The true cost of plug-in hybrid vehicles

Ukraine Power Grid Attacks intensify as missile and drone strikes hit substations and power plants, causing blackouts, humanitarian crises, strained hospitals, and emergency repairs, with winter energy shortages and civilian infrastructure damage worsening nationwide.

Key Points

Strikes on energy infrastructure causing blackouts, service disruption, and heightened humanitarian risk in winter.

✅ Missile and drone strikes cripple plants, substations, and lines

✅ Blackouts disrupt water, heating, hospitals, and critical services

✅ Emergency repairs, generators, and aid mitigate winter shortages

Ukraine's energy infrastructure remains a primary target in Russia's ongoing invasion, with a recent wave of missile strikes causing power outages in western regions and disrupting critical services across the country. These attacks have devastating humanitarian consequences, leaving millions of Ukrainians without heat, water, and electricity as winter approaches.

Systematic Targeting of Energy Infrastructure

Russia's strategy of deliberately targeting Ukraine's power grid marks a significant escalation, directly affecting the lives of civilians. Power plants, substations, and transmission lines have been hit with missiles and drones, with the latest strikes in late April causing blackouts in cities across Ukraine, including the capital, Kyiv, as the country fights to keep the lights on amid relentless bombardment.

Humanitarian Catastrophe Looms

The damage to Ukraine's electrical system hinders essential services like water supply, sewage treatment, and heating. Hospitals and other critical facilities struggle to operate without reliable power. With winter around the corner, the ongoing attacks threaten a humanitarian catastrophe even as authorities outline plans to keep the lights on this winter for vulnerable communities.

Ukrainian Resolve Remains Unbroken

Despite the devastation, Ukrainian engineers and workers race against time to repair damaged infrastructure and restore power as quickly as possible, while communities adopt new energy solutions to overcome blackouts to maintain essential services. The nation's energy workers have been hailed as heroes for their tireless efforts to keep the lights on amidst relentless attacks. Officials have urged civilians to reduce energy consumption whenever possible to alleviate strain on the fragile grid.

International Condemnation and Support

The systematic attacks on Ukraine's power grid have been widely condemned by the international community.  Western nations have accused Russia of war crimes, highlighting the deliberate targeting of civilian infrastructure. Aid organizations and countries are coordinating efforts to provide emergency power supplies, including generators and transformers, to help Ukraine mitigate the immediate crisis, even as the U.S. ended support for grid restoration in a recent policy shift.

Implications Beyond Ukraine

The humanitarian crisis unfolding in Ukraine due to power grid attacks carries implications far beyond its borders. The disruption of energy supplies could lead to further instability in neighbouring countries dependent on Ukraine's power exports, although officials say electricity reserves are sufficient to prevent scheduled outages if attacks subside. Additionally, a surge in Ukrainian refugees fleeing the deteriorating conditions could put a strain on resources within the European Union.

War Crimes Allegations

International human rights organizations are documenting evidence of Russia's deliberate attacks on Ukraine's civilian infrastructure. Human Rights Watch (HRW) has stated that Russia's targeting of power stations could violate the laws of war and amount to war crimes. This documentation will be crucial for holding Russia accountable for its actions in the future.

Uncertain Future for Ukraine's Power Supply

The long-term consequences of Russia's sustained attacks on Ukraine's power grid remain uncertain. While Ukrainian workers demonstrate incredible resilience, the sheer scale of repeated damage may eventually overwhelm their ability to keep pace with repairs, and, as winter looms over the battlefront, electricity is civilization for frontline communities. Rebuilding destroyed infrastructure could take years and cost billions, a daunting task for a nation already ravaged by war.

Related News

• Electricity Forum News

• Grid Technologies News

Senate Renewable Energy Tax Credits face Finance Committee scrutiny, with Democrats urging action on tax extenders, clean energy incentives, and climate policy, while Republicans cite prior wins in wind, biodiesel, and EV credits.

Key Points

Legislative incentives debated in the Senate Finance Committee to extend and align clean energy tax benefits.

✅ Democrats press hearings and action on energy tax policy

✅ Focus on clean energy, EVs, wind, biodiesel, and resilience

✅ Grassley cites prior extenders; disputes push for bigger subsidies

A group of 27 Democratic senators is calling for action in the Senate Finance Committee on extending energy-related tax credits and examining new tax proposals, especially those that incentivize renewable energy projects and align with FERC action on aggregated DERs across the grid.

Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., the ranking Democrat on the Senate Finance Committee, who recently introduced a wildfire-resilient grid bill with Sen. Merkley, led the group of Democrats in writing a letter Tuesday to Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, who chairs the committee.

“Despite numerous opportunities, including in the recent tax extenders package, the Finance Committee has failed to take action on the dozens of energy tax proposals pending before it,” they wrote. “It is critical that the Committee move to address these issues in a timely manner, along with much needed policy changes that heed warnings on regulatory rollbacks to combat the damage and growing dangers caused by global climate change.”

The number of Americans ages 65 and over is projected to nearly double by 2060. And most would prefer to age in place and hiresenior caregivers if needed.

They pointed out that the Senate Finance Committee hasn’t held a single hearing on energy tax policy during the previous congressional term, and has yet to hold one in the current one.

“The sole energy tax-related recommendation of the Committee’s temporary policy task forces was ignored in the tax extender legislation passed in December 2019, along with nearly all proposals put forward in members’ legislation this Congress,” they wrote. “This Committee must fulfill its role in examining members’ energy tax proposals and in bolstering our nation’s efforts to combat climate change, including a clean electricity standard approach that sets firm targets.”

They noted that In 2019, the global average temperature was the second highest ever recorded and the past decade was the hottest ever. The lawmakers pointed to raging wildfires and increased flooding in the western part of the U.S., as well as challenges in California’s power system during the transition, causing unprecedented destruction over the past several years. They called for tax incentives for renewable energy to help combat climate change.

“Gaps in the tax code have disadvantaged complementary technologies that could improve climate resiliency and provide additional emissions reductions,” they wrote. “While power sector emissions continue to decrease, emissions from transportation, heavy industry and agriculture have stayed level or increased over the past 10 years, even amid $5 gas not spurring a green shift in consumer behavior. The United States is not on pace to meet its international climate commitments, to say nothing of the reductions necessary to stave off the worst potential outcomes of global warming.”

Grassley reacted to the letter, noting that he had worked to get tax extenders legislation passed, even as some states consider bans on clean energy use by utilities. "I begged Democrats for a year to help me get an extenders package passed, about half of which were green energy policies, so this rings hollow," he said in a statement Tuesday. "We wouldn’t have a wind energy credit or a biodiesel credit but for me, let alone an extension of either. Democrats were holding up these green energy provisions in an attempt to get a big expansion of taxpayer subsidies for rich Tesla owners."

Related News

• Electricity Forum News

• Energy Policy News

ABO Wind Tunisia 10MW Solar Project will build a photovoltaic park in Gabes with a STEG PPA, fixed tariff, 2,500 m grid connection, producing 18 million kWh annually, targeted for 2020 commissioning with local partners.

Key Points

A 10MW photovoltaic park in Gabes with a 20-year STEG PPA and fixed tariff, slated for 2020 commissioning.

✅ 18 million kWh/year; 2,500 m grid tie, 20-year fixed tariff

✅ Electricity supplied to STEG under PPA; 2020 commissioning

✅ Located in Gabes; built with local partners, 10MW capacity

ABO Wind has received a permit and a tariff for a 10MW photovoltaic project in Tunisia, amid global activity such as Spain's 90MW wind project now underway, which it plans to build and commission in 2020.

The solar park, in the governorate of Gabes, is 400km south of the country’s capital Tunis and aligns with renewable funding initiatives seen across developing markets.

The developer said it plans to build the project next year in close cooperation with local partners, as regional markets from North Africa to the Gulf expand, with Saudi Arabia boosting wind capacity as well.

ABO Wind department head Nicolas Konig said: “The solar park will produce more than 18 million kilowatt hours of electricity per year and will feed it into the grid at a distance of 2500 metres.”

The developer will conclude an electricity supply contract with the state-owned energy supplier (Societe tunisienne de l’electricite et du gaz (STEG), which will provide a fixed remuneration over 20 years, a model echoed by Germany's wind-solar tender for the electricity fed into the grid.

Earlier this year, ABO Wind had already secured a tariff for a wind farm with a capacity of 30MW in a tender, 35km south-east of Tunis, underscoring Tunisia's wind investments under its long-term plan.

