Coal ash rules remain bogged down by politics

COAL: A new vision emerges for Chicago’s retiring Fisk and Crawford coal plants, and EPA coal ash regulations remain stalled by politics. (Midwest Energy News, Washington Post)

POLITICS: North Dakota’s Democratic U.S. Senate candidate says President Obama is ​“headed in the wrong direction” on energy and calls for the heads of the EPA and Energy Dept. to be fired; and Mitt Romney pitches coal and nuclear in southern Ohio. (The Hill, Columbus Dispatch)

WIND: T. Boone Pickens drops out of Minnesota’s controversial Goodhue Wind project, a nearby Minnesota county will receive $1.2 million in tax revenue from its wind farms this year, a community college’s wind program sees 100% of its graduates land high-paying jobs, and bird advocates object to a proposed Ohio wind farm site. (Minneapolis Star Tribune, Rochester Post-Bulletin, Toledo Blade)

SOLAR: A Toledo Blade report attempts to link former Ohio Gov. Ted Strickland’s political contributions to a state energy program, and the last of a series of solar installations on St. Paul public buildings is complete. (Toledo Blade, St. Paul Pioneer Press)

OIL: Opposition to Keystone XL fizzles in Nebraska, and construction begins on the new Enbridge pipeline in Michigan. (InsideClimate News, WLNS)

NUCLEAR: Economic concerns will likely further delay Xcel Energy’s proposed expansion of its Prairie Island nuclear plant in Minnesota. (Minneapolis Star Tribune)

NORTH DAKOTA: More than 1.7 billion tons of North Dakota clay could be useful as fracking proppant, according to a state geologist; and formerly low-value rocky farmland in the state is sought for gravel mining to support the road construction boom. (Fargo Forum, Grand Forks Herald)

TEA’D OFF: Local officials grow weary of Agenda 21 conspiracy theorists. (Reuters)

COMMENTARY: Why the ​“war on coal” is a myth, why neither President Obama nor Mitt Romney is a true ​“friend of coal,” and ​“an assault on the solar industry becomes akin to sabotaging armaments factories during a mobilization for war.” (The Nation, Huffington Post, New York Times)