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I got DER-pilled at DERVOS 2023.
The hottest ticket in Brooklyn last week wasn’t for an indie rock show or a buzzy new restaurant. It was for the most niche, nerdiest clean energy conference of the year — the sold-out DERVOS 2023.
The conference name — a satirical play on Davos, a stuffy, World Economic Forum event attended by governmental and business elites — tells you much of what you need to know about this irreverent subculture of the climate movement. A teaser video for DERVOS described it as a “rad clean energy summit … where youths get DER-pilled and the hot takes haven’t been approved by PR.”
To translate, DERVOS is for people who are stoked about a category of technologies known as “distributed energy resources,” or DERs. They encompass pretty much any device that can generate or store energy, or use energy flexibly, at the scale of a single building, like rooftop solar panels, batteries, and smart thermostats. This kind of tech has historically been written off as less important than big projects like wind farms — “nice-to-haves” but incapable of cutting emissions at climate-relevant scales. But once you get DER-pilled, another vision for the future emerges.
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Imagine a solar panel on every roof, a battery in every basement, and a smart thermostat in every home. Now imagine these devices being aggregated and synchronized across neighborhoods, cities, or entire regions. If 5,000 batteries discharge at the same time, you’ve got the equivalent of a new power plant. If 5,000 smart thermostats turn the temperature up by a few degrees on a hot summer day, you can prevent a natural gas “peaker” plant from firing up. In that sense, DERs offer a potentially faster option for growing the electric grid than large-scale projects, and could provide significant savings — around $10 billion in avoided infrastructure costs by 2030, according to a recent Department of Energy report.
But that’s not all. To the DER-pilled, this future will also be a “better world, a higher performing world,” as James McGinniss, one of the organizers of DERVOS, put it. It’s a world where your heating and cooling and EV charging are orchestrated seamlessly to utilize the cleanest power at the lowest cost; where solar panels and batteries aren’t called upon to keep your lights on when the power goes out, because they are preventing system-wide blackouts from occurring in the first place.
“How many industries can you work on that are going to completely change the way one of our foundational systems works and flip it entirely on its head?” Nathaniel Teichman, a DER-pilled former financial analyst, told me at the conference. “I don’t think there’s anywhere else with such importance or at such an inflection point.”
To kick things off at DERVOS, McGinniss painted a picture of an industry on the verge of an explosion. “It feels like if DERs were the internet, it’s 1995,” he told the roughly 250-person crowd. “We’re very, very early in this. And I think there’s massive, massive growth coming to this space.”
The event was held at Newlab, a startup incubator located in a renovated shipbuilding warehouse in the Brooklyn Navy Yard. Unlike other energy summits, it’s not put on by a trade association or a professional organization. It’s organized by a loose collective called the DER Task Force, a bunch of enthusiasts who met on Twitter.
The story is a roadmap for movement-building in the modern age. It started in March 2019, when McGinniss posted a tweet asking if anyone in New York wanted to start a monthly happy hour to talk shop about distributed energy. “Like 30 people responded. And I had like 100 Twitter followers,” he told me.
The tweet led to a group message called “DG Beers” (for distributed generation) and eventually to a series of real life hangs. They got drinks. They went to see The Current War, a movie about the 19th century battle over which electrical current system would prevail. They had people give powerpoint presentations. When COVID-19 hit, they moved the monthly meetup to Zoom and started a podcast. The group blew up. “Suddenly we had people from like, South Africa and like, rural Alaska joining us,” said Duncan Campbell, another one of the original members.
Regulars at the meetups told me it was unlike other networking spaces. “What stands out the most is the atmosphere of strong opinions, weakly held,” said Kyle Baranko. “I think there’s a lot of people who are intellectuals, who like getting into the big picture and the small details. But they never take themselves too seriously.”
That’s also a fitting description of DERVOS, which covered broad, heady topics like the concept of “energy abundance” with a combination of deep expertise and lighthearted, often crude informality. “We need to double or triple the grid. That is crazy,” said Pier LaFarge, the CEO of a company called Sparkfund, during the first panel, which contemplated the potential for centralized grid planning. “That is like the technical challenge of the space race and the economic scale of the highway system. That is non-trivial, societal shit.”
