Catch the latest energy news from around the region. Check back for these monthly Energy News Roundups.
It’s been two weeks since a truck rolled into an excavation site for Enbridge’s fiercely disputed Line 5 pipeline and caused what is thought to be among the largest natural gas spills in Wisconsin history, releasing an estimated 1.3 million gallons of hazardous liquids that vaporized into the atmosphere in rural Iron County. The pipeline is still shut down, with service now expected to resume this weekend, Enbridge said in an update Tuesday. Days after the spill, Wisconsin officials asked Enbridge to stop work on a reroute of the pipeline around the reservation of the Bad River Band of Lake Superior Chippewa until the spill could be resolved and measures put in place to prevent future spills.
A prolonged power outage in Gary, Indiana has prompted calls to investigate the power company and safeguard grid infrastructure against extreme weather — like the derecho that brought wind gusts up to 99 miles per hour to northern Indiana last month — as climate change makes these extremes more likely. Thousands of Gary-area residents went two weeks without power after the Aug. 11 storms as crews disentangled uprooted trees from the many overhead power lines the trees took down with them. State officials have requested a formal investigation of power company NIPSCO’s vegetation management practices.
Days before state regulators were set to vote on a Michigan utility’s divisive plan to sell 13 aging dams, the utility has asked for more time to negotiate with its critics. Dam owner Consumers Energy has said selling the dams to a private equity firm and buying back the power would be cheaper than keeping or demolishing the dams. Critics of the plan, including Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, see the dams’ sale as a safety risk and a bad deal for taxpayers.
A first-of-its-kind coal ash refinery opens in Ohio this week at the site of a former coal plant along Lake Erie. PHNX Materials’ temporary, 200 to 300-square-foot demonstration facility will convert coal ash into materials used in defense and semiconductor manufacturing. The facility is expected to operate for six months to a year.
A Madison, Wisconsin nuclear fusion company and electric utility are partnering to pursue building a 200-megawatt nuclear fusion power plant in Wisconsin. Realta Fusion, which announced the partnership with Madison Gas and Electric last week, said it will focus initially on considerations like siting, permitting, ownership and grid interconnection, with the aim of building the power plant in the 2030s.
More energy news, in case you missed it:
- Michigan ballot measures that would ban certain corporate political contributions and move Ann Arbor toward the creation of a publicly owned electric utility each survived legal challenges and will head to voters in November.
- The Trump administration will allow an Ohio steel mill to use a Biden-era decarbonization grant to upgrade a coal-fueled blast furnace.
- An executive order from Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz seeks to prevent the mining of copper, nickel and other materials besides iron ore in the watershed of the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness.
- Indianapolis has approved a moratorium on new data centers within the city limits through the end of 2027.
- LG Energy Solution has opened a more than $2 billion battery plant in Lansing, Michigan originally set to be co-owned and operated by General Motors.
