Minnesota could become the 17th state to mandate that major power companies generate more electricity from the sun.

The state House passed a bill Tuesday to require investor-owned utilities to get 4 percent of their power from solar by 2025. It would be one of the nation’s more aggressive solar mandates, the equivalent of 2,000 solar arrays like the one Ikea installed atop its Bloomington store last year.

“It is a move toward the future,” said House Majority Leader Erin Murphy of St. Paul.

[Read more →]

On April 18, 2013, the New York State Public Service Commission (“NYPSC”) approved construction of the 1,000 MW Champlain-Hudson direct current transmission line. When built, the Champlain-Hudson line is anticipated to deliver primarily hydroelectric power from Canada to New York City. [Read more →]

On April 23, 2013, FERC’s Director of Office of Energy Projects, Jeff C. Wright, testified before the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources concerning draft legislation aimed at increasing hydropower production in the United States. The draft legislation at issue included S. 545, “Hydropower Improvement Act of 2013” and H.R. 267, “Hydropower Regulatory Efficiency Act of 2013.” In his testimony, Wright discussed FERC’s authority under the Federal Power Act (“FPA”) to issue licenses or exemptions for hydropower projects under its jurisdiction. Wright further detailed FERC’s recent efforts to support small and “innovative” projects, including marine and hydrokinetic projects, and pumped storage projects. [Read more →]

A bill that would allow renewable energy projects to be structured as master limited partnerships was reintroduced on Wednesday. Although designed to foster investment in renewable energy projects, commentators see several potential problems with the bill. As noted in the following article, there is considerable concern in the solar industry that the bill would come at the expense of existing tax credits. The concern is that the heralding in of this new financing structure, would mean the elimination of the current tax credits upon which the industry heavily relies. Further, even if current tax benefits were left in place, unless the bill is revised to exempt renewable energy credits from the passive loss and at risk limitation (as is the case for oil and gas industry) it seems unlikely that widespread investment in Master Limited Partnerships would occur.  [Read more →]

North Carolina lawmakers today rejected efforts to scale back the use of renewable energy. [Read more →]