Advanced Energy Perspectives

As we learned from the Advanced Energy Now 2021 Market Report, the U.S. market for advanced energy products and services proved remarkably resilient in 2020, despite the disruptions of COVID-19. Excluding Ethanol – a large but volatile slice of the domestic market that flipped from record 2019 revenue to 2020 crash – U.S. advanced energy revenue grew roughly 8% per year in both 2019 and 2020. But the COVID impact on employment was more severe, at one point accounting for the loss of more than 600,000 jobs. Still, at 3.2 million jobs nationwide at the end of 2020, advanced energy employs more U.S. workers than Food & Beverage Stores and twice as many as Commercial Banks. What’s more: advanced energy jobs are on the rebound, and ready to scale up for a national push for clean energy and jobs.

Here at AEE, we are dedicated to advancing policies that expand market opportunities for advanced energy technologies around the nation. Central to that mission is helping state legislators learn about the latest advanced energy developments and policy needs within their states. On April 5, we hosted a virtual meeting attended by approximately 30 legislators and staff members from the Illinois General Assembly. AEE’s Daniel Bloom was joined by industry leaders from Apex Clean Energy, Borrego, CPower, EVgo, Rivian, and Schneider Electric to discuss how advanced energy resources can grow and transform the Illinois economy, and what policies are needed to achieve that end.

Texas’ February winter weather emergency dominated energy news nationwide. Now it’s dominating proposals in the Texas legislature. Following historic electricity outages, it’s no surprise grid reliability issues have come to the forefront of lawmakers’ priority list, with proposed legislation focusing on everything from distributed energy resources to various commission reforms. We turned to AEE’s PowerSuite to parse out which bills at play in the Lone Star State are generating the most buzz and share the measures we’re keeping our eyes on.

For the past two years, states, advanced energy developers, and corporate buyers of clean energy have expressed interest in creating competitive wholesale electricity markets in the Southeast. They see these markets as potentially reducing consumer costs and facilitating the cost-effective achievement of state and corporate clean energy goals. As calls in the region to study the creation of competitive wholesale market mechanisms in the region steadily grew, surprising news leaked in July that several utilities in the Southeast, including Southern Co., Duke Energy, and the Tennessee Valley Authority, were talking about a new platform for power trading called the Southeast Energy Exchange Market (SEEM), culminating in a filing with FERC in February. The question now: is SEEM a step toward wholesale market competition and greater access to advanced energy in the region, or a preemptive strike by the region’s utilities to avoid true competition? 

Last week, the Indiana Utility Regulatory Commission (IURC) issued its final order in a proceeding to examine Duke Energy Indiana’s coal-fired unit commitment decisions during the Fall of 2019. While the IURC ultimately declined to order Duke to refund customers for the financial losses it knowingly incurred, the Commission rightly acknowledged that today’s changing energy landscape has complicated the way coal plants should operate. AEE had hoped that the IURC would go further to protect customers from the financial harm caused by Duke’s uneconomic operating practices, but the Commission did push Duke to move toward a better decision-making process for future commitment decisions. With those now under a bit more scrutiny, we look forward to working with Duke on the alternatives we proposed to help the utility give up its costly coal addiction in its 2021 Integrated Resource Plan.