Adapting Spatial Frameworks to Guide Energy Access Interventions in Urbanizing Africa

The extension of electricity into rural areas has been the main focus of efforts to achieve universal access to reliable, affordable, and modern energy by 2030. On the African continent and elsewhere, however, rapid urbanization has produced new patterns of human settlement that blur the distinction between rural and urban. As a case study of Kenya demonstrates, access metrics aggregated at the rural or urban level do not equip governments and their partners to properly identify or target sites for electrification. Spatialized frameworks and data that define space along a rural–urban continuum or as urban catchment areas can improve policy …

How to Decarbonize Industrial Process Heat While Building American Manufacturing Competitiveness

This brief outlines a path to electrifying 70% of industrial process heat by 2050, highlighting major challenges and opportunities. They discuss actions that four key stakeholders—federal policymakers, state and local policymakers, utility planners, and utility regulators—can take today to shift the market for industrial process heat away from fossil fuels and towards efficient, electrified technologies. An electrified industrial sector will be cleaner, smarter, more efficient, and more reliable than the emissions-heavy, fossil-fueled sector we have today. This shift will bring economic and health benefits—from reduced air pollution—to communities across the United States.

Manufacturing investments in the United States have steadily …

Multi-Objective Transmission Expansion

Despite ambitious offshore wind targets in the U.S. and globally, offshore grid planning guidance remains notably scarce, contrasting with well-established frameworks for onshore grids. This gap, alongside the increasing penetration of offshore wind and other clean-energy resources in onshore grids, highlights the urgent need for a coordinated planning framework.

This paper describes a multi-objective, multistage generation, storage and transmission expansion planning model to facilitate efficient and resilient large-scale adoption of offshore wind power. Recognizing regulatory emphasis and, in some cases, requirements to consider externalities, this model explicitly accounts for negative externalities: greenhouse gas emissions and local emission-induced air pollution. Utilizing …

Denial, Disinformation, and Doublespeak: Big Oil’s Evolving Efforts to Avoid Accountability for Climate Change

This joint staff report on Big Oil’s decades-long deception campaign is the culmination of a nearly three year-long investigation by the Democratic staff of the House Committee on Oversight and Accountability (House Oversight), which has worked with Democratic staff of the Senate Budget Committee staff during the 118th Congress. The investigation, focused on ExxonMobil Corporation (Exxon), Chevron Corporation (Chevron), Shell USA Inc. (Shell), BP America Inc. (BP), the American Petroleum Institute (AI), and the Chamber of Commerce (the Chamber), provides a rare glimpse into the extensive efforts undertaken by fossil fuel companies to deceive the public and investors about their …

Discussion: Adapting The Poseidon Principles For NZBA-Compatible Target Setting

The purpose of this paper is to provide recommendations and clarifications for adapting the Poseidon Principles’ climate alignment assessment methodology for Net-Zero Banking Alliance (NZBA)–compatible shipping portfolio target setting. Recommendations and clarifications are given in three areas: target metrics, financial scope and methodology, and scenario selection. Incorporating some of the recommendations of this paper into bank target-setting efforts may require further work by banks, their clients, and others.

It is acknowledged at the outset that NZBA published updated target setting guidelines in March 2024. This paper references version one of the guidelines because only these were available at the time …

4 Ways Utilities Can Manage Spending More Sustainably

Utilities are moving quickly to decarbonize the grid. But they will also need to focus on internal initiatives to avoid potentially costly compliance challenges as new environmental, social, and governance (ESG) requirements take shape.

SAP Concur’s latest utility sustainability and spend management survey reveals how leaders are factoring ESG compliance into internal management policies and processes. Based on feedback from utilities across the U.S., the findings demonstrate how internal teams can deploy spend strategies to meaningfully contribute to decarbonization goals.
– Insights from utility industry leaders. Learn how utility and energy clients rank themselves on compliance and sustainability.
– Best …

Gaining Steam: Incumbent Lock-In and Entrant Leapfrogging

This report examines the long transition from water to steam power in US manufacturing, focusing on early users of mechanical power: lumber and flour mills. Digitizing Census of Manufactures manuscripts for 1850 to 1880, they show that as steam costs declined, manufacturing activity grew faster in counties with less waterpower potential. This growth was driven by steam powered entrants and agglomeration, as water powered incumbents faced switching barriers primarily from sunk costs. Estimating a dynamic model of firm entry and steam adoption, they find that the interaction of switching barriers and high fixed costs creates a quantitatively important and socially …

Energy and Carbon Payback Times for Modern U.S. Utility Photovoltaic Systems

Solar photovoltaic (PV) technologies are helping decarbonize the U.S. electricity system by harnessing a renewable energy source—the sun. However, manufacturing and operating a PV system consumes non-renewable energy and produces carbon emissions, as does end-of-life handling when PV systems are eventually decommissioned. To fully account for PV’s contribution toward decarbonization, these life cycle impacts must be quantified.…

Stakeholder Guidebook for Coal-to-Nuclear Conversions

This guidebook provides stakeholders in communities and electric utilities with information supported by analyses and document reviews about issues pertinent to the topic of coal-to-nuclear (C2N) transitions. Economic impact analysis and workforce transition issues make up the section geared towards community stakeholders. Cost considerations, policy opportunities, technology mapping, coal remediation issues, and siting considerations make up the section geared for utility stakeholders. Community stakeholders will find aspects of the utility-focused section helpful, e.g., ash remediation. And similarly, utility stakeholders will find aspects of the community-focused section helpful, e.g., workforce transition. …

Case Study: Decarbonizing Process Heat at California Dairies, Inc. with Skyven Technologies

Explore how California Dairies, Inc. (CDI), the largest member-owned dairy cooperative in California, partnered with RTC Solutions Provider Skyven Technologies to decarbonize industrial process heat across two major facilities. This case study details the project’s integrated approach to deploying solar thermal technology, smart steam traps, and heat recovery systems expected to avoid a total of 7,000 metric tons of CO2 emissions annually. It explains how CDI implemented the renewable thermal projects with no capital expenditure by utilizing Skyven’s innovative Energy-as-a-Service model and combining direct investment, third-party financing, utility incentives, and state grants. The case study highlights the substantial emissions reductions …