WHAT’S HAPPENING TODAY: Good afternoon and happy Thursday, readers! Callie is back in Washington after her quick trip to Three Mile Island yesterday, bringing you the highlights from her latest sitdown with Energy Secretary Chris Wright. The full exclusive video interview will be published tomorrow afternoon, be sure to check it out!
Congress is one step closer to capturing the white whale that is permitting reform as the House has advanced the so-called SPEED Act. Keep reading to find out the final vote tally as some Democrats pulled their support last minute over an amendment added by conservative holdouts earlier in the week.
Plus, electricity prices are still on the rise, jumping by nearly 7% for the year ending in November. We have the latest from the most recent Consumer Price Index report released this morning.
Welcome to Daily on Energy, written by Washington Examiner energy and environment writers Callie Patteson (@CalliePatteson) and Maydeen Merino (@MaydeenMerino). Email cpatteson@washingtonexaminer dot com or mmerino@washingtonexaminer dot com for tips, suggestions, calendar items, and anything else. If a friend sent this to you and you’d like to sign up, click here. If signing up doesn’t work, shoot us an email, and we’ll add you to our list.
PERMITTING REFORM WATCH – HOUSE ADVANCES SPEED ACT: In a 221–196 vote, the House has passed the bipartisan Standardizing Permitting and Expediting Economic Development Act, a major milestone in the broader effort within Congress to pass meaningful reforms to the permitting process for energy and infrastructure projects.
The bill, better known as the SPEED Act, advanced just minutes ago with 11 Democrats voting in favor and one Republican member (Pennsylvania Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick) voting against. More members on the left side of the aisle were expected to vote in favor of the bill, including California Rep. Scott Peters, but that support was pulled after conservatives with the House Freedom Caucus squeezed in a last minute amendment giving the Trump administration flexibility to revoke existing permits.
The SPEED Act’s passage is a major win for House Natural Resources chair Bruce Westerman, who introduced the legislation this past summer. In August, Westerman told Callie that his goal was to send a permitting package to the Senate before the end of the year.
It remains to be seen whether the upper chamber will include any provisions from the SPEED Act in its own permitting reform proposal early next year, as key Democrats in favor of such reforms are adamant about preventing the Trump administration from pulling approvals for offshore wind.
Following this afternoon’s vote, however, Westerman is confident the upper chamber will keep some of the bill.
“Certainty is a big issue. We kept the certainty language in there,” Westerman told reporters outside of the House floor.
“Hopefully when everybody gets a chance to look at it closer, they’ll realize that this is a very strong bill,” he added. “It does create certainty that people on both sides of the aisle want, nobody wants to go through the process to get their project permitted, invest capital in it, and then have a judge come in and say, ‘out of here, you can’t do your project anymore.’”
A reminder: The SPEED