Local Energy Rules

Can a utility company be carbon neutral by 2050 if it builds a gas plant now? Maybe if it shuts off the gas plant well before its 40 years of useful life are complete, leaving electric customers to pay off millions in debt.

For this episode of the Local Energy Rules podcast, host John Farrell speaks with John Romankiewicz, Senior Analyst for the Sierra Club’s Beyond Coal Campaign. Romankiewicz and the Sierra Club released a report in January scoring utilities on their plans to transition from fossil fuels to clean power. Farrell and Romankiewicz discuss how utilities are doing far too little to retire coal, replace it with renewable energy generation, and fulfill their promises. The two had the conversation for a recent episode of ILSR’s Building Local Power podcast, republished here for Local Energy Rules.

Listen to the full episode and explore more resources below — including a transcript and summary of the conversation.

https://ilsr.org/articles/dirty-truth-utility-climate-pledges-ler-129/

For this episode of Local Energy Rules, republished from the Building Local Power podcast, host John Farrell and guest John Romankiewicz discuss The Dirty Truth About Utility Climate Pledges: utilities are doing far too little to retire coal, replace it with renewable energy generation, and fulfill their promises. |

Show page available: https://ilsr.org/dirty-truth-utility-climate-pledges-ler-129 |

Listen to all of our Local Energy Rules podcast episodes at our site: https://ilsr.org/local-energy-rules-podcast-homepage |

Don't forget to subscribe, share with your friends, leave a recommendation on our podcast feeds, and join the conversation online using the #LocalEnergyRules hashtag!

St. Louis Park, a Minneapolis suburb of 48 thousand residents, has a clean energy goal rivaling that of its larger neighbor. Will the city’s smaller size help, or hinder, its efforts?

For this episode of our Voices of 100% series of the Local Energy Rules Podcast, host John Farrell speaks with St. Louis Park Council Member Larry Kraft and Sustainability Manager Emily Ziring. St. Louis Park, Minn. is committed to carbon neutrality by 2040. Farrell, Kraft, and Ziring discuss the youth organizing that started it all, taking climate action in a small city, and how innovative ideas will help the city reach its goal.

Listen to the full episode and explore more resources below — including a transcript and summary of the conversation.

https://ilsr.org/articles/st-louis-park-minnesota-voices-of-100-podcast/

For this Voices of 100% episode of the Local Energy Rules Podcast, host John Farrell and guests Larry Kraft and Emily Ziring discuss the St. Louis Park, Minn. climate action plan and commitment to carbon neutrality by 2040. |

Show page available: https://ilsr.org/st-louis-park-minnesota-voices-of-100-podcast |

Listen to all of our Local Energy Rules podcast episodes at our site: https://ilsr.org/local-energy-rules-podcast-homepage |

Don't forget to subscribe, share with your friends, leave a recommendation on our podcast feeds, and join the conversation online using the #LocalEnergyRules hashtag!

The electricity market is not built for community-focused, small-scale solar developers. To overcome the many barriers they face, cooperative solar developers are banding together in the People’s Solar Energy Fund.

For this episode of the Local Energy Rules podcast, host John Farrell speaks with Timothy DenHerder-Thomas, General Manager of Cooperative Energy Futures. The two discuss cooperatively-owned solar development and the People’s Solar Energy Fund, an initiative to pool together community-owned solar developers and scale up community solar nationwide.

Listen to the full episode and explore more resources below — including a transcript and summary of the conversation.

https://ilsr.org/articles/peoples-solar-energy-fund-ler-127/

For this episode of the Local Energy Rules podcast, host John Farrell and guest Timothy DenHerder-Thomas discuss the People’s Solar Energy Fund, an initiative to pool together community-owned solar developers and scale up community solar nationwide. |

Show page available: https://ilsr.org/peoples-solar-energy-fund-ler-127 |

Listen to all of our Local Energy Rules podcast episodes at our site: https://ilsr.org/local-energy-rules-podcast-homepage |

Don't forget to subscribe, share with your friends, leave a recommendation on our podcast feeds, and join the conversation online using the #LocalEnergyRules hashtag!

As our technology gets smarter, will our strategies for electric grid management keep up?

For this episode of the Local Energy Rules podcast, host John Farrell speaks with Cisco DeVries, CEO of OhmConnect. OhmConnect tracks its California customers’ energy use and rewards them for saving energy when the electric grid is under stress. Farrell and DeVries discuss OhmConnect’s innovative approach to demand response, the 550 megawatt Resi-Station “virtual power plant,” and the potential for a similar approach across the nation.

Listen to the full episode and explore more resources below — including a transcript and summary of the conversation.

https://ilsr.org/articles/ohmconnect-resi-station-ler-126/

For this episode of the Local Energy Rules podcast, host John Farrell and CEO of OhmConnect Cisco DeVries discuss demand response and the 550 megawatt Resi-Station “virtual power plant.” |

Show page available: https://ilsr.org/ohmconnect-resi-station-ler-126 |

Listen to all of our Local Energy Rules podcast episodes at our site: https://ilsr.org/local-energy-rules-podcast-homepage |

Don't forget to subscribe, share with your friends, leave a recommendation on our podcast feeds, and join the conversation online using the #LocalEnergyRules hashtag!

The publicly-owned Sacramento Municipal Utility District, or SMUD, had already installed the first utility-scale PV array in the nation back in 1984. By the early 1990s, the utility saw a potential for rooftop solar and launched its PV Pioneer program, placing dozens of solar arrays on their customer’s rooftops, for a fee. The standardized rollout meant dramatic declines in the cost of solar, long before the industry had launched anywhere else.

In June, ILSR’s Director of Democratic Energy John Farrell spoke with Brent Sloan, the “solar dude” at SMUD, to talk about these ahead-of-the-curve PV Pioneer programs and how his utility was created a viable rooftop solar market 20 years before other utility’s have “waved the white flag.”

Hosting an in-person community gathering may be unthinkable these days, but that is exactly how Hanover, N.H. endorsed its 100 percent renewable energy goal back in 2017: a show of hands in the high school gymnasium.

For this episode of our Voices of 100% series of the Local Energy Rules Podcast, host John Farrell speaks with Hanover, N.H. Sustainability Director April Salas. They discuss the importance of coalition building, how to take action in a small town, and slowing down to achieve goals the right way.

Listen to the full episode and explore more resources below — including a transcript and summary of the conversation.

https://ilsr.org/articles/hanover-new-hampshire-voices-of-100-podcast/