During the next session, Andy Frank, founder of the home retrofit company Sealed, was talking about how DERs can help avoid the need to build transmission lines and power plants. “We need a — and this is a very technical term — a fuck-ton of DERs to try to avoid an even more fuck-ton of costs,” he said.
“Is it a metric fuckton?” Jesse Jenkins, an energy systems engineer from Princeton University and Heatmap contributor on the panel, shot back. The audience burst out laughing.
The conference skewed very white and male. Nicole Green, another founding member, speculated that it might be because that’s still the demographic at a lot of university engineering programs. Integrating DERs into the grid and into power markets is technologically complicated, and the community is largely made up of engineers.
When I asked other attendees to describe the vibe, one said it was “tech bro-ey, but better — not as toxic.” Another said “young and exciting.”
“It feels a little bit like the energy industry underground, in a way,” Baranko told me.
“There’s a rebellious, counter-establishment ethos within the DER community,” said Teichman, “both by the nature of what it is and the people it attracts.”
Part of that comes from the fact that these technologies challenge the monopoly utility model — the way that electricity has been generated and distributed and commoditized for decades through big, corporate power plants. The DER community also likes to push back on the narrative that tackling climate change requires sacrifice. “That’s also where the irreverence bleeds in,” said McGinniss. “It’s just like, this is an awesome, exciting future. That’s what we want people to feel.”
To illustrate the point, McGinniss and his friends organized a DERVOS afterparty with the first-ever “vehicle to rave” demonstration. Working with another group of DER-enthusiasts called the SOLARPUNKS, who specialize in sustainable event production, they used a Ford F-150 Lightning to power the sound system at an old fire station-turned-event space in lower Manhattan.
But this better, higher performing world is still mostly out of reach. “We’re mired in a lot of decades-old thinking at this point about DERs and how they can be a part of all of this,” Campbell told the audience at the start of the conference.
The obstacles preventing DERs from realizing their full potential was a major theme of the day. Frank talked about how DERs aren’t properly valued in energy markets. Leah Stokes, a political scientist from the University of California, lamented that utilities haven’t taken DERs seriously or integrated them into their resource planning. Jenkins suggested we regulate utilities differently so that they have more incentive to utilize DERs. Jen Downing, a senior advisor at the Department of Energy, said regulators need data showing that DERs are reliable.
Part of the problem is that there’s no DER industry association, no one advocating for funding or policy changes to support these solutions at the state or national level. During last year’s conference, Jigar Shah, a Department of Energy official and a sort of Godfather figure in the DER scene, pushed the community to be more ambitious. “You guys are left out of the narrative, and it’s just fun, it’s sort of like, 'oh that’s so cool, I’m glad that they’re doing that,’” he said, calling in to deliver the keynote speech from the car during his family vacation.
The DER Task Force took up Shah’s call to arms and decided to use its revenue from events and the podcast to hire Allison Bates Wannop, an energy lawyer, to work on policy full time. At this year’s DERVOS, Wannop announced the group’s initial plans, which include turning New York State into a DER “nirvana,” and a campaign to “occupy NARUC,” the association for utility regulators that holds triannual conferences, which are heavily attended by the natural gas industry.
Colleen Metelitsa, one of the founders of the Task Force, told me the current landscape for DERs was like the internet before the iPhone came out. There was a lot you could do with the existing technology, but the iPhone “proliferated so many things we do on the internet that we didn’t even think about.”
What else, besides raves powered by pick-up trucks, does the future hold?
Editor’s note: A previous version of this article misattributed a quote. It has since been corrected. We regret the error.
