RMI’s Community Benefits Catalog

Many federal programs now require applicants to develop Community Benefit Plans, or CBPs. These CBPs are a tool for supporting project developers in ensuring that communities, particularly those historically harmed by energy infrastructure projects, equitably benefit from federal grants and loans. For many applicants and host communities, the development of a CBP is a new process to navigate.

RMI’s Community Benefits Catalog connects community benefit examples both to federal funding program criteria and to stakeholder priorities. The searchable catalog allows users to find which types of benefits might meet federal policy guidelines from DOE and USDA and that also address …

SEPA Resilience Playbook for States and Utilities

SEPA’s Resilience Planning Playbook provides state energy offices and utilities with a starting point to address the role of distribution system resilience in the clean energy transition. This playbook utilizes traditional electric utility best practices (e.g., system reliability and capacity planning) and emerging best practices (e.g., environmental justice, energy equity, and critical infrastructure considerations) to help states and utilities understand the tools needed to ensure resilience in light of changing customer needs and demands. It introduces various tools for improving resilience planning (e.g., grid modernization, grid hardening, and distributed energy resources).

In 2020, the Smart Electric Power Alliance (SEPA) developed …

From Cradle to Grave: Taxpayer Subsidies Throughout a Carbon Capture and Storage Project’s Lifecycle

Carbon Capture and Sequestration (CCS) encompasses technologies designed to capture carbon oxides emitted during power generation and other industrial processes, instead of releasing them into the atmosphere. These captured carbons are then sequestered underground or in specially designed facilities. For decades, the federal government has provided billions of dollars in both direct and indirect subsidies to support CCS technology and projects. These subsidies have included research, development, and demonstration (RD&D) funding, loan guarantees, and tax credits. Over the past few decades some of these subsidies have gone to projects that have been repeatedly started and stopped, only to eventually collapse …

Summary of Travel Trends

Both policymakers and transportation decision-makers rely on transportation statistics, including data on personal travel behavior, to formulate strategic transportation policies and improve the safety and efficiency of the U.S. transportation system. Policymakers, state departments of transportation, metropolitan planning organizations, industry professionals, and academic researchers use such data to gauge the extent and patterns of travel, plan new investments, and better understand the implications of travel trends on the Nation’s transportation infrastructure and overall quality of life through equitable access for all Americans.

To address these data needs, the U.S. Department of Transportation (USDOT) initiated an effort to collect detailed data …

Resilient Power Funding Programs: 2023 Annual Impact Report

Clean Energy Group’s Resilient Power Funding Programs had a record setting year in 2023, with resilient power technical assistance, capacity building support, and funding provided to more organizations than ever before.

CEG’s grant programs, consisting of the Technical Assistance Fund (TAF) and Resilient Power Leadership Initiative (RPLI), were founded to support resilient power development in communities that had the greatest need for renewable and resilient power infrastructure but were the least able to access it due to decades of disinvestment, environmental racism, and neglect by industry leaders.

This report measures and tracks the growth of their programs over the past …

Regional Clean Hydrogen Hubs Program

The Regional Clean Hydrogen Hubs (H2Hubs) Program, managed by the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Office of Clean Energy Demonstrations (OCED), aims to create networks of hydrogen producers, consumers, and local connective infrastructure to accelerate the use of hydrogen as a clean energy carrier that can deliver or store tremendous amounts of energy.

Funded through the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, OCED selected seven H2Hubs to begin award negotiations for up to $7 billion, the largest investment in clean manufacturing and jobs in American history. Following negotiations, in July 2024, OCED awarded the Pacific Northwest Hydrogen Hub—led by the Pacific Northwest Hydrogen …

HyBuild™ North America Contracts Workstream Consumption Profiles Working Group Report

The Green Hydrogen Coalition’s HyBuildTM North America Initiative seeks to bring together key ecosystem stakeholders to plan and develop the competitive, high-volume supply chain necessary to achieve low-cost, mass-scale green hydrogen to large offtakers. Success of the initiative is dependent on enabling offtakers in strategically targeted locations to sign precedent contracts.

Through the Contracts Workstream, the Green Hydrogen Coalition seeks to establish a shared understanding of the issues, risks and high-level terms and conditions that must be addressed to facilitate green hydrogen procurement. …

Hydrogen: Not a Solution for Gas-Fired Turbines

Electric utilities and project developers have latched on to the “hydrogen-ready” and “hydrogencapable” tags in describing their plans to build new methane gas-fired (popularly called natural gasfired) power plants. State regulators and potential project investors need to scrutinize assertions that hydrogen gas will be widely used in methane-fired turbines. IEEFA concludes that these assertions amount to little more than marketing designed to obscure the myriad shortcomings and unanswered questions associated with using hydrogen in methane-fired turbines, particularly regarding the enormous cost and lengthy time that would be required to build out the infrastructure needed for such a transition.

Utilities and …

The Future of Vehicle Grid Integration: Harnessing the Flexibility of EV Charging

Transportation electrification is happening now. Consumers’ preference for electric vehicles (EVs) is growing, the number of available EV models is increasing, and global enterprises have announced plans to go electric. Federal funding and private investments are supporting the transition. Questions about the transition have moved past “if,” and “when” has given way to “how.” This transition is occurring at the same time with other transformations at the grid edge where buildings, industry, renewables, and storage come together, leading to projections of faster load growth for the first time in more than a decade. Understanding the role of EVs in this …

Structuring Demand for Lower-Carbon Materials: An Initial Assessment of Book and Claim for the Steel and Concrete Sectors

As leading companies look to deeply decarbonize their supply chains to meet their climate goals, lower-carbon steel and concrete stand out for many as clear yet complex targets for reducing their emissions. These materials sectors are emissions-intensive and limited lower-carbon supply exists, as the transition to lower-carbon steel and concrete production technologies can require large capital investment. Many companies today may struggle to directly buy lower-carbon concrete and steel at scale because: 1) they do not contract directly with materials producers, and/or 2) they do not have physical access to lower-carbon materials for a particular use case.

Book and claim …