The company is working on half a dozen Tunisian wind and solar projects, as institutions like the World Bank support wind growth in developing countries.

“We are making good progress on our way to assemble a portfolio of several ready-to-build wind and solar projects attractive to investors, as Saudi clean energy targets continue to expand globally,” said ABO Wind general manager responsible for international business development Patrik Fischer.

Related News

• Electricity Forum News

• Renewable Energy News

PG&E dividend halt for wildfire mitigation directs cash from shareholders to tree clearing, wildfire risk reduction, and probation compliance under Judge William Alsup, amid bankruptcy, Camp Fire liabilities, and power line vegetation management mandates.

Key Points

A court-ordered dividend halt funding vegetation clearance and wildfire mitigation as PG&E meets probation terms.

✅ Judge Alsup bars dividends until mitigation targets met

✅ 375,000 trees cleared near power lines in high-risk zones

✅ Measures tied to probation amid bankruptcy and liabilities

A U.S. judge said on Tuesday that PG&E may not resume paying dividends and must use the money to fund its plan for cutting down trees to reduce the risk of wildfires in California, stopping short of more costly measures he proposed earlier this year.

The new criminal probation terms for PG&E are modest compared with ones the judge had in mind in January and that PG&E said could have cost upwards of $150 billion.

The terms will, however, keep PG&E under the supervision of Judge William Alsup of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California and hold the company, which also is in Chapter 11 bankruptcy and whose bankruptcy plan has drawn support from wildfire victims, to its target for clearing areas around its power lines of some 375,000 trees this year.

PG&E's probation stems from its felony conviction after a deadly 2010 natural gas pipeline blast in San Bruno, California, near San Francisco, that killed eight people and injured 58 others.

PG&E filed for bankruptcy protection on Jan. 29 in anticipation of liabilities from wildfires, including a catastrophic 2018 blaze, the Camp Fire, for which PG&E later pleaded guilty to 85 counts in state court. It killed 86 people in the deadliest and most destructive wildfire in California history.

At a January hearing, Alsup, who is overseeing PG&E's probation, said he felt compelled to propose additional probation terms in the aftermath of Camp Fire. San Francisco-based PG&E expects its equipment will be found to have caused the blaze.

The probation process is separate from San Francisco-based PG&E's bankruptcy filing and from operational measures such as its pandemic response and shutoff moratorium implemented to protect customers.

As the company faces $30 billion in wildfire liabilities and bankruptcy proceedings and has opened a wildfire assistance program for affected residents, the energy company is expected to name as its new chief executive Bill Johnson, a source said on Tuesday. Johnson has been the CEO of the Tennessee Valley Authority since 2013 and is retiring on Friday.

Additional probation terms imposed by Alsup on Tuesday will require PG&E to meet goals in a wildfire mitigation plan it unveiled in February.

The goals include removing 375,000 dead, dying or hazardous trees from areas at high risk of wildfires in 2019, compared with 160,000 last year.

The judge said PG&E will not be able to pay shareholders until it complies with his new probation terms.

Shares fell 2% on Tuesday to close at $17.66 on the New York Stock Exchange and are down 63% since November 2018 due to concerns about the company's bankruptcy and wildfire liabilities, though the utility has said rates are set to stabilize in 2025 as part of its long-term plan. The shares traded as low as $5.07 in January.

PG&E in December 2017 suspended its quarterly cash dividend, while continuing to pay significant property taxes to California counties, citing uncertainty about liabilities from wildfires in October of that year that struck Northern California.

PG&E paid $798 million in dividends in 2017 and $925 million in 2016, a period in which the company did a poor job of clearing areas around its power lines of hazardous trees, according to Alsup.

Money meant for shareholders should have been spent on efforts to reduce wildfire risks in recent years, Alsup said at Tuesday's hearing.

"PG&E has started way more than its share of these fires," Alsup said.

"I want to see the people of California safe," the judge added.

Lawyers for PG&E did not contest the new terms, which the company considers more feasible than terms Alsup proposed in January.

To comply with the terms Alsup proposed in January, PG&E said it would have to remove 100 million trees. The company added that shutting power lines during high winds as Alsup proposed would not be feasible because the lines traverse rural areas to service cities and suburbs.

