Clean energy’s looming copper crisis

MINING: Copper isn’t being mined quickly enough to keep up with U.S. policies for transitioning to electric vehicles and clean energy, creating a potential bottleneck for Michigan automakers unless recycling improves and deeper mines are tapped, a University of Michigan researcher says. (Bridge)

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OIL & GAS:

• The CEO of a North Dakota cooperative utility announces that the organization will build a 1,400 MW natural gas plant, marking its largest capital investment to date. (KFGO)
• Eastern Ohio city officials are unsatisfied with a state agency’s response to their concerns and calls for action to clean up a fracking waste processing facility that the state attorney general says threatens the area’s drinking water. (Times Leader)
• A Federal Reserve official says he looks to North Dakota and the Bakken region’s oil industry to provide vital insight into the health of the U.S. economy. (North Dakota Monitor)

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PIPELINES:

• Tribal leaders and environmental justice groups urge a Canadian consulate in Detroit to recognize long standing treaties with First Nations and retract a 1977 treaty that allows Line 5 to operate in the Great Lakes. (Michigan Advance)
• The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ environmental assessment of the Dakota Access pipeline now is likely to stretch into 2025. (E&E News, subscription)

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CLIMATE: For the Great Lakes region, a repeat of 2023 this year is possible as wildfire smoke threatens to continue undoing decades of progress on air quality improvement. (Bridge)

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COAL: The USDA hosts a two-day workshop in southern Illinois aimed at helping the region find new economic opportunities amid the decline of coal plants and mining. (WPSD)

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CLEAN ENERGY:

• Students across the U.S. are turning to community colleges for training in electrification, wind and solar installations and energy efficiency. (Associated Press)
• Two school districts in Lansing and southwestern Michigan receive federal funding to invest in solar, geothermal and energy efficiency projects. (City Pulse; The ‘Gander)

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EMISSIONS: American Electric Power is among the latest electric utilities to join a lawsuit challenging the Biden administration’s new rules for cutting pollution from coal and gas plants. (E&E News, subscription)

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GRID: Wisconsin utility We Energies deploys high-tech acoustic cameras that scan distribution grid equipment to identify potential problems and improve reliability. (WISN)

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UTILITIES: American Electric Power sells its distributed resources business that owns more than 300 MW of solar and storage projects across the U.S. for what will amount to about $315 million. (Utility Dive)

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