Read more about batteries and solar:
Why Batteries Might — Might! — Solve America’s Power-Line Shortage
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The first veto of Joe Biden’s presidency, in March 2023, came on a bill that would have overturned a Department of Labor rule allowing retirement funds to consider environment, social, and governance factors — commonly known as ESG — when making investment decisions. At the time, it seemed like a good representation of where the issue stood: Though there was a conservative backlash against ESG investing, much of which revolves around whether companies are incorporating climate risks into their planning, the backlash was more bark than bite. ESG not only seemed here to stay, it was gaining in prominence as more investors and Wall Street firms realized they could no longer ignore the effects of climate change on the economic prospects of the companies they were funding.
Less than two years later, the picture looks rather different — at least politically. There is still over $3 trillion invested in ESG funds worldwide, the vast majority of it in Europe. But here in the U.S., the backlash has only grown stronger, and with Donald Trump’s election, there has been a Wall Street stampede away from public commitments to assess climate risk as a key component of investment decisions. There’s no way to know how much long-term effect this change will have on emissions, but the reversal in the public stance of the financial sector has been swift and intense.
Let’s begin with the banks. In the space of a month, the six largest banks in the United States — Goldman Sachs, Bank of America, Wells Fargo, Citi, Morgan Stanley, and JPMorgan — all pulled out of the Net-Zero Banking Alliance, an international United Nations-sponsored group under which member banks commit to pursuing net-zero carbon emissions from their lending and investments by 2050.
While Trump’s election may have been the tipping point, it comes after an organized campaign waged at the state level over the past couple of years, as Republican attorneys general have pressured and threatened the finance industry into abandoning its efforts to contribute to the mitigation of climate change.
In the spring of 2023, 23 Republican AGs threatened the Net-Zero Insurance Alliance (like the NZBA, a UN-sponsored group) with antitrust action, saying it was pursuing “an activist climate agenda.” Companies began leaving, and a year later, the group disbanded. The effort against the banking alliance followed a similar pattern: Threats of legal action from Republican attorneys general, followed by a pullback from the banks.
Like insurance companies and banks, investment firms are clearly feeling the pressure. BlackRock, the largest asset manager in the world, recently pulled out of the Net-Zero Asset Managers Initiative, a group similar to those for insurers and banks, citing “legal inquiries from various public officials.” That included a lawsuit filed by Texas and 10 other Republican states, alleging that BlackRock and other firms were unfairly harming the fossil fuel industry with their investment decisions. This week, the NZAMI released a statement saying that in response to “different regulatory and client expectations,” it is launching an internal review, and meanwhile “suspending activities to track signatory implementation and reporting” of climate goals.
Meanwhile, Republicans in Congress have been issuing reports and press releases condemning the “woke ESG cartel,” which they claim consists of “left-wing activists and major financial institutions that collude to impose radical environmental, social, and governance goals on American companies.” After the election, those Republicans now control both houses of Congress, as well as the White House.
So it’s a good bet that the pressure on the finance industry from Washington will only increase, especially with a new administration that combines dismissal of climate change with an eagerness to bring corporations to heel. In many cases, key administration positions will be staffed by former employees of the very fossil fuel companies that oppose real climate action, or at least by their allies. One vivid example: Lee Zeldin, Trump’s nominee to lead the Environmental Protection Agency, revealed in disclosure forms that he was paid tens of thousands of dollars to pen op-eds attacking ESG investing. His forms list only the PR firms that paid him, not the clients on whose behalf they did so.
These pullbacks from climate pledges are clearly motivated by fear, and may even be taken with regret by some of the CEOs making the decisions. If that is the case, however, it is not a universal sentiment. The Financial Timesreports that “Some Wall Streeters also feel able to embrace making money openly, without nodding to any broader social goals. ‘Most of us don’t have to kiss ass because, like Trump, we love America and capitalism,’ one said.”
Here’s the kicker: These alliances that are now wavering began with few requirements in order to bring in as many participants as possible; only later would companies have to meet more reporting and emissions goals. But “as accountability mechanisms started to come into play, at the same time we started to see the conservative backlash against it,” Tensie Whelan, founding director of the NYU Stern Center for Sustainable Business, told me. Now, “they’re all running scared.”
