MAGA organizer leads WV coal plant push

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

FOSSIL FUELS

• The company proposing to use $18.5 million in federal funding to build a new 1.6 GW coal-fired power plant in West Virginia is run by three individuals without experience in the coal industry, including one who ran a conference for QAnon conspiracy promoters. (Politico)

• Two gas-fired power plants that were funded in part through Texas’ $10 billion fund to spur more gas generation are now operating and sending electricity to the grid, but critics point out they’re only operating during times of high power demand. (E&E News)

• A new analysis from the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas suggests uncertainty about spiking oil prices will likely prevent Texas’ oil industry from moving to significantly increase production. (Houston Chronicle)

• The chief of Texas’ Vision Oil & Gas was arrested last week on charges of theft and organized crime, and court records reveal a longer history of unpaid debts and broken payment promises. (Houston Chronicle)

• A recent report documents tens of thousands of abandoned and orphaned oil and gas wells in West Virginia. (West Virginia Public Broadcasting)

POLITICS

• Republican voters in Alabama will determine a runoff election for the GOP nomination to the state’s utility regulation board between a former state auditor and a longtime incumbent who is villainizing both data centers and solar power. (AL.com, New York Times)

• A PAC that is targeting opponents of clean energy says it helped tank Rep. Ralph Norman’s gubernatorial campaign in South Carolina, marking its second victory against anti-clean energy Republicans in as many months. (E&E News)

CLIMATE

• Republican Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry signs legislation banning lawsuits against oil and gas companies over the effects of climate change. (Times-Picayune)

SOLAR

• A group of Arkansas taxpayers challenge a county’s use of a decades-old economic development incentive for a $400 million bond issue for a NextEra Energy solar project. (Arkansas Business)

• Many of Arkansas’ new solar farms will power data centers and tech companies generally. (Arkansas Business)

• The Rockingham County, Virginia, Board of Supervisors votes unanimously to reject a permit for a solar farm on land zoned for agriculture. (Daily News-Record)

STORAGE

• Dominion Energy is building a virtual power plant pilot program mandated by Virginia lawmakers to aggregate the output of EV chargers and other devices to put more power onto the grid. (WHRO)

PIPELINES

• A federal appeals court denies environmental groups’ motions to stay water quality certifications for the Mountain Valley Pipeline’s proposed Southgate spur from Virginia into North Carolina. (Reuters, Carolina Journal)

DATA CENTERS

• Microsoft is considering ending its longtime goal of meeting its energy consumption with zero-carbon electricity, creating tension in Virginia, where it maintains several data centers and which has its own clean-energy goals. (Inside Climate News)

• Democratic Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear promises data centers will have to pay for 100% of their own energy, but environmental advocates warn that’s actually handled by utilities and state regulators. (Kentucky Lantern)

• Local governments in both rural and urban parts of Tennessee move to pause data center development while they develop new regulations to protect resources. (Tennessee Lookout)

UTILITIES

• Dominion Energy is increasingly using unmanned drones for work on its power planes, transmission lines, and solar farms. (Richmond Times-Dispatch)

COMMENTARY

• Oklahoma’s lack of adequate grid infrastructure means that wind farms are having to curtail their power production because the grid is incapable of carrying what they produce, writes a Texas journalist and researcher. (Oklahoma Voice)

• Two chambers of commerce endorse the Mountain Valley Pipeline’s push to add a compressor station to increase its capacity, arguing gas is more affordable than alternative fuel sources and is boosting economic development. (Cardinal News)

• “It’s a foul world after all! It’s a foul, foul world!”: A journalist decries the Trump administration’s order for Orlando, Florida’s municipal utility to continue operating a coal-fired power plant that had been slated for retirement. (Florida Phoenix)