Florida leapfrogs California for large solar installations

This roundup of energy news headlines comes from our Southeast Energy News newsletter. Sign up to get it in your inbox each morning.

SOLAR

• Florida installed 3 GW of utility-scale solar in 2024, vaulting past California to rank behind just Texas as the second biggest state for large solar installations despite its conservative leadership. (Canary Media)

POLITICS

• Twenty-one Congressional Republicans sign a letter calling for the preservation of clean energy tax credits that have fueled billions of new investments, with many projects located in Republican-led districts in the Southeast. (Politico)

• North Carolina lawmakers fast-track legislation to roll back the state’s carbon reduction goals and allow utilities to charge customers for new gas or nuclear plants while they’re still under construction. (WRAL)

FOSSIL FUELS

• The Trump administration terminates leases for 29 mine safety offices, a third of which are in Appalachia, including six in Kentucky. (Louisville Courier Journal)

• Entergy receives final approval to sell its natural gas distribution networks in New Orleans and Baton Rouge, Louisiana, to a utility company. (Greater Baton Rouge Business Report)

• Texas residents organize to oppose oil and natural gas waste disposal sites now under construction near their neighborhood. (KSLA)

• Oil and gas executives will celebrate the Trump administration’s regulatory rollbacks and discuss uncertainty around tariffs as they meet in Houston for CERAWeek. (E&E News, S&P Global)

• The Department of Government Efficiency proposes closing a Bureau of Indian Affairs office in Oklahoma that helps oversee and regulate the oil and gas industry. (KTUL)

• West Virginia’s attorney general lobbies Maryland lawmakers to block a bill that would impose a transportation fee on out-of-state coal producers. (WV News)

NUCLEAR

• Duke Energy considers building a small modular nuclear reactor in North Carolina. (WXII)

GRID

• NextEra CEO John Ketchum says renewables are becoming a more attractive option to meet growing demand from data centers as the cost of building gas-fired generation triples due to a shortage of turbines. (Politico Pro)

CLIMATE

• The U.S. Supreme Court rejects a lawsuit from an Alabama-led coalition of 19 Republican attorneys general that wants to block climate change-related lawsuits against the oil and gas industry. (Houston Chronicle, Associated Press)

UTILITIES

• Atlanta senior citizens complain that $500,000 approved by the city council to help with high energy bills still hasn’t made its way to residents, while city officials counter they’re still waiting to see the effects of the Trump administration’s funding changes. (Atlanta Journal-Constitution)

COMMENTARY

• The U.S. should embrace solar to secure abundant, affordable energy and encourage domestic production from the solar supply chain in South Carolina, writes the state director of the American Conservation Coalition. (Chronicle-Independent)