Though some critics charge that ESG is mostly about greenwashing, many financial actors — banks, asset managers, investors — have embraced greener investing because it is both good for the planet and good for business. If a company is exposed to climate risk but fails to account for it in its long-term strategy, that company is probably a bad investment. Investments incorporating sustainability considerations tend to perform as well or better than ordinary investment vehicles — the S&P 500 ESG Index, for instance, has outperformed the standard S&P 500. And a study by HIP Investor showed that public pension funds in blue states that incorporated ESG factors have generated higher returns than red-state funds that eschewed them.
“I would hope and assume that at some point there will be some class-action suits” against states that have turned away from ESG investing, and in so doing cost taxpayers money, Whelan said. In 2024, 17 Republican-run states passed bills restricting ESG investments with state funds, while eight Democratic states passed pro-ESG bills.
When banks or investment firms abandon climate alliances or pull back from climate goals in other ways, they nearly always put out statements reiterating their commitment to reducing emissions. While those might be sincere, the most important message is that the threats and pressure are effective. And that’s what has become so clear: Conservatives are energized and emboldened to roll back corporate efforts to address climate change, and are using every tool they have — legislation, litigation, threats, public pressure campaigns — to destroy those initiatives.
Nevertheless, there is plenty of room for pressure from the other side. Whelan notes that blue states “are very adamant about having key sustainability criteria” in their investments, and as younger generations accumulate more wealth, they are more likely to demand sustainability where they put their money. As for Wall Street responding to political pressure by backing away from its climate goals, “this retrenchment is unfortunate,” Whelan told me, but “I do think it’s temporary, and I think they know that. Because they’re not stupid.”
On executive orders, the Supreme Court, and a “particularly dangerous situation” in Los Angeles.
Current conditions:Nearly 10 million people are under alert today for fire weather conditions in southern California • The coastal waters off China hit their highest average temperature, 70.7 degrees Fahrenheit, since record-keeping began • A blast of cold air will bring freezing temperatures to an estimated 80% of Americans in the next week.
High winds returned to Los Angeles on Monday night and will peak on Tuesday, the “most dangerous” day of the week for the city still battling severe and deadly fires. In anticipation of the dry Santa Ana winds, the National Weather Service issued its highest fire weather warning, citing a “particularly dangerous situation” in Los Angeles and Ventura Counties for the first time since December 2020.
A new brush fire, the Auto Fire, ignited in Oxnard, Ventura County, on Monday evening. It spread 55 acres before firefighters stopped it. Meanwhile, investigators continue to look for the cause of the Palisades Fire, which ignited near a week-old burn scar, a popular partying spot, and damaged wooden utility poles, according to a New York Times analysis.
National Weather Service
Trump is planning an executive order banning offshore wind developments on the East Coast, Heatmap’s Jael Holzman reported Monday. The news came from New Jersey Republican Representative Jeff Van Drew, who said he’s working with Trump’s team to “to prevent this offshore wind catastrophe from wreaking havoc on the hardworking people who call our coastal towns home.”
Van Drew’s press release also said that this order is “just the beginning,” and that it would be finalized “within the first few months of the administration,” a far cry from the Day One action Trump has promised. Van Drew had earlier told New Jersey reporters that the ban would last six months.
Meanwhile, in other executive order news, Biden issued an order on Tuesday directing the Energy and Defense departments to lease federal lands for “gigawatt-scale” data centers, according to E&E News, but only if they bring online enough clean energy to match their facilities’ needs.
On Monday, the Supreme Court refused to hear a lawsuit brought by Utah attempting to seize control of the “unappropriated” federal lands in the state. Opponents argued that the lawsuit, if successful, would have put public lands across the West on the path to privatization since Utah and other states likely couldn’t afford to manage them and would have had to sell off much of them. However, “while the Court’s decision denying original review of Utah’s claims is welcome news for our shared public lands, we fully expect Utah’s misguided attacks to continue,” Alison Flint, the senior legal director at The Wilderness Society, said in a statement.
