September 9, 2017

Weekend reads: Irma devastates Puerto Rico's grid; EPA shrinkage; Europeans abandon utilities & more

Every Saturday, we'll bring you five of the most interesting — or quirky; it is the weekend after all — energy stories from around the web that you may have missed this week. This weekend's reads:

Hurricane Irma May Leave Parts of Puerto Rico Without Power for Six Months (The Daily Beast): One million residents don’t have electricity, thanks to a fragile grid and the Category Five storm. As the sun rose on Thursday, Wilma Martínez did not wake up to the gusty winds of Hurricane Irma that battered the island hours earlier, but rather to the noise of her ventilator warning its battery was about to die. "It's barely at 20 percent. Once it reaches 5 percent I only have one more hour left of normal breathing," the 68-year-old women told The Daily Beast after Irma, the most powerful Atlantic Ocean hurricane in recorded history, knocked out all the power in San Juan.  

Europeans Are Abandoning Their Utility Companies in Droves (Bloomberg): Home energy use is finally exciting to people. Unfortunately for the traditional utilities, it's not because of them. A combination of new technology and a push toward low-carbon energy has caused customers at Europe’s largest and most-established utilities to flee. The average annual rate of leavers is nearly 12 percent, more than double the rate a decade ago, according to analysis by Bloomberg New Energy Finance published Tuesday. The largest six utilities in the U.K. alone lost more than 2 million customers since 2010.

EPA under Trump shrinks to near Reagan-era staffing levels (The Washington Post): The workforce of the Environmental Protection Agency could soon shrink to the lowest level since Ronald Reagan occupied the White House — part of a push to curtail the size and scope of an agency that President Trump once promised to eliminate "in almost every form." The EPA employs about 14,880 people, but administration officials made clear this spring that they intended to reduce those numbers in several ways. The agency also has been under a hiring freeze. And in June, the EPA said it planned to offer buyouts and early retirement packages to more than 1,200 people by early September.

Millennials embrace the clean energy transition, pushing energy companies to adapt (Climate Action): A recent report from the consumer advocacy group Smart Grid Consumer Collaborative (SGCC) “Spotlight on Millennials” shed light to Generation’s Y consumption habits revealing that the Millennials are more keen on new clean energy technologies than older generations and are expected to make play a significant role within the energy transition. As Millennials are becoming the largest consumers on the market, overtaking baby boomers, their consumer habits are expected to redefine customer relationships between clients and utilities.

Renewables developers 'gaming' PURPA should force reforms, utilities tell Congress (Utility Dive): Renewable energy developers are manipulating key provisions of the Public Utilities Regulatory Policy Act (PURPA), electric utilities and a state regulator told an Energy and Commerce Subcommittee in the U.S. House of Representatives on Wednesday, demanding reforms from Congress. Large renewable energy suppliers are abusing the “one-mile rule” separating qualifying facilities under the law to compel utilities to purchase their power, they said, defying the spirit of a law meant to support small energy suppliers.

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