Virginia lawmakers move to overturn solar bans

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.

SOLAR

• As rural Virginia counties increasingly pass blanket bans on utility-scale solar, state lawmakers advance legislation that would prohibit such restrictions but still allow local boards to reject projects on a case-by-case basis. (Canary Media)

HYDROGEN

• Alternative-fuels startup Infinium’s Project Roadrunner to combine low-carbon hydrogen with waste carbon in west Texas represents a rare example of a project that’s secured stable financing in the nascent green-hydrogen field. (Canary Media)

• Republican West Virginia U.S. Sen. Jim Justice expresses skepticism about the future of the Appalachian Regional Clean Hydrogen Hub. (Times West Virginian)

ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE

• Local organizers and energy justice advocates push to ground the South’s clean energy transition in local ownership and environmental justice, centering Black, Indigenous, and working-class communities that have been left behind during previous energy booms. (Scalawag)

• A federal district court judge considers the fate of a civil rights lawsuit to pause the approval of new industrial facilities within a Louisiana parish’s two majority Black council districts. (Verite News)

FOSSIL FUELS

• The United Steelworkers union reaches a four-year agreement with Marathon Petroleum to raise wages for 30,000 oil workers and avoid a nationwide strike. (Houston Chronicle)

• The U.S. Forest Service proposes opening almost all of the Conecuh National Forest in Alabama to oil and gas leasing, which critics say jeopardizes some of the last remaining longleaf pine forest ecosystem in the U.S. (AL.com)

• Texas’ lack of a floodplain policy allowed companies to build more than 500 enormous oil tanks in the floodplains of the Guadalupe River and its tributaries, which residents worry could cause major problems during a flood. (Inside Climate News)

• Environmental groups react negatively to Georgia regulators’ approval of Georgia Power’s plans to build an additional 10 GW of power generation, with roughly 60% of that coming from the buildout of nine new gas-fired power plants. (Inside Climate News)

• Appalachian coal communities strongly backed President Donald Trump for his pro-coal policies, but his tariffs have hurt coal’s international markets and his slashing of federal programs is harming the health of local residents. (Mother Jones)

• A Virginia county board awards Chesapeake Utilities a deal to begin engineering a new gas pipeline system on Virginia’s Eastern Shore. (news release)

ELECTRIC VEHICLES

• Kentucky lawmakers want to talk about how to recoup the state’s $250 million loan to Ford now that the automaker will repurpose its electric vehicle battery factory to make grid batteries and miss employment targets as a result. (Kentucky Public Radio)

GRID

• Entergy announces it’s nearly completed the restoration of power in Louisiana after a winter storm knocked out residents’ electricity for 11 days. (Louisiana Illuminator)

• Hundreds of Texas residents rally against Oncor’s Dinosaur–Longshore Project to build 765 kV transmission lines on more than 200 miles across the state, with one proposed route running near Dinosaur Valley State Park. (CBS News)

BIOFUELS

• The Florida-based owner of Indian River Biodiesel pleads guilty to generating and seeking several million dollars’ worth of fraudulent fuel and tax credits from the U.S. EPA. (E&E News)

DATA CENTERS

• A data center developer acquires and plans to redevelop a former aluminum smelter in Kentucky that was closed in 2022 due to high energy prices. (WKU Public Radio)

• TotalEnergies signs a deal to supply Google with 1 GW of power from 805 MW and 195 MW solar farms under construction in Texas. (Renewables Now)

COMMENTARY

• Virginia lawmakers should pass legislation to encourage renewable energy and regulate data centers to help bring down power bills for residents, writes the executive director of the Virginia League of Conservation Voters. (Virginian-Pilot)