WV’s largest solar farm to be built on massive former coal mine

SOLAR: A company announces it will develop a 250 MW solar farm on 3,000 acres of a former West Virginia coal mine, which organizers say will be the largest solar project in the state. (WV News, Charleston Gazette-Mail)

ALSO:
• Entergy is increasingly developing solar power in Arkansas, with three major solar plants already in operation and two others on the way. (Arkansas Business)
• More than 800 solar and storage projects in Virginia, Maryland and Pennsylvania are waiting in queue with transmission organization PJM Interconnection. (Chesapeake Bay Journal)
• A Texas city announces it will become the first in the state to run its municipal operations entirely on solar power, and will build a facility on a former landfill to fulfill its needs. (KXAS)

PIPELINES: An appeals court declines to reconsider its decision to strike down key permits for the Mountain Valley Pipeline, further delaying the project. (Roanoke Times)

OIL & GAS: Texas shale oil and gas producers resist expanding production despite high oil prices as investors push for slow-growth plans (Dallas Morning News)

COAL:
• Some of the Alabama miners striking against a coal company are making ends meet by working at an Amazon warehouse — where workers are also trying to unionize. (New York Times)
• The U.S. Department of Energy provides $3 million for a West Virginia project to test coal-derived building materials, including roof tiles, siding panels, bricks and blocks. (Bluefield Daily Telegraph)

EMISSIONS:
• West Virginia health and environmental officials try to convince residents cancer rates didn’t increase near facilities where the state measuring carcinogenic chemical emissions. (Charleston Gazette-Mail)
• Louisiana officials find a leak at a New Orleans plant that powers the city’s drainage and drinking water pumps is showering a nearby neighborhood with oil droplets. (WWL-TV)

ELECTRIC VEHICLES:
• Elected leaders in a small, majority Black community in Tennessee near Ford’s planned electric vehicle megasite file a lawsuit against the state comptroller to stop a financial takeover. (Tennessee Lookout)
• An electric vehicle supply company announces plans to build a factory in Georgia. (Atlanta Journal-Constitution)
• A North Carolina economic development official sees potential for more companies to locate around a likely electric vehicle production and supplier cluster. (Winston-Salem Journal)

GRID:
• A regional environmental group mobilizes against a proposal to build Amazon data centers, an electrical substation and high-power transmission lines in a Virginia county near two historical sites. (Culpeper Star-Exponent)
• Entergy completes an $86 million transmission system upgrade in a Louisiana community still recovering from Hurricane Ida. (Courier)

UTILITIES: Kentucky lawmakers sign a letter opposing the sale of Kentucky Power and ask that customers be refunded part of the profit from the sale. (Hazard Herald)

COMMENTARY: U.S. Sen. Joe Manchin and West Virginia Gov. Jim Justice’s deep connections to the coal industry undercut their participation in climate and energy transition conversations, writes an editorial board. (Beckley Register-Herald)