This is Not Cool

Coal Plant Owners Fight Trump’s Coal Mandates as a “Taking” of Ownership Rights

Kind of stunning.
Arbitrary “emergency” power grab by grifting Secretary of Energy Chris Wright opposed by owners of a slated-to-close coal plant in Colorado – who have now sued, calling the action a “taking” of their property rights, to make the right economic decision.
Wright’s actions are divorced from reality, and serve no purpose but to directly transfer ratepayer’s money to the accounts of wealthy cronies and donors.

You really have to ask yourself if Republicans actually believe in anything. In service of their wealthy donors, whether it’s property rights, first or even second(!) amendment rights, or even the safety of children against sexual predators.

Utility Dive:

The owners of a Colorado power unit say the Department of Energy violated their Constitutional rights when it ordered them to continue running a coal-fired generator they had been planning for years to retire at the end of 2025.

By mandating the generator’s availability to operate, the order “constitutes both a physical taking and a regulatory taking” of property by the government without just compensation or due process, in violation of the Fifth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution and federal law, the Tri-State Generation and Transmission Association and the Platte River Power Authority said in a Jan. 29 request for clarification and rehearing.

Moreover, they said, keeping the unit available to operate “will not best meet DOE’s goal of securing dispatchable electricity resources in the northwestern United States.”

Shut Out: Trump’s Offshore Wind War now 0 and 5 in Court

Reagan appointee Judge hands climate denier and pedophile Donald Trump, as well as climate denier and pedophile protector Chris Wright, their asses, on another offshore wind case.
This makes for a complete 0-5 shutout of the “war on wind”.

New York Times:

A federal judge on Monday struck down the Interior Department’s order to halt work on a multibillion-dollar wind farm off the coast of New York State, the fifth time the courts have ruled against the Trump administration’s efforts to throttle the country’s offshore wind industry. The administration is now 0-5 in its effort to stop wind farms under construction along the East Coast.

Judge Royce Lamberth of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia issued a preliminary injunction that would allow the developer of the New York project, known as Sunrise Wind, to restart construction while the broader legal battle unfolds.

In December, the Interior Department ordered all work to halt on Sunrise Wind and four other wind farms off the East Coast. To justify the sweeping move, officials cited a classified report by the Defense Department that they said found the projects to be a national security threat.

But Judge Lamberth, who was nominated to the bench by President Ronald Reagan, said he was unpersuaded by the government’s claims about national security after reviewing the classified report under seal. He said the actions of the Interior Department’s Bureau of Ocean Energy Management had caused “irreparable harm” to the developer of Sunrise Wind.

Heat Pumps: What’s the Deal?

I want very much to electrify my home, but am still finding it difficult to budget for a heat pump.
In addition there is a problem with installers, in that most of them are the same plumbing and heating guys (bless ’em) that installed your (most likely) gas unit and AC if you have one.
They specialize in those and they don’t like moving out of their comfort zone. So it’s hard to. know where to get good advice that is specific to my geographic area.
I’ll keep looking – in the meantime, the video above is a good summary of what we know, and what the costs still are.

Time Magazine Breakdown: What is Driving Electric Rates?

Time magazine has a rundown of what is driving higher electric rates. Turns out it’s not clean energy. Huh.

Time:

If you’ve found yourself drained by your electricity bill this winter, you’re not alone. Electricity costs have been steadily rising for years now, outpacing inflation. The average monthly residential electricity bill increased from about $121 in 2021 to $156 in 2025, a nearly 30% rise. And from last January to October alone, electricity bills rose 12.7%.

Brace yourself: things are likely only going to get more expensive. The average U.S. household is projected to spend nearly $1,000 this winter to heat its home, according to data from the National Energy Assistance Directors Association (NEADA). The rising costs come as more Americans are finding themselves unable to afford their utility bills. NEADA estimates that up to four million households experienced utility disconnections in 2025, nearly 500,000 more than in 2024. Meanwhile, total funding for federal heating assistance is on the decline—falling from $6.1 billion in 2023 to about $4 billion in 2025.

