Jeffrey is a St. Louis-based reporter covering the Midwest power sector for Energywire. Focus areas include the shift by coal-dependent states to cleaner energy sources and the evolution of the utility business model in response to new technologies. Before joining E&E News, Jeffrey was the energy and environment reporter for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, where he won a SABEW award for a story on the Iowa ethanol boom. He also covered energy for Bloomberg News. A native of Houston, he is a Tulane University graduate with a double major in English and economics.
As its Great Lakes neighbors Illinois and Michigan firm up plans to add thousands of megawatts of new wind and solar energy in the coming years, a stalemate over clean energy policy drags on in the Buckeye State.
Last week was a busy one for electric bus maker Proterra Inc., the California-based company led by former Tesla Inc. executive Ryan Popple.
Michigan's second-largest utility is making a big bet on solar as the linchpin of a plan to eliminate coal from its fuel mix and slash carbon emissions by 80 percent over the next two decades.
The nation's second-largest power grid has more than ample capacity to meet electricity demand next year, and likely for the next five years, despite continued coal plant retirements, according to a survey by the Midcontinent Independent System Operator and state regulators in the grid operator's footprint.
A coalition of environmental groups is urging regulators to take enforcement action against FirstEnergy Corp. and bankrupt FirstEnergy Solutions on the grounds that the companies have inadequate funding set aside to meet nuclear decommissioning requirements for reactors in Ohio and Pennsylvania.