N.C. nonprofit fills demand for weatherization upgrades

Editor’s note: Southeast Energy News is taking a quick break and won’t publish tomorrow. We’ll be back Thursday.

EFFICIENCY: An innovative nonprofit in Asheville, North Carolina, performs no-cost energy efficiency upgrades and boosts the city’s progress in the clean energy transition as a complement to federal weatherization programs. (Energy News Network)

ALSO:

• A trade group of industrial utilities pushes North Carolina regulators to block a program to help low-income Duke Energy residential customers afford their bills. (Raleigh News & Observer)
• Kentucky Power touts its energy efficiency programs ahead of winter. (Appalachian News-Express)

ELECTRIC VEHICLES:

• Labor advocates want to build on the deal between United Auto Workers and the big three automakers to protect Black auto workers at electric vehicle and battery plants in the largely non-unionized Southeast. (States Newsroom)
• A report shows no one has enrolled in Dominion Energy’s Virginia program to make it cheaper for electric vehicle owners to install chargers at home and work, even while the number of EV registrations grows. (WVEC)

CARBON CAPTURE: Texas has embraced carbon capture because it involves cashing in on federal subsidies to scale up something oil producers have already been doing for a long time: pumping liquefied carbon gas into the ground. (Capital and Main)

PIPELINES: Energy company Kinder Morgan purchases NextEra Energy Partners’ Texas natural gas pipelines for $1.82 billion. (Reuters)

SOLAR:

• A Florida city votes to move forward with a plan to incorporate a new 77-home subdivision that’s powered entirely by solar on a microgrid. (WFTS)
• Texas residents worry after a county board approves a nearly $4 million tax abatement for a planned solar farm. (KWTX)
• Florida officials chose not to pursue up to $400 million in federal funding to help low-income households install solar panels to reduce their energy costs by 20% or more. (Pensacola News Journal)

WIND: A Virginia city receives $39.2 million in federal funding to turn a marine terminal into an offshore wind logistics facility. (WVEC)

COAL: A new report projects coal production to drop next year as coal-fired generation falls below 15% of the U.S. power mix. (West Virginia Public Broadcasting)

STORAGE: The propensity for lithium-ion batteries to catch fire creates concerns about their disposal, especially after a fire at a Georgia recycling center. (WAGA)

RENEWABLE GAS: Two landfill-to-renewable gas plants begin operating in North Carolina. (news release)

MANUFACTURING:

• Amid rising tension with China, Japanese companies are increasingly investing in U.S. factories, especially in low-cost cities in the Southeast. (Financial Times)
• Houston’s emergence as a clean energy innovation hub moves it to the top spot in a ranking of cities for foreign investment. (Financial Times)
• A semiconductor manufacturer makes progress on a planned North Carolina factory, with plans to begin production late next year. (Raleigh News & Observer)

POLITICS: Texans vote today on a proposal to create a state energy fund to incentivize construction of natural-gas fired power plants in an effort to shore up the grid. (KRIS)

COMMENTARY:

• The vast majority of Floridians who live on the front lines of climate change acknowledge its reality and causes, unlike many of their elected leaders, writes an editorial board. (Miami Herald)
• A plunge in fossil fuel severance tax revenue as prices have ​“fallen like a rock” should push West Virginia’s leaders to finally diversify the state economy, writes an editorial board. (Weirton Daily Times)