Ford halts $3.5B Michigan battery plant

ELECTRIC VEHICLES:

• Ford halts construction on a $3.5 billion Michigan electric vehicle battery plant until the company is ​“confident about our ability to competitively run the plant.” (Detroit News)

• Michigan has approved billions of dollars in incentives for electric vehicle and battery manufacturing plants, though industry experts say the state would be particularly exposed to losing internal combustion-related jobs. (Crain’s Detroit Business)

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OIL & GAS: The head of Ohio’s Department of Natural Resources says the agency will not further investigate claims by dozens of residents that their names were used without consent in support of fracking on public lands. (Cleveland.com)

CLEAN ENERGY:

• Sticking points in Michigan clean energy legislation include whether carbon capture technology or burning tires should count as renewable energy. (MLive)

• A northwestern Illinois county creates a property assessed clean energy (PACE) financing program as a way to incentivize clean energy installations. (Telegraph Herald)

POLITICS: Climate advocacy groups plan significant advertising and event spending in swing states such as Michigan and Wisconsin to educate the public about the benefits of the Inflation Reduction Act. (Washington Post)

GRID:

• Michigan utility Consumers Energy will file a new five-year grid reliability plan with state regulators that aims to limit outages to no more than 24 hours and explores more opportunities to bury power lines. (MLive)

• An Illinois appeals court lifts a prior order and will allow the Grain Belt Express transmission line developer to resume pre-construction work surveying property and securing easements. (FarmWeek)

• Four Indiana utilities tell state regulators that they adequately monitored severe weather and promptly restored outages during a week of heavy storms this summer that spurred investigations into their responses. (Indiana Capital Chronicle)

PIPELINES: Residents in Peoria County, Illinois, call on county officials to enact a moratorium on carbon pipeline developments. (25 News Now)

SOLAR:

• First Solar, which is expanding solar panel manufacturing in Ohio, may prove to be a test case in whether federal efforts to onshore panel manufacturing will be successful amid fierce competition from China. (New York Times)

• A Minnesota tribal member who founded a solar installation company in 2017 is partnering with an industrial electrical company to create a pilot job-training program in Indigenous communities. (MPR)

• U.S. senators from Wisconsin and Iowa plan legislation that calls for land and soil management practices at commercial solar projects on farm land. (CBS 58)

HYDROGEN: Critics of efforts to create a regional hydrogen hub in Appalachia raise concerns that the plan would raise electricity prices on consumers and fail to deliver promised jobs and emission reductions. (Inside Climate News)

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RENEWABLES: Indiana utility NIPSCO has hundreds of megawatts of wind, solar and battery storage under development to help displace retiring coal plants. (LaPorte County Life)

COMMENTARY: Clarifying state zoning laws and requiring urban and rural areas to share in decarbonization strategies are ways to fix Michigan’s broken renewable energy permitting process, a University of Michigan researcher says. (Bridge)