OurEnergyPolicy Webinar Summary – Regulations for a Clean Power Sector

The EPA is working on regulations that will act as a successor to the Clean Power Plan and the Affordable Energy Rule. The forthcoming regulations will target carbon indirectly as a result of addressing air pollutants associated with carbon dioxide, or by requiring efficiency upgrades. Numerous legal, logistical, and policy challenges remain, however. This webinar examined what these new regulations are likely to entail, potential legal challenges, and the implications for the power industry.…

View Full Resource

Renewable Energy Resource Assessment Information for the United States

The Renewable Energy Resource Assessment Information for the United States report summarizes the results of nearly 30 national renewable energy resource assessments performed by the U.S. national laboratories since 2012. Included are assessments for solar, wind, biomass, marine, geothermal, and hydropower energy resource technologies. Increased attention is given to the renewable energy resources available near federally recognized Tribal Nations and low-to-moderate income households, where assessed.…

View Full Resource

Sustainable Energy in America 2022 Factbook

The massive uncertainty and upheaval that plagued the U.S. in 2020 began to ease in 2021, offering the country’s energy sector a chance to take stock of a new reality buffeted by a lingering pandemic, global supply chain bottlenecks and rising inflation, but powered by a strong economic recovery. Despite considerable uncertainty, the clean energy and energy efficiency transition continued, with a record–breaking year for deployment of renewable power, battery storage and sustainable transportation, an unprecedented injection of new capital into companies, technologies and projects, and a wave of supportive new policies.

The Factbook…

View Full Resource

The Impacts of COVID-19 on Clean Energy Labor Markets

COVID-19 pandemic has affected clean energy labor market. Using real-time job vacancy data, this study analyzes the impacts of the pandemic on the U.S. clean energy labor market in 2020, including biomass, energy efficiency (EE), electric vehicle (EV), power/microgrid, solar, and wind industries. This study identifies how COVID-health factors and public health interventions influence clean energy job availability during the early COVID pandemic. Overall, California had the most energy jobs and experienced a significant decrease in April 2020. EV and solar had the highest percentages of job vacancies during the pandemic in general. Still, lockdowns had the most severe influence …

View Full Resource

A Clean Energy Future for MidAmerican and Iowa

Iowa has some of the best wind resources in the country, with 57 percent of the state’s generation coming from wind in 2020. Despite this abundant, clean, renewable, and cost-effective wind resource, utilities in the region continue to also rely heavily on costly and aging coal-burning generation resources and invest minimally in energy efficiency and demand-side management programs. MidAmerican Energy Company (MidAmerican or the Company) provides electricity to approximately 42 percent of the 1.7 million electric customers in the state of Iowa. The Company has invested substantially in wind resources, but still relies heavily on coal, with nearly half of …

View Full Resource

Let Communities Choose: Clean Energy Sovereignty in Highland Park, Michigan

In Highland Park, Michigan, the energy education and advocacy organization Soulardarity has a vision of energy sovereignty: a community powered by resilient, affordable clean energy resources, owned by Highland Park residents and businesses.

To that end, this analysis by the Union of Concerned Scientists and Soulardarity shows how solar power, energy efficiency, and other local resources can meet 100 percent of the community’s electricity demand. Changes in public policies can make the vision not only possible but affordable for Highland Park as well as other communities across the United States. Empowering local communities to choose clean energy can and should …

View Full Resource

Practices for Demonstrating Energy Savings from Commercial PACE Projects

This issue brief is for state and local governments that want to track the energy impacts and performance of a Commercial Property Assessed Clean Energy (C-PACE) financing program. C-PACE programs provide a mechanism for commercial property owners to finance energy improvements and can provide a variety of both private and public benefits. State and local governments authorize C-PACE programs based on the public benefits they afford, such as economic development opportunities, greater resiliency in the built environment, and, the focus of this brief, energy savings.…

View Full Resource

United: Union Jobs Improve the Clean Energy Economy

The climate crisis demands massive, immediate action and a transition away from fossil fuels. However, the move to an inclusive economy based on clean energy raises critical questions about our workforce. Unions especially are wondering how American workers can prosper as we take steps to combat climate change. High quality union jobs are already declining; can this trend be reversed as we further transition to a clean economy?

The climate crisis demands massive, immediate action and a transition away from fossil fuels. However, the move to an inclusive economy based on clean energy raises critical questions about our workforce. Unions …

View Full Resource

Health Benefits by the Kilowatt-Hour: Using EPA Data to Analyze the Cost-Effectiveness of Efficiency and Renewables

Energy planners and regulators have traditionally valued the health benefits of energy efficiency and renewable energy at zero — because these benefits do not flow to energy users in proportion to usage and because decision-makers had no simple and feasible way to estimate them. But recent work by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is an important step forward in being able to quantify the benefits per kilowatt-hour of efficiency and renewables across the United States. The numbers are quite dramatic. The “BPK” tool shows that in many cases, the cost of new wind and solar resources is entirely offset by… View Full Resource

Help Wanted: Diversity in Clean Energy

Despite its broad range of businesses, including construction, utilities, manufacturing, professional services, and repair and maintenance, the clean energy sector is dominated by white men. Given the incredible job growth of the energy sector over the past decade, this lack of diversity threatens to cause women, Hispanic and Latino workers, and Black workers in particular to miss out on one of America’s great economic expansions.

As the United States looks to build back a better, cleaner, more equitable economy, a renewed focus on increasing diversity in the clean energy sector should be an economic imperative. Both the transition to a …

View Full Resource