Catch the latest energy news from around the region. Check back for these monthly Energy News Roundups.
The November election will be a big one for energy issues in Michigan, with multiple energy-related proposals having secured enough signatures to appear on the November ballot. Voters across Michigan will decide whether to ban regulated gas and electric utilities companies with over $250,000 in annual state government contracts from political spending in state elections. And Ann Arbor residents will decide whether to create a new municipal electric utility to replace DTE Energy, the city’s current electricity provider.
An Indiana utility is asking federal regulators to let it collect $38 million from ratepayers in 15 states for three months of operating a coal plant the Trump administration ordered kept open. The Northern Indiana Public Service Co. (NIPSCO) spent $116.7 million between January and March to run two coal units that were scheduled to retire at the end of last year, the utility said in a filing with the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. While both units have been offline for most of the year for maintenance and repairs, one unit was operational through February and earned $33.5 million from electricity sales.
Throwing another curveball in the yearslong battle over the Line 5 pipeline, the Michigan Supreme Court directed state regulators to redo their review of a key permit. The court ruled that the Michigan Public Service Commission needed to look more broadly at the potential impacts of rerouting a 4-mile stretch of the pipeline through a tunnel beneath the Straits of Mackinac. A win for the tribal nations that challenged the permit, the decision is yet another setback for energy company Enbridge.
Wisconsin regulators have delivered a similar setback to a billion-dollar power line project intended to serve a data center campus. The Public Service Commission of Wisconsin told American Transmission Co. to resubmit its application for the project because of the significant number of changes the power line company has made since December. Regulators said the changes made the project challenging to assess. The restart could affect ATC’s plan to build the power line by late 2027, before the first phase of the data center campus is complete.
General Motors Co. is selling its 50% stake in a planned $3.5 billion Indiana electric vehicle battery plant. Samsung SDI, a South Korean company that had partnered with GM on the project, announced it will take over the automaker’s share amid lagging growth in EV demand. The company said the plant west of South Bend will produce “high-tech batteries for use in various applications,” including energy storage systems.
More energy news, in case you missed it:
- Approximately 800 union workers have been locked out of BP’s Whiting, Indiana, refinery for nearly five months amid a labor dispute.
- Ontario Premier Doug Ford responded to the Michigan Supreme Court ruling on the Line 5 permit by plugging a proposed Canadian pipeline that would transport crude oil to the province from Alberta.
- Four managers at an Illinois coal mine are accused of concealing an underground fire, putting workers’ lives at risk and obstructing a federal investigation.
- The Indianapolis City-County Council has advanced a proposed moratorium on new data centers, which would not affect the three data centers approved earlier this year.
- An Ohio steel company now plans to use up to $500 million from the Biden administration to refurbish its coal-based blast furnace, rather than replace it with a lower-emissions alternative.