Idling lines could also affect the power grid in other states, PG&E said.

Alsup on Tuesday said he was still considering his proposal to require PG&E to shut down power lines during windy weather to prevent tree branches from making contact and sparking wildfires linked to power lines in the region.

Related News

• Electricity Forum News

• Energy Policy News

Florida Hurricane Irma Power Outages strain the grid as utilities plan rebuilds; FPL and Duke Energy deploy crews to restore transmission lines, substations, and service amid flooding, storm surge, and widespread disruptions statewide.

Key Points

Large-scale post-storm power losses in Florida requiring grid rebuilds, thousands of crews, and phased restoration.

✅ Utilities prioritize plants, transmission, substations, then critical facilities

✅ 50,000-60,000 workers mobilized; bucket trucks wait for safe winds

✅ Remote rerouting and hardening aid faster restoration amid flooding

Parts of Florida could be without electricity for more than a week, as damage from Hurricane Irma will require a complete rebuild of portions of the electricity grid, utility executives said on Monday.

Irma has knocked out power to 6.5 million Florida electricity customers, or nearly two-thirds of the state, since making landfall this weekend. In major areas such as Miami-Dade, 74 percent of the county was without power, according to Florida's division of emergency management.

Getting that power back online may require the help of 50,000 to 60,000 workers from all over the United States and Canadian power crews as well, according to Southern Company CEO and Chairman Thomas Fanning. He is also co-chair of the Electricity Subsector Coordinating Council, which coordinates the utility industry and government response to disasters and cyberthreats.

While it is not uncommon for severe storms to down power lines and damage utility poles, Irma's heavy winds and rain batted some of the state's infrastructure to the ground, Fanning said.

"'Restore' may not capture the full sense of where we are. For the very hard impacted areas, I think you're in a 'rebuild' area," he told CNBC's "Squawk Box."

"That's a big deal. People need to understand this is going to take perhaps weeks, not days, in some areas," Fanning said.

Parts of northern Florida, including Jacksonville, experienced heavy flooding, which will temporarily prevent crews from accessing some areas.

Duke Energy, which serves 1.8 million customers in parts of central and northwestern Florida, is trying to restore service to 1.2 million residences and businesses.

Florida Power & Light Company, which provides power to an estimated 4.9 million accounts across the state, had about 3.5 million customers without electricity as of Monday afternoon, said Rob Gould, vice president and chief communications officer at FPL.

The initial damage assessments suggest power can be restored to parts of the state's east coast in just days, but some of the west coast will require rebuilding that could stretch out for weeks, Gould told CNBC's "Power Lunch."

"This is not a typical restoration that you're going to see. We actually for the first time in our company history have our entire 27,000-square-mile, 35-county territory under assault by Irma," he said.

FPL said it would first repair any damage to power plants, transmission lines and substations as part of its massive response to Irma, then prioritize critical facilities such as hospitals and water treatment plants. The electricity company would then turn its attention to areas that are home to supermarkets, gas stations and other community services.

Florida utilities invested billions into their systems after devastating hurricane seasons in 2004 and 2005 in order to make them more resilient and easier to restore after a storm. Irma, which ranked among the most powerful storms in the Atlantic, has nevertheless tested those systems.

The upgrades have allowed FPL to automatically reroute power and address about 1.5 million outages, Gould said. The company strategically placed 19,500 restoration workers before the storm hit, but it cannot use bucket trucks to fix power lines until winds die down, he said.

Some parts of Florida's distribution system — the lines that deliver electricity from power plants to businesses and residences — run underground. However, the state's long coastline and the associated danger of storm surge and seawater incursion make it impractical to run lines beneath the surface in some areas.

Duke Energy has equipped 28 percent of its system with smart grid technology to reroute power remotely, according to Harry Sideris, Duke's state president for Florida. He said the company would continue to build out that capability in the future.

Duke deployed more than 9,000 linesmen and support crew members to Irma-struck areas, but cannot yet say how long some customers will be without power.

Separately, Gulf Power crews reported restoring service to more than 32,000 customers.

"At this time we do not know the exact restoration times. However, we're looking at a week or longer from the first look at the widespread damage that we had," Sideris told CNBC's "Closing Bell."