Here are five reasons why your electricity bill might be higher than normal.

Inflation

Since the pandemic, electricity prices have been getting more expensive—just like almost everything else.

“Consumer electricity prices have been growing at a much faster rate than the rate of inflation in the general economy, which is important because the rate of inflation and general economy has been pretty high,” says Christopher Knittel, faculty director of the MIT Climate Policy Center.

Rising inflation also means that maintaining the nation’s electricity grid costs more than it used to. “Anything that’s being built or installed right now costs more than it did just five years ago,” says Kenny Stein, vice president of policy at the Institute for Energy Research.

EV Sales Pass Petrol in EU

Reuters:

Sales of fully electric cars surpassed those of petrol-only vehicles in the European Union for the first time in December, data from ‌the auto industry group ACEA showed on Tuesday, even as hybrids held onto the largest overall share of the market.

The data underscores how the bloc is shifting slowly towards electric and hybrid vehicles, even as policymakers have proposed loosening emission regulations that should allow vehicles with combustion engines to stick around for longer.

Independent automotive analyst Matthias Schmidt said that the fewer petrol car sales partly reflect reclassification of some as “mild ‌hybrids”, which still have petrol engines and only modestly contribute to lowering emissions.

“It will still take around half a decade before pure electric cars genuinely overtake combustion-engine models across the region, but this is nonetheless a start,” he said.

Fully electric vehicles made up 22.6% of cars registered in the EU last month, edging out petrol cars ‍on 22.5%. Gasoline-electric hybrids, including plug-in hybrids that can go limited distances on battery power alone, were the top group with 44%.

The EU unveiled a plan in December to abandon an effective 2035 ban on combustion engine cars, bowing to pressure from carmakers as ‌they fend ‌off challenges from Chinese rivals, U.S. import tariffs and difficulties in selling EVs profitably.

Another Climate Denier Caught up in Epstein Files

Bjorn Lomborg “looking forward” to meeting Epstein, years after the financier had been convicted and served time for trafficking

Not all climate deniers are pedophiles, but I bet most pedophiles are climate deniers.

just sayin’.

Yale Climate Connections:

The newly released documents show that in late 2016 and early 2017, after Donald Trump was elected to his first term, Epstein exchanged emails with celebrity physicist Lawrence Krauss, who at the time was the director of the Origins Project at Arizona State University. Epstein was a major donor to the Origins Project.

In the emails, which contain numerous typos and grammatical errors, Epstein pressed Krauss – who himself left Arizona State University in 2019 amid allegations of sexual misconduct – about several common claims by climate deniers. In each exchange, Krauss politely pushed back.

“i liked the argument that more co2 is good for plants?” Epstein wrote.

Texas “Test Bed” Weathered Cold Snap with Diverse Generation,Wind, New Batteries.

The **massive** system, nicknamed Fern, began its cross-continent **trek** on January 22, 2026 and lasted several days. It brought heavy snow, ice, and freezing rain to more than 220 million people.

Last week’s cold air blob challenged the Texas grid, it was not as severe as 2021’s Winter Storm Uri, nor as long lasting, but offered a reasonable test of improvements and updates since that deadly debacle.

Weatherization, what a concept.
Wind over performed, Batteries and solar backed up newly renovated gas.

Latitude Media:

ERCOT analysts and energy experts told Latitude Media that gas plants and wind turbines were less vulnerable to icy conditions than they were in 2021, in part due to weatherization mandates from state officials. Few plants went offline during the storm — a stark departure from when gas well heads and pipelines froze during Uri, causing rolling blackouts and skyrocketing electricity prices. Since then, Texas has also added more than 14 gigawatts of new battery storage capacity, some of which kicked in during critical windows Monday and Tuesday morning when demand spiked as residents and businesses turned on the heat.

“The gas, coal, and nuclear fleet was all significantly more reliable this time around, and then the batteries gave Texas the flexibility that those other generators don’t,” said Stephen Ryan, power market analyst at Wood Mackenzie.

Luck played another role: There was more wind and less ice than forecasters feared in the lead-up.

