Canary Media: Utilities are planning to shift to clean energy — just not too quickly
Nearly every major utility company in the U.S. has committed to shifting to clean energy, but a lot of Americans don’t know that — including, it would seem, a majority of Supreme Court justices.
The court ruled last month to block the Environmental Protection Agency from enforcing already out-of-date carbon emission regulations for the power sector. The conservative majority determined that a decision about whether to move the nation away from coal power should be made by Congress, not EPA regulators. The justices appear to have missed the fact that utilities have already pledged to leave coal behind and have begun minimizing it in favor of cleaner options.
“In the last three years, you have seen major energy companies in the U.S. publicly declare net-zero” targets, said Arshad Mansoor, CEO of the Electric Power Research Institute. “I think that has been a sea change.”
Mansoor knows a few things about C-suite attitudes in the utility sector. The organization he runs is funded by utilities to research the big questions facing their industry; it was created by Congress in response to the Great Northeast Blackout of 1965. He answers to a board comprising dozens of top U.S. utility executives.
At EPRI’s Electrification 2022 conference in Charlotte, North Carolina last month, the leaders of heavy-hitter utilities unanimously embraced cutting carbon emissions and electrifying transportation. That is, on its face, a huge win for climate activists and clean-energy advocates.