As I reported last month, the Utah lawsuit organizers “seem prepared to make an appeal to Congress or the Trump administration if the Supreme Court doesn’t make a move in their favor,” given that “funding for the messaging for Stand for Our Land, the publicity arm of the lawsuit, has reportedly outpaced the spending on lawyers.
Also on Monday, the Supreme Court declined to hear a fossil fuel industry argument to block states, municipalities, and other groups from seeking damages for the harms caused by climate change. The appeal by Sunoco, Exxon Mobil, Chevron, and others stemmed from a high-profile lawsuit in Honolulu that seeks to hold energy companies accountable for causing “a substantial portion” of the effects of climate change. Had the Supreme Court taken up the case, similar lawsuits by California and others likely would have been paused during deliberations. The American Enterprise Institute, a conservative think tank, responded to Monday’s decision by claiming activists will now “make themselves the nation’s energy regulators.”
A little over a week after the start of New York City’s congestion pricing, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority released data showing significant decreases in the amount of time passengers spend in inbound traffic. On average, during the morning commute, traffic times have decreased by 30% to 40%; in some cases, such as during rush hour in the Holland Tunnel, travel time has been cut in half, going from over 11 minutes to under five. Due to the traffic reductions, some bus routes are up to 28% faster now than at the same time last year. “It has been a very good week here in New York,” MTA deputy chief Juliette Michaelson said in a news conference.
So far, the MTA has seen an average of 43,000 fewer drivers entering the congestion pricing zone, which begins below 60th St. and costs $9 during the day. While Gothamist notes that this is only a 7.3% reduction compared to last January, many New Yorkers say congestion pricing effects are visibly noticeable in the streets of lower Manhattan.
The Brooklyn Bridge as congestion pricing went into effect. Photo by Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images
Oil and gas magnate Harold Hamm is throwing a “swanky party” to celebrate the inauguration of Donald Trump, on whose campaign he spent more than $4.3 million, according to the research group Fieldnotes and The New York Times. Interior Secretary nominee Doug Burgum was among the invitees, although an advisor has said he does not plan to attend; one of the party’s several major oil and gas industry sponsors, Liberty Energy, was founded by Chris Wright, Trump’s nominee for Energy Secretary.
In May, Trump met with oil and gas executives at his Mar-a-Lago resort and promised industry-friendly tax and regulatory policies and an aggressive stance against wind energy if they helped fund his White House bid. The oil and gas industry ultimately invested some $75 million in efforts to help re-elect the former president and contributed millions to his legal defense.
25% — That’s the level of tariff Alberta Premier Danielle Smith said Canada should prepare for after a meeting with incoming President Trump — and not expect exceptions for its crude oil exports to the U.S., per Bloomberg’s Javier Blas.
Though it might not be as comprehensive or as permanent as renewables advocates have feared, it’s also “just the beginning,” the congressman said.
President-elect Donald Trump’s team is drafting an executive order to “halt offshore wind turbine activities” along the East Coast, working with the office of Republican Rep. Jeff Van Drew of New Jersey, the congressman said in a press release from his office Monday afternoon.
“This executive order is just the beginning,” Van Drew said in a statement. “We will fight tooth and nail to prevent this offshore wind catastrophe from wreaking havoc on the hardworking people who call our coastal towns home.”
The announcement indicates that some in the anti-wind space are leaving open the possibility that Trump’s much-hyped offshore wind ban may be less sweeping than initially suggested.
In its press release, Van Drew’s office said the executive order would “lay the groundwork for permanent measures against the projects,” leaving the door open to only a temporary pause on permitting new projects. The congressman had recently told New Jersey reporters that he anticipates only a six-month moratorium on offshore wind.
The release also stated that the “proposed order” is “expected to be finalized within the first few months of the administration,” which is a far cry from Trump’s promise to stop projects on Day 1. If enacted, a pause would essentially halt all U.S. offshore wind development because the sought-after stretches of national coastline are entirely within federal waters.
Whether this is just caution from Van Drew’s people or a true moderation of Trump’s ambition we’ll soon find out. Inauguration Day is in less than a week.
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