Disasters On Disasters. Every climate related crisis seems to layer horrific images and situations on our society. For some reason, the pictures of koalas holding our hands and kangaroos holding each other is especially sad. Imagine reading that 500 million animals have died, that’s an insane number that will create a generations hole in nature. This is a reminder that we have to be victorious in our work and regulatory expansion of our markets. We cannot fail in this endeavor as well as the work that needs to be done to expand the tent.
Hummer Comeback. The SUV that died due to being a gas guzzler, and relatively useless is making a comeback to your General Motors dealership. GM announced it will be releasing an EV Hummer in 2022 in time to compete with the Tesla Cybertruck, Ford F-150 EV and more. This is a category that should be interesting as it tests the purchase behavior of consumers that aren’t driven to EVs for environmental purposes given they drive SUVs and pickups now. I assume they will be successful which drives a huge increase of load for utilities across the Country and the need for more charging stations.
Puerto Rico Hit Again. Last week an earthquake struck Puerto Rico that knocked out a large part of the grid once again. Years after groups piloted onto the island to show them how their grid should be rebuilt, not much more than talk has occurred. Maybe a different approach should be taken up.
Being Smarter. Utilities have spent billions in ratepayer money to get smart meters onto the homes. What has that yielded those consumers? I am a PG&E customer and it still takes an engineering degree to download and review my consumption data. I’d like to see this data be more easily accessed and readable for consumers and their contractors so that saving energy can be smarter.
Watching BlackRock. BlackRock is one of the largest investors in the world and they announced they would be entering the Climate Action 100+. The world’s eyes and ears are now watching to see what this means and what, if any, changes to investment policies or voting policies occur.
- Vox: Can the catastrophic fires bring some sanity to Australian climate politics?
- MotorTrend: Electric Hummer Pickup Truck Coming to Your GMC Dealer
- New York Times: With Earthquakes and Storms, Puerto Rico’s Power Grid Can’t Catch a Break
- Greentech Media: Why Most US Utilities Are Failing to Make the Most of Their Smart Meters
- Axios: The climate spotlight on BlackRock
- Utility Dive: Renewable advocates highlight ‘most effective’ path to net-zero emissions as House releases clean energy proposal
- Bloomberg: Renewable-Energy Spending Needs to Double by 2030, Irena Says
Opinion
Best, Yann