Clean Energy Today

In Iceland, which has vast geothermal resources, Syntholene Energy, with support from Idaho National Laboratory, is testing synfuel production that combines geothermal heat with high-temperature electrolysis. The company says its synfuel is 70% less expensive than synfuels produced using other clean energy options and could reach price parity with fossil fuels in about 10 years.  While Iceland has...

In December 2023, a winter storm hit Highland Park, Michigan, and the ensuing power outage lasted four days – a common occurrence in the community, which has a high poverty rate. Partially in response to the outages, Juan Shannon created Parker Village, with plans to provide clean, low-cost local energy to the residents, including net zero homes, two solar microgrids and an electric transportation...

Under the first-of-a-kind Oregon Power Act, data centers served by the state's two investor-owned utilities can't drive up utility bills or undermine Oregon's clean energy goals. The law has attracted interest from other states considering similar measures. While Portland General Electric and PacifiCorp are required to follow the provisions of the law, the state's public utilities do not, and in U...

Temperatures, altitude, snow, wind, sunshine and road surfaces can significantly shorten or lengthen how far an electric vehicle (EV) driver can go on a charge. Lasse Lumiaho, head of automotive at Vaisala Xweather , which provides weather data and intelligence for many Fortune 500 companies, describes a recent study about the factors that affect EV range.  Read the study here . About the guest: L...

With oil prices at the time of this interview–April 2026–close to $100/ barrel because of the war in Iran, will we see higher deployment of renewable energy and electric vehicles (EV)? Wesley Herche , co-founder of Sustainability Decoded and director of energy and sustainability solutions at Prologis, where he deploys solar, battery storage and commercial EV charging infrastructure for the world's...

Enel North America's Blue Jay Agrivoltaics project in Grimes County, Texas  spans 2,700 acres, produces 270 megawatts (MW) of solar and includes a 59-MW battery storage system. I t uses sheep for vegetation management and includes pollinator habitat, veteran-managed apiaries and drone maintenance. Jesse Puckett, director of sustainability projects and community affairs at Enel North America descri...

Millions of people are driving electric vehicles (EV) which, with bidirectional charging, can provide value to the electrical grid and back up homes and businesses during outages. What's standing in the way of unlocking these benefits? Steve Letendre, an  energy economist, senior advisor to the Vehicle-Grid Integration Council and the founder and editor of V2G News , says bidirectional charging te...

Since 2021, Public Service Electric & Gas (PSE&G), New Jersey's largest utility, has added 30,000 electric vehicles (EV) to its system, in part by offering rebates and other incentives. Before January 2026, the growth rate was double-digit, but is now flat, because of the loss of the federal EV tax credit and changes in the market. Dawn Neville, senior manager of electric transportation at PSE&G,...

Elliott Steele, a researcher at the UC Davis Wild Energy Center, is now studying how a floating solar array at the Nelson Family Vineyards in Mendocino County, Calif. affects birds. He's also studying how a 6-MW floating solar array–Califronia's largest– in Sonoma County is influencing wildlife. In Florida, he says, alligators and other animals hang out on the solar systems. Wildlife can also affe...

Nelson Family Vineyards in Mendocino County, Calif., will soon power up its floating solar system, deployed on pontoons on an irrigation pond, expecting to cut utility costs, which jumped 180% over the last three years, by about $90,000 annually. Researchers at the University of California Davis are studying how the system will affect wildlife–the focus of our next podcast, which will touch on how...

Itanna and Yosafe Murphy are working to use agrivoltaics--co-locating solar PV energy production with agricultural activities on their 160-acre farm--to provide healthy, fresh and tasty food to their community, along with STEM education and energy resilience.  In addition to agrivoltaics, the project, located in Oregon's Willamette Valley, will integrate vertical farming and hydroponics. Oregon St...

Byron Kominek , founder of Jack's Solar Garden in Boulder, Colo., an agrivoltaics site that attracts thousands of visitors annually, says hay farming doesn't pay the bills. But installing solar panels above crops and selling the solar to the utility is a revenue generator for the solar garden.   Not only can agrivoltaics--the practice of co-locating solar panels with agricultural activities-- gene...

