GOLDEN CRESCENT AND 1000 ISLAND NEWS

  Fossil fuels, renewables, nuclear, and the grid Read by investors, executives, engineers. policy makers and more   Pew’s new survey cuts through the noise: Republicans and Democrats disagree on everything in energy policy — except nuclear power. On solar, wind, coal, offshore drilling, and fracking, the partisan gap is a canyon. But on nuclear? It’s a crack in the sidewalk.   This chart shows it clearly: Solar: +30 Dem advantage Wind: +39 Dem advantage Coal: +50 GOP advantage Offshore O&G: +52 GOP advantage Fracking: +45 GOP advantage Nuclear: just 17 points apart   In a country fracturing along nearly every energy axis ,  nuclear is the one place where both sides are at least in the same ZIP code. Democrats like the climate upside; Republicans like the firmness, the industrial logic, and the national strength it implies. That overlap is tiny, but historically rare — and politically potent.   Grid Take : If you’re looking for the coalition that actual...

This week, we released a bombshell new report detailing the massive costs and reliability challenges posed by New York State’s climate and energy policies. Just kidding, the report, entitled  New York’s Climate Crossroads: Assuring Affordable Energy ,  was actually a scathing piece from the  Progressive Policy Institute  (PPI)—but based on the findings, you would be forgiven for thinking we had written it. PPI identified “a clear and undeniable pattern of failure” when assessing New York’s progress in meeting the mandates in its signature climate law, the 2019 Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act (CLCA). According to the  New York Post , Neel Brown, the author of the PPI study, said: “New York set bold climate targets, but ignored the economic and technical realities required to achieve them.” We couldn’t have said it any better ourselves. Failure to Launch PPI reports that the key mandates in the CLCA are: ·        ...

December 8, 2025   NEW YORK – New York Attorney General Letitia James today released the following statement after a federal judge ruled in her favor and  struck down the Trump administration’s unlawful blockade on wind energy development : “As New Yorkers face rising energy costs, we need more energy sources, not fewer. Wind energy is good for our environment, our economy, and our communities. I am grateful the court stepped in to block the administration’s reckless and unlawful crusade against clean energy.” In May, Attorney General James  led a coalition of 17 other attorneys general in suing to block a presidential directive suspending all federal approvals for wind energy projects . Today, the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts granted the coalition’s motion for summary judgment, declaring the directive illegal and vacating the order.                                ...

Another important date is looming for wind and solar developers – January 1. Going into 2026 and beyond developers will lose the benefit of the federal tax credits that are crucial to their business model if they utilize material and components (or money) from a short list of foreign counties. For all intents and purposes that means China. Chinese origin components and materials are pervasive in the wind and solar global supply chain. Developers that have not commenced construction by the mid-July deadline for doing so to claim the tax credits, will have a lot of sorting out to do to be sure they are not knowingly or even unknowingly in violation of the new Foreign Entity of Concern (FEOC) rules. At this late stage the IRS has not yet issued detailed guidance to developers on how the rules will be applied. They complain, perhaps correctly, that is by design from this administration to keep them guessing and off balance. Below is a summary of FEOC from various sources: The new limitatio...

The electric grid is built for heat. The days when the system is under the most stress are typically humid summer evenings, when air conditioning is still going full blast, appliances are being turned on as commuters return home, and solar generation is fading, stretching the generation and distribution grid to its limits. But  as home heating and transportation goes increasingly electric, more of the country — even some of the chilliest areas — may start to struggle with demand that peaks in the winter. While summer demand peaks are challenging, there’s at least a vision for how to deal with them without generating excessive greenhouse gas emissions — namely battery storage, which essentially holds excess solar power generated in the afternoon in reserve for the evening. In states with lots of renewables on the grid already, like California and Texas, storage has been helping  smooth out and avoid reliability issues  on peak demand days. The winter challenge is that you ...

A major solar energy trade group now says the Trump administration is  refusing to do even routine work to permit solar projects on private lands  — and that the situation has become so dire for the industry, lawmakers discussing permitting reform in Congress should intervene. The Solar Energy Industries Association on Thursday  published a letter  it sent to top congressional leaders of both parties asserting that a  July memo  from Interior Secretary Doug Burgum mandating “elevated” review for renewables project decisions instead  resulted in “a nearly complete moratorium on permitting for any project in which the Department of Interior may play a role, on both federal and private land, no matter how minor.”  The letter was signed by more than 140 solar companies, including large players EDF Power Solutions, RES, and VDE Americas. The letter reinforces a theme underlying much of Heatmap’s coverage since the memo’s release — that the bureaucratic...