FPL said on Monday it was doing final checks before bringing back nuclear reactors that were powered down as Hurricane Irma hit Florida.

"We are in the process now of doing final checks on a few of them; we will be bringing those up," FPL President and CEO Eric Silagy told reporters.

Related News

• Electricity Forum News

• Utility Operations News

FERC DER Aggregation advances debates over distributed energy resources as Congress presses action on Order 841, grid resilience, and wholesale market access, including rooftop solar, storage, and virtual power plant participation across PJM and ISO-NE.

Key Points

FERC DER Aggregation enables grouped distributed resources to join wholesale markets, providing capacity and flexibility.

✅ Opens wholesale market access for aggregated DER portfolios

✅ Aligns with Order 841, storage, and grid resilience goals

✅ Raises jurisdictional questions between FERC and state regulators

The Monday letter from Congressional Democrats illustrates growing frustration in Washington over the lack of FERC action on multiple power sector issues, including the aging U.S. grid and related challenges.

Last May, after the FERC technical conference, 16 Democratic Senators wrote to then-Chairman Kevin McIntyre urging him to develop guidance for grid operators on aggregated DERs.

In July, McIntyre responded, saying that FERC was "diligently reviewing the record," but the commission has taken no action since.

Since then, "DER adoption and renewable energy aggregation have continued to grow," House and Senate lawmakers wrote in their identical Monday letters, "driven not only by state and federal policies, but consumer interest in choosing cost-competitive technologies such as rooftop solar, smart thermostats and customer-sited energy generation and storage, reflecting key utility trends in the sector."

The lawmakers wrote they were "encouraged" by FERC Chairman Neil Chatterjee's comments in June 2018, writing that he "specifically cited the role DERs will play in our continued grid transition."

In that speech at the S&P Global Platts 2018 Transmission Planning and Development Conference, Chatterjee noted "growing interest" in non-transmission alternatives, including "DERs and storage."

"How the Commission treats filings associated with those first-of-kind projects could prove an important factor in investors’ assessments of whether similar non-traditional projects are bankable or not — and more broadly signal whether FERC is open to innovation in the transmission sector,” he said.

In addition to the DER order and rehearing decision on Order 841, FERC has multiple other power sector initiatives that have not seen official action in months, even as major changes to electricity pricing are debated by stakeholders.

The highest profile is its open proceeding on grid resilience, set up last January after FERC rejected a coal and nuclear bailout proposal from the Department of Energy. In October, the CEO of the PJM Interconnection, the nation’s largest wholesale power market, urged FERC to issue a final order in the docket, calling for "leadership" from the commission.

Chatterjee, however, has not indicated when FERC could decide on the case. In December, Commissioner Rich Glick told a Washington audience he is "not entirely sure where the chairman wants to go with that proceeding yet."

Outside of resilience, FERC also has open reviews of both its pipeline certificate policy and implementation of the Public Utilities Regulatory Policy Act, a key law supporting renewable energy. McIntrye set those reviews in motion during his tenure as chairman, but after his death in January the timing of both remains unclear.

In recent months, Chatterjee has also delayed FERC votes on major export facilities for liquefied natural gas and a political spending case involving PJM after impasses between Republicans and Democrats on FERC.

Two members from each party currently sit on the commission. That allows Democrats to deadlock commission votes on natural gas facilities and other issues — a partisan divide on display this week when they clashed with the chairman over offshore wind.

As the commission considers final guidance on DERs, the boundaries of federal jurisdiction are likely to be a key issue. At the technical conference, states from the Midcontinent ISO argued FERC should allow them to choose whether to let aggregated DERs participate in retail and wholesale markets. Other states argued the value proposition of distributed resources may rely on that sort of dual participation.

Despite the lack of action from FERC, some grid operators are moving forward with aggregated distributed resources in New England market reform efforts and elsewhere, demonstrating momentum. Last week, a residential solar-plus-storage aggregation cleared the ISO-NE capacity auction for the first time, committing to provide 20 MW of capacity beginning in 2022.

On the Senate side, Sens. Sheldon Whitehouse, R.I., and Ed Markey, Mass., led the letter to FERC. In the House, Reps. Peter Welch, Vt., and Mike Levin, Calif., led the signatories.

Related News

• Electricity Forum News

• Energy Policy News