Debate heats up over California’s proposed fixed utility fee

UTILITIES: Two years after California lawmakers passed a proposed fixed monthly utility charge designed to slash electricity use and reduce low-income residents’ bills, advocates say it has amounted to a gift for utilities. (Los Angeles Times)

ALSO:

• A Washington state utility begins implementing public safety power outages to reduce the risk of sparking wildfires. (Spokesman-Review)
• California advocates step up a campaign to create a public utility in San Diego that would replace SDG&E. (Voice of San Diego)

COAL:

• Talen Energy’s bid to acquire a Washington state utility’s share of the Colstrip coal plant in Montana falls through, casting the facility’s future into doubt. (Billings Gazette)
• Conservation groups look to dismiss a company’s lawsuit seeking to rush the federal environmental review of the Bull Mountains coal mine’s proposed expansion in Montana. (news release)

OIL & GAS: 

• New Mexico regulators are poised to vote on controversial proposed regulations that would open the door to reusing treated oil and gas wastewater. (Source NM)
• An analysis finds Colorado’s new oil production fee to fund transit and conservation projects will not completely offset the state’s relatively low oil and gas severance taxes. (Colorado Newsline)
• Wyoming shed 400 oil and gas industry jobs over the last year even as production increased. (County 17)
• Alaska regulators say private, state and tribal lands contain about 47 abandoned oil and gas wells in need of plugging and reclamation. (KTUU)
• ExxonMobil completes its $64.5 billion buyout of one of the Permian Basin’s largest oil and gas operators. (Carlsbad Current-Argus)

BATTERIES: Southern California residents push back against a proposed grid-scale battery energy storage system, claiming the facilities are fire-prone. (Fox 5 San Diego)

CLIMATE: The University of Denver looks to achieve net-zero carbon emissions by 2030 by installing solar facilities and slashing natural gas use for water and space heating. (Colorado Sun)

NUCLEAR: A researcher explains the benefits of the sodium-based nuclear reactor a Bill Gates-backed company plans to build in a Wyoming coal town. (Inside Climate News)

GEOTHERMAL: An Arizona copper mine plans to partly power its operations with geothermal energy. (Think GeoEnergy)

CLIMATE:

• California struggles to protect an iconic coastal highway from climate change’s effects. (Washington Post)
• Portland, Oregon’s budget relies heavily on higher-than-anticipated Clean Energy Fund tax revenues. (OPB)

ELECTRIC VEHICLES: Amazon adds 50 all-electric big rigs to its southern California fleet. (news release)

CARBON CAPTURE: The U.S. Energy Department considers capturing carbon emissions from fossil fuel power plants in Japan and shipping them to Alaska for geologic sequestration. (Northern Journal)

MINING:

• A company plans to begin operating its mobile direct lithium extraction plant near the Great Salt Lake this summer. (Environment + Energy Leader)
• A firm plans to restart uranium production at its Nichols Ranch mine in Wyoming. (Cowboy State Daily)