CRYPTOCURRENCY: A bitcoin mining firm urges Idaho regulators to reverse their approval of Idaho Power’s special cryptocurrency facility rate plan, saying it would kill its proposed project in the state. (Utility Dive)
ALSO: A Colorado county begins developing regulations for methane-powered cryptocurrency mining facilities located at oil and gas wells. (9News)
CLIMATE:
• A federal appeals court rules that Hawaiian governments’ climate liability lawsuit against oil and gas companies should be heard in state court. (Courthouse News)
• Utah climate advocates hope the state’s bid to host the Olympic Games — and a requirement to minimize carbon emissions — will catalyze a clean energy transition in a state that gets 61% of its power from coal. (E&E News)
OIL & GAS:
• The Biden administration’s draft five-year plan for offshore oil drilling proposes auctioning leases in the Cook Inlet in Alaska, even though a planned lease sale was canceled this year due to lack of industry interest. (KTOO)
• Federal regulators investigate the cause of a 25-million cubic foot methane leak from a pipeline in Colorado last month. (E&E News, subscription)
• The first federal oil and gas lease sale held after the Biden administration’s leasing pause draws criticism — from industry for its reduced scope, and from environmentalists for being held at all. (WyoFile, Billings Gazette)
ELECTRIFICATION:
• San Luis Obispo, California’s city council votes to ban natural gas hookups in all new construction beginning next year. (New Times)
• A California city receives $4.5 million from the state to help low- and middle-income residents switch appliances from natural gas to electric. (Almanac News)
• An energy analyst finds that a rapid transition in Oregon from natural gas and electric resistance heating and cooling appliances to electric heat pumps would nearly halve carbon emissions. (Utility Dive)
SOLAR: A California nonprofit plans to create a virtual power plant by installing rooftop solar-plus-storage and smart appliances at 120 Bay Area homes and businesses and selling excess power back to the grid. (Inside Climate News)
GRID: The federal Bureau of Land Management will hold a public workshop on the proposed Greenlink North high-voltage transmission project in Nevada. (press release)
UTILITIES: Public Service Company of New Mexico asks the state Supreme Court to reverse regulators’ order to begin issuing customer refunds immediately after closing a coal power plant. (NM Political Report)
TRANSPORTATION: Montana lawmakers consider a bill that would levy a fee on electric vehicles and another that would establish a tax on EV charging stations. (Daily Montanan)
NUCLEAR: A company proposes storing spent nuclear reactor fuel from a recently shuttered Michigan power plant in a planned temporary repository in southeast New Mexico. (Carlsbad Current-Argus)
COMMENTARY: A Colorado journalist says Xcel Energy’s plan to stop burning coal within a decade and invest billions of dollars in renewable generation is equivalent to rural electrification in the 1930s and 1940s. (Big Pivots)
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