Ryan said that wind generation “overperformed.” Output was nearly six GW higher on Saturday and three GW higher on Sunday than Wood Mackenzie had forecasted. For every megawatt of wind on the grid, there’s less need for more expensive fossil fuels, he said. Renewables help drive down the cost overall of the entire system.

ERCOT’s ability to weather the storm could be a glimpse at the future for other grid operators; Texas leads the nation in renewables and storage deployment, and has become a test bed for the energy transition. Fern has demonstrated that a mix of winterized power generation can absorb shocks to the system, and — especially if the wind cooperates — temper skyrocketing prices. Analysts told Latitude Media that grid reliability doesn’t come from certain technologies winning, but rather from fossil fuels, solar, wind, and battery storage all covering the weaknesses of each other.

Chinese EVs WILL Come to the US

CBS Detroit interview with very plugged-in, long time Auto Industry and Michigan journalist Paul Eisenstein.

The Trump administration’s insult and threats to Canadians motivated Canada’s turn to China, and deal for EVs imports to Canada – which had formerly been tariffed out of deference and partnership with the US industry.
That’s all blown up and gone permanently.
Eisenstein says not only will China being coming to Canada, but that Chinese automaker will be coming to America.
“Almost certain in the next 3 or 4 years” – some Chinese manufacturing in the US.

Trump “Energy Dominance” Agenda Plays into China’s Hands

Besides providing more evidence of the President’s bottomless insecurity and neediness, the obnoxious “Energy Dominance” messaging from this administration, coupled with military attacks on Venezuela, and Iran, as well as threats against NATO allies and Canada, are only accelerating the energy transition to China’s benefit.

Jigar Shah on Linked In:

Most discussions of global oil markets fixate on supply: where the next barrel comes from, how much it costs to extract, and which producer sets the marginal price. That lens is in full force with the Venezuela and Iran events this weekend.

China’s energy strategy suggests a different framing—one that looks far more like the long-standing playbook advanced by Amory Lovins and the Rocky Mountain Institute (RMI): don’t fight oil directly. Get more out of each barrel through efficiency, electrification, and better system design until demand structurally disappears.

If China succeeds at achieving their peak oil demand this year, their domestic success will be embraced by other oil importing countries that are looking to shift their oil import dollars into domestic technology investments. Oil demand will never go away, but we are seeing a long-term erosion of oil’s economic relevance.

Reagan Judge finds Fracker Energy Sec’s Climate Denial Panel Illegal

Turns out having secret meetings coordinated by shadowy fossil fuel funded groups with a pre-determined outcome aimed at overturning critical policies based on mainstream science is wrong.

In the video above, the grifter DOE Sec-to-be took time out from his busy schedule as a Fracking millionaire to produce a video on the complete harmlessness of fracking fluid.

What is misleading about the demonstration is, Fracking fluid that goes down into the hole is not the problem. It’s the stuff that comes back out.

Our Energy Secretary is a con man – Pete Hegseth without the tattoos.

New York Times:

A federal judge on Friday ruled the Energy Department violated the law when Secretary Chris Wright handpicked five researchers who reject the scientific consensus on climate change to work in secret on a sweeping government report on global warming.

The Energy Department issued the report, which downplayed the dangers of warming, in late July without having held any public meetings or made records available to the public. Lee Zeldin, the administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, then cited the report to justify a plan to repeal the endangerment finding, a landmark scientific determination that serves as the legal foundation for regulating climate pollution.

But the Federal Advisory Committee Act of 1972 does not allow agencies to recruit or rely on secret groups for the purposes of policymaking. Judge William Young of the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts said the Energy Department did not deny that it had failed to hold open meetings or assemble a balance of viewpoints, as the law requires, when it created the panel, known as the Climate Working Group.

“These violations are now established as a matter of law,” wrote Judge Young, who was nominated to the bench by Ronald Reagan. He said the Climate Working Group was, in fact, a federal advisory committee designed to inform policy, and not, as the Energy Department claimed, merely “assembled to exchange facts or information.”