Legislative

Maria Korsnick, president and CEO of the Nuclear Energy Institute (NEI), told POWER on March 9 that the U.S. nuclear industry is optimistic this Congress will work to resolve the nation’s long drawn out spent fuel predicament. Speaking at CERAweek by IHS Markit last week, Korsnick said that optimism was based on Republican domination of […]

The Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA’s) administrative priorities will be reined in to focus on process, rule of law, and cooperation with states, the agency’s new head Scott Pruitt told attendees at CERAweek by IHS Markit on March 9. Since the former Oklahoma Attorney General was sworn in as EPA administrator in late February, the agency has […]

Bipartisan lawmakers in Minnesota want utilities in that state to procure 50% of power sold by 2030 from renewable sources. The measure, if passed, could put the state’s renewable efforts on par with California’s. The bipartisan bill introduced in the Minnesota Legislature on February 27 seeks to double the state’s renewable energy standard, which is […]

A bill signed by Minnesota’s Gov. Mark Dayton (D) on February 28 allows Xcel Energy to build a 786-MW combined cycle gas-fired power plant without approval from state regulators. The governor signed Chapter 5, House File 113, a bill that had bipartisan support of the state’s legislators, to allow the Minneapolis-based power company to move […]

In a final 52–46 vote, the Senate on Friday confirmed Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt as Donald Trump’s nominee to lead the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). The vote was mostly along party lines. Every Republican present except Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) voted for Pruitt (Sen. John McCain [R-Ariz.] did not vote because he is at […]

A state court ordered Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt to turn over more than 2,500 emails his office withheld from open records requests relating to communications with coal, oil, and gas corporations. The order came a day before the Senate is poised to confirm him as President Donald Trump’s nominee to lead the Environmental Protection […]

A group of power companies have filed a federal lawsuit against the State of Illinois, challenging a recently enacted law that creates subsidies for Exelon’s uneconomic nuclear power plants. The plaintiffs in the lawsuit filed on February 14 in the Northern District of Illinois are the Electric Power Supply Association (EPSA), Dynegy, Eastern Generation, NRG […]

Former President Barack Obama’s regulation-heavy Climate Action Plan was inefficient and should be replaced with a carbon tax, a group of senior Republican statesmen told White House officials during a February 8 meeting. The new pitch is laid out in a paper by the Climate Leadership Council — whose membership includes former GOP Treasury Secretaries […]

President Donald Trump’s drive to roll back federal regulations, especially from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), will not be simple or smooth, a veteran Washington, D.C., attorney said at a utility conference on February 8. Speaking at the Energy, Utility, and Environment Conference (EUEC) in San Diego, Calif., Thomas Lorenzen, a partner with D.C.–based law […]

As House Republicans issued a bill to dismantle the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) this week, a House committee held a hearing on how to make the agency “great again,” and former EPA employees expressed serious concerns about the looming nomination of Scott Pruitt to head the agency. The bill (H.R. 861), which seeks to […]