosions that severely burned them as they worked at facilities in the southern part of the state. (Cowboy State Daily)

POLLUTION: A California lawmaker tables legislation that would make clean air and a healthy environment a constitutional right to allow more time to garner support. (Los Angeles Times)

SOLAR:

• Developers bring the 200 MW Escalante solar facility online at the site of a shuttered coal plant in the western part of the state. (Solar Power World)
• A New Mexico firm receives $50 million in federal and state funding to expand its space-grade solar cell manufacturing facility in Albuquerque. (Space News)

WIND: A Wyoming startup vies for state funds to develop its airfoil wind turbine design it claims would reduce power generation costs. (Casper Star-Tribune)

ELECTRIC VEHICLES: Federal labor regulators accuse Arizona electric vehicle manufacturer Lucid of illegally attempting to squash unionizing efforts last year. (KJZZ)

COAL: Alaska, Montana, Utah and Wyoming join ten other states in a lawsuit seeking to block new Biden administration rules giving federal regulators greater oversight over coal mines. (E&E News, subscription)

MINING: Emails obtained by an advocacy group reveal a federal Bureau of Land Management official worried the agency was rushing the review of the contested Rhyolite Ridge lithium project in Nevada. (E&E News, subscription)

GEOTHERMAL:

• A Colorado ski resort receives nearly $300,000 in state funding to study the feasibility of integrating geothermal energy generation and hydrogen fuel production. (Hydrogen Central)
• Utah officials travel to Iceland to gather ideas about how to develop geothermal energy in their state. (KSL)