A virtual power plant (VPP) is a collection of small-scale energy resources that, aggregated and coordinated with grid operations, can provide the same reliability and economic value to the grid as a traditional power plant, according to the nonprofit organization RMI. And VPPs can help utility customers earn money. Large energy users can earn up to $100,000 a year through CPower Energy's program,...

Tim Nesbitt, former chief of staff to Oregon Governor Ted Kulongoski, claims bragging rights for charging his Chevy Bolt EV solely with solar power on his small farm, which is carbon neutral--and sometimes carbon negative. He has 84 ground-mounted solar panels that generate 18-19 kWh daily. Batteries provide some resilience for critical systems such as the internet and refrigeration. Nesbitt's fri...

Whether you're a consumer who hoards old photos or a company that hangs onto unusable data, you're boosting data centers' energy costs. By focusing on reducing hoarded--or "junk" data--and improving efficiency, data centers can slash power consumption by 40% to 60%, according to Simon Ninan, senior vice president, business strategy, Hitachi Vantara. Ninan provides details about how data centers ca...

At the Sun Day event Sept. 21 in Portland, Ore.--a rally for clean energy--attendees shared their opinions about the Trump administration's policies targeting clean energy.  They described the energy savings and resilience they're experiencing installling solar and storage at home. One atttendee started to shed tears recalling her involvement in the first Earth Day and the clean-energy inroads tha...

Plug-in solar systems can be installed on balconies, sheds, walls and any other areas exposed to solar. Users plug them into standard wall outlets and immediately begin producing electricity. Bright Saver, a nonprofit organization that aims to make plug-in solar accessible to "everyone, everywhere," particularly to renters and those who can't access rooftop solar, seeks to overcome the legislative...

Hadron Energy says its micro modular reactors will produce power at 15 cents/kWh. How will the company make that possible? Do small modular reactors create more radioactive waste than conventional nuclear reactors? Which states have a moratorium on nuclear energy deployment? These are some of the questions my guests addressed in this podcast. Advanced nuclear reactors are seen as key to meeting so...

In rural Oregon, electricity prices are low compared to those of gasoline and diesel fuel, as low as 6 cents/kWh. EVmath is a nonprofit that aims to help rural drivers crunch the numbers on buying EVs--beginning with Oregon and Washington. The nonprofit organization wants to show rural drivers that, whatever their politics, it might make sense economically to drive EVs.  Here's an example: A gasol...

The African Methodist Episcopal (AME) Church in Georgia plans to build 18 resilience hubs--and eventually up to 482. Five are moving forward right now. Churches are being offered a menu of options, with the highest level of resilience including solar, storage, bidirectional electric vehicle (EV) charging and energy efficiency. Since this interview was recorded, the so-called "Big Beautiful Bill" l...

At a July 10 conference, "The Great Transformation: A Data Center and Energy Innovation Summit,"  three panelists and attendees answered the question: Where do renewables go from here, given that the so-called "Big Beautiful Bill," will phase out the investment tax credit for solar and wind? Separate from the conference, longtime solar industry member Mike Hall, CEO at Anza, answered the question...

Musician AY Young has produced more than 950 renewable-energy powered concerts. The artist, who was recognized as one of 17 U.N. Youth Leaders for Sustainable Development Goals, was inspired by his parents, who were community leaders and activists. His father transformed his neighborhood--which had four drug houses--block-by-block and created a neighborhood development plan. His mother became a st...

DER develoeprs, frustrated by interconnection delays, see the potential for cost and time savings through flexible interconnection programs. Pilot projects from Pacific Gas & Electric (PG&E), Commonwealth Edison (ComEd) and other utilities are demonstrating the value of flexible interconnection programs in which utilities allow customers to interconnect to the grid much more quickly than they woul...

This Clean Energy Today preview describes some of the topics that will be covered in this podcast, including distributed energy, microgrids, bidirectional charging, equity, research and consumer choices. Background reading:  Do You and I Mean the Same Thing When We Say Local Energy? Microgrids Aren't What They Used to Be Deploying Bidirectional Vehicles to Support the Grid Takes a Leap Forward Low...

Oregon solar companies describe how the Trump administration's policies are hurting them and say how they're coping. They also provide some good news. Interviews were conducted at the Oregon Solar and Storage Industries Association's conference May 15, 2025.  Visit CleanEnergyWriters.com. to learn more about host Lisa Cohn News stories mentioned during the episode: Oregon Bills Would Advance Micro...