Local Energy Rules

Portland, Ore. may have been the first city in the United States to adopt a carbon reduction strategy, but in January 2020, its smaller neighbor Milwaukie became the first city in Oregon to declare a climate emergency. For this episode of our Voices of 100% series of the Local Energy Rules Podcast, host John Farrell speaks with Mayor Mark Gamba and Climate Action and Sustainability Coordinator Nat...

In competitive markets, companies do good things to win over new customers. Your monopoly electric utility, on the other hand, needs more motivation to provide what customers want. For this episode of the Local Energy Rules podcast, host John Farrell speaks with Isaac Moriwake, managing attorney of the EarthJustice MidPacific/Hawaii office. Moriwake has been an intervener and advocate for Hawaii’s...

Can a utility company be carbon neutral by 2050 if it builds a gas plant now? Maybe if it shuts off the gas plant well before its 40 years of useful life are complete, leaving electric customers to pay off millions in debt. For this episode of the Local Energy Rules podcast, host John Farrell speaks with John Romankiewicz, Senior Analyst for the Sierra Club’s Beyond Coal Campaign. Romankiewicz and...

St. Louis Park, a Minneapolis suburb of 48 thousand residents, has a clean energy goal rivaling that of its larger neighbor. Will the city’s smaller size help, or hinder, its efforts? For this episode of our Voices of 100% series of the Local Energy Rules Podcast, host John Farrell speaks with St. Louis Park Council Member Larry Kraft and Sustainability Manager Emily Ziring. St. Louis Park, Minn....

The electricity market is not built for community-focused, small-scale solar developers. To overcome the many barriers they face, cooperative solar developers are banding together in the People’s Solar Energy Fund. For this episode of the Local Energy Rules podcast, host John Farrell speaks with Timothy DenHerder-Thomas, General Manager of Cooperative Energy Futures. The two discuss cooperatively-...

As our technology gets smarter, will our strategies for electric grid management keep up? For this episode of the Local Energy Rules podcast, host John Farrell speaks with Cisco DeVries, CEO of OhmConnect. OhmConnect tracks its California customers’ energy use and rewards them for saving energy when the electric grid is under stress. Farrell and DeVries discuss OhmConnect’s innovative approach to...

Hosting an in-person community gathering may be unthinkable these days, but that is exactly how Hanover, N.H. endorsed its 100 percent renewable energy goal back in 2017: a show of hands in the high school gymnasium. For this episode of our Voices of 100% series of the Local Energy Rules Podcast, host John Farrell speaks with Hanover, N.H. Sustainability Director April Salas. They discuss the impo...

An advocacy group in Boulder, Colo. has made the case for why utilities, not customers, should be responsible for the cost of retiring fossil fuel assets. For this episode of the Local Energy Rules podcast, host John Farrell speaks with Leslie Glustrom, an advocate with Clean Energy Action in Boulder. They discussed Clean Energy Action’s white paper on utility accountability and how we can equitab...

Could your bank account help your neighbor go solar? A new “virtual bank,” started by a bank in Iowa, will pay you interest to invest your deposits in Midwest solar installation. For this episode of the Local Energy Rules podcast, host John Farrell speaks with Greenpenny Vice President Jason MacDuff. Greenpenny, a program started by Decorah Bank & Trust, is a virtual bank that exclusively inve...

While ENERGY STAR® and other energy efficiency labels are familiar to many, purchasing appliances with energy saving technology is out of reach for many people. In this episode of Local Energy Rules, host John Farrell talks with Marti Frank, principal at Efficiency for Everyone and founder and director of the Shift Consortium. Frank and Farrell discuss the Shift Model: an approach that uses utilit...

To invest in energy conservation and clean energy generation is to invest in a healthier community. For this episode of the Local Energy Rules podcast, host John Farrell talks with Patrick Hanlon, Director of Environmental Programs for the Minneapolis Health Department. They discuss Green Cost Share: a program that promotes public health by matching investments in solar and energy efficiency proje...

In 2018, Portland voters showed their support for a climate action fund. Now, the city works to maintain that community support and involvement as the money is given out. For this episode of the Local Energy Rules podcast, host John Farrell speaks with Jaimes Valdez, a member of the Portland Clean Energy Community Benefits Fund startup team. They discuss steps Portland has taken to implement the 2...

In the midst of a global pandemic, online shopping behemoth Amazon has now tripled its quarterly profits. Meanwhile Seattle, the home of Amazon headquarters, suffers from a housing crisis in which the “city is becoming too expensive for nearly half of our population.” For this episode of the Local Energy Rules podcast, host John Farrell speaks with Jill Mangaliman, Executive Director of Got Green,...

Getting electricity customer-generators the compensation they deserve has been a battle in many states. Could a settlement between the utility and solar advocates squash net metering conflict for good? For this episode of the Local Energy Rules podcast, host John Farrell speaks with Thad Culley, Senior Regional Director of the Southeast at Vote Solar. They discuss a novel utility-advocate settleme...

Where do local climate and clean energy goals lie in the priority list, when the COVID-19 induced economic crisis and the crisis of racial inequality are so pressing? For this episode of our Voices of 100% series of the Local Energy Rules Podcast, host John Farrell speaks with Brandon Coan and Gretchen Milliken. Coan, who helped draft Louisville’s 100% renewable resolution, is a Metro Councilman f...

The Nov. 3rd election is behind us, though the votes are still being counted. How will the next presidential administration, whichever that may be, affect the potential for a distributed solar stimulus? For this post-Election Day episode of the Local Energy Rules podcast, John Farrell and Katie Kienbaum of ILSR’s Energy Democracy Initiative discuss the intersection between federal policy and 30 Mi...

When cities have done their part to power the community with clean electricity, the final push of the clean energy transition rests on individuals. Still, individuals can come together, pass innovative local policy, and hold themselves accountable to a clean and equitable ethos. In this episode of the Local Energy Rules Podcast, host John Farrell speaks with Ben Paulos of the Berkeley, Calif. Ener...

Florida has been hard hit by the climate change-fueled growth of hurricane season over recent decades. Despite the pressures of disastrous weather and the complications of living in a landlocked part of the state, Gainesville, Fla. leads the way to net zero emissions and 100% renewable energy. In this episode of our Voices of 100% series of the Local Energy Rules Podcast, host John Farrell speaks...

In the journey towards 100% renewable energy, utilities are often the largest variable. In this game of “will they/won’t they,” with the environmental health and economic stability of cities at stake, the push towards a more sustainable future can reveal the ugly face of monopoly utilities. In this episode of the Local Energy Rules Podcast, host John Farrell speaks with Jamie Valdez about Pueblo,...

In January 2018, Fayetteville topped headlines as the first Arkansas city to commit to 100% renewable energy. In less than 2 years, the progress Fayetteville plotted since its initial promise has made those aspirations look like a near-future reality. In this episode of our Voices of 100% series of the Local Energy Rules Podcast, host John Farrell speaks with Mayor Lioneld Jordan and Peter Niereng...

Above the earth’s surface, temperatures change with each passing season. Below-surface temperatures remain consistent and can be captured with geothermal systems. An idea has emerged that, using existing water mains, could empower more communities to take advantage of the “earth heat” trapped below. In this episode of the Local Energy Rules Podcast, host John Farrell speaks with Jay Egg, a geother...

In this episode of our Voices of 100% series of the Local Energy Rules Podcast, host John Farrell speaks with two important leaders in Missoula, Montana’s efforts to reach 100% renewable energy: City Council President Bryan von Lossberg and Missoula County Commissioner Dave Strohmaier. They discuss the city and county’s joint efforts to achieve their goal, despite the resistance from stubborn util...

In this episode of the Local Energy Rules Podcast, we feature host John Farrell’s interview with Scott Hempling for ILSR’s Building Local Power podcast. Scott Hempling is an author, expert witness, lawyer, and law professor specializing in utility regulatory issues. Their discussion covers the changing ideas around natural monopolies, the consolidation of such monopolies in recent years, and the i...

A concerted effort is growing in the Northeast to address renewable energy goals and make renewable energy accessible to everyone. Co-op Power is on the front lines, coordinating community power and constructing valuable policy resources to change legislation and the lives of many nationwide. In this episode of the Local Energy Rules Podcast, host John Farrell speaks with Lynn Benander, president...

Previous energy deserts, like the rural Tennessee Valley, have seen federally-funded utilities turn into state-owned energy monopolies. This limits cities’ abilities to prioritize clean, renewable energy on their own terms. For this episode of the Local Energy Rules Podcast, host John Farrell speaks with Maggie Shober, Director of Utility Reform for the Southern Alliance for Clean Energy. They dis...