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Q&A

Just Having Fun at RE+ Edition

Talking with the director of the Energy Department’s Solar Energy Technologies Office, the CEO of Empact Technologies, and more

Jael at RE+
Heatmap Illustration.

This week I’m in Anaheim wandering the halls of RE+ for the first time. It’s been a thrill to learn about the cavalcade of companies working on the frontlines of the energy transition. I’ll have a LOT more to say about my trip in next week’s edition of The Fight. But during my first day there I decided to ask a few impressive individuals to sit in my hot seat. Here’s what they said!

Becca Jones-Albertus – Director of the Energy Department’s Solar Energy Technologies Office

  • Does the federal government’s neutrality on what U.S. regions are best for renewables help or hurt the energy transition, given how many competing interests are at play? “I think for our country it helps. It provides more opportunities for local areas to engage and take charge of their own futures. The clean energy transition doesn’t depend on whether we develop a plan in [one] particular area. That means there are more communities that can engage, can push for benefits for those systems. There’s more room and opportunity there.”

Kevin Diau – CEO of 1Climate, an AI permitting assistance tool

  • Can AI help with NIMBY problems? “I think AI can make it easier to understand where all those regulations are that exist. But I think that a lot of the challenges when it comes to people having NIMBY conflicts, that’s a lot of interpersonal dynamics that AI can’t necessarily address head on. I think developers still have these NIMBY challenges from people in the community.”

Charles Dauber – CEO of Empact Technologies, policy consulting firm

  • What’s the question you’ve been asked most about the IRA at RE+? “Even though the IRA’s been around for like, two years, it turns out given safe harbor last year, many companies didn’t have to deal with this until now. So we’re just now starting to get questions about dealing with prevailing wage and apprenticeship compliance requirements. We see that probably from 70% of the people that walk up here: How do I go do this? I’m getting requirements from my investors that want to prove we’re going to be compliant with these requirements.

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Hotspots

Judge, Siding With Trump, Saves Solar From NEPA

And more on the week’s biggest conflicts around renewable energy projects.

The United States.
Heatmap Illustration/Getty Images

1. Jackson County, Kansas – A judge has rejected a Hail Mary lawsuit to kill a single solar farm over it benefiting from the Inflation Reduction Act, siding with arguments from a somewhat unexpected source — the Trump administration’s Justice Department — which argued that projects qualifying for tax credits do not require federal environmental reviews.

  • We previously reported that this lawsuit filed by frustrated Kansans targeted implementation of the IRA when it first was filed in February. That was true then, but afterwards an amended complaint was filed that focused entirely on the solar farm at the heart of the case: NextEra’s Jeffrey Solar. The case focuses now on whether Jeffrey benefiting from IRA credits means it should’ve gotten reviewed under the National Environmental Policy Act.
  • Perhaps surprisingly to some, the Trump Justice Department argued against these NEPA reviews – a posture that jibes with the administration’s approach to streamlining the overall environmental analysis process but works in favor of companies using IRA credits.
  • In a ruling that came down on Tuesday, District Judge Holly Teeter ruled the landowners lacked standing to sue because “there is a mismatch between their environmental concerns tied to construction of the Jeffrey Solar Project and the tax credits and regulations,” and they did not “plausibly allege the substantial federal control and responsibility necessary to trigger NEPA review.”
  • “Plaintiffs’ claims, arguments, and requested relief have been difficult to analyze,” Teeter wrote in her opinion. “They are trying to use the procedural requirements of NEPA as a roadblock because they do not like what Congress has chosen to incentivize and what regulations Jackson County is considering. But those challenges must be made to the legislative branch, not to the judiciary.”

2. Portage County, Wisconsin – The largest solar project in the Badger State is now one step closer to construction after settling with environmentalists concerned about impacts to the Greater Prairie Chicken, an imperiled bird species beloved in wildlife conservation circles.

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Spotlight

Renewables Swept Up in Data Center Backlash

Just look at Virginia.

A data center.
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Solar and wind projects are getting swept up in the blowback to data center construction, presenting a risk to renewable energy companies who are hoping to ride the rise of AI in an otherwise difficult moment for the industry.

The American data center boom is going to demand an enormous amount of electricity and renewables developers believe much of it will come from solar and wind. But while these types of energy generation may be more easily constructed than, say, a fossil power plant, it doesn’t necessarily mean a connection to a data center will make a renewable project more popular. Not to mention data centers in rural areas face complaints that overlap with prominent arguments against solar and wind – like noise and impacts to water and farmland – which is leading to unfavorable outcomes for renewable energy developers more broadly when a community turns against a data center.

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Q&A

How the Wind Industry Can Fight Back

A conversation with Chris Moyer of Echo Communications

The Q&A subject.
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Today’s conversation is with Chris Moyer of Echo Communications, a D.C.-based communications firm that focuses on defending zero- and low-carbon energy and federal investments in climate action. Moyer, a veteran communications adviser who previously worked on Capitol Hill, has some hot takes as of late about how he believes industry and political leaders have in his view failed to properly rebut attacks on solar and wind energy, in addition to the Inflation Reduction Act. On Tuesday he sent an email blast out to his listserv – which I am on – that boldly declared: “The Wind Industry’s Strategy is Failing.”

Of course after getting that email, it shouldn’t surprise readers of The Fight to hear I had to understand what he meant by that, and share it with all of you. So here goes. The following conversation has been abridged and lightly edited for clarity.

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