Advanced Energy Perspectives

With 2022 more than halfway through, AEE returns with the latest edition of its biennial top utility regulatory trends roundup. Utility regulatory commissions across the country have been off to a busy start, navigating supply chain hurdles, inflationary pressures, extreme weather events, and the accelerated adoption of clean energy technologies. With PowerSuite, AEE’s policy tracking platform, we cut through the noise to provide insights on the trends shaping utility regulation this year and in years to come.

Note: some links in this post reference PUC filings and other documents in AEE's software platform, PowerSuite. Click here and sign up for a free trial. PowerSuite – policy tracking by policy professionals.

In the winter of 2021, Texas experienced firsthand the dangers of an electric grid dependent on the seamless functioning of a small number of large, weather-vulnerable generation sources. The inability to meet the energy needs of over 70% of the state amid a winter weather crisis signals the system’s clear need for reform; so, too, the unseasonable heat waves that hit Texas this spring, which pushed grid power to its limits. With large traditional power plants taking at least six years to become operational, Texans need adaptive solutions that will meet their needs today. In the face of rapidly growing electricity demand, uncertain forecasting, and aging infrastructure, a new TAEBA report demonstrates the power of distributed energy resources as clean, low cost, and resilient tools poised to bring Texas into the 21^st century of electricity provision.

Since the start of this year’s legislative sessions, Advanced Energy Economy has been tracking energy legislation across all 50 states, the District of Columbia, and the U.S. Congress through its online PowerSuite platform. PowerSuite provides policy tracking by policy professionals. In the process, we have identified several trends in how states are contemplating the future of their energy, transportation, and building sectors. The bills described in this post, which range from simply introduced to fully signed into law, by no means represent every bill in the country filed this year, but are rather indicative of the attention being devoted to each topic by lawmakers. What follows represents the top 10 state energy legislative issues of 2022.

As policymakers, industry, and advocates lean into the challenge of decarbonizing the economy, hydrogen has for some become the New New Thing, an energy source that gives off no harmful emissions and is not dependent on the weather. As with many technologies that experience a surge in interest, there is both excitement and skepticism about hydrogen as a clean energy source, prompting AEE to ask: What is the appropriate role of hydrogen in an advanced energy economy? What should policymakers be considering when hydrogen is proposed as a solution for reaching a 100% clean energy future? We don’t have all the answers to these questions, but we do have a set of principles for approaching them.

Today, 95% of school buses in the United States are powered by diesel, emitting more than 40 toxic chemicals from their exhausts each day. The 24 million children who ride these school buses are exposed to five to 15 times more air pollutants than those who do not. In order to eliminate these harmful emissions, mitigate their health impacts on school-aged children, and reduce the effect of school transportation on climate change, policymakers should take action to electrify school bus fleets. This transition would be especially beneficial in regions prone to electricity supply disruptions caused by natural disasters, because electric school buses can also provide emergency backup power in the event of a grid failure. The challenge now is how to get it done – fast.