RMI Outlet
Electricity
A Fair Green Deal for the Last Coal Plant in Mississippi
Late in 2021, Southern Company, the giant utility headquartered in Atlanta, announced it would pursue the retirement or conversion of 15 coal-fired generation units at its power plants, totaling nearly 9,000 MW of capacity. One Southern-owned plant was conspicuously absent from those plans: the Red Hills Generating…
The Best Time to Plan Transmission Was 15 Years Ago. The Second-Best Time Is Now.
The United States needs to rapidly expand its long-range transmission infrastructure to meet its climate goals. Federal regulators are now taking important steps to address key barriers to that build-out.
Shining a Light on Utility Performance in Hawaii’s Clean Energy Transition
In June 2021, the Hawaii Public Utilities Commission (PUC) approved an extensive portfolio of performance mechanisms, including almost 40 metrics and scorecards that provide visibility into a wide scope of utility operations.
States Move Swiftly on Performance-Based Regulation to Achieve Policy Priorities
Performance-based regulation has gained significant traction in the United States in the past year and a half, with four new states enacting laws authorizing PBR.
What Do We Know about Utility Shutoffs of Vulnerable Families during COVID-19?
As households across the United States began to feel the multifaceted impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic, thousands of grassroots organizers rallied for a moratorium that would protect vulnerable customers facing disconnections from their utility. Disconnecting households for unpaid energy bills would have meant the loss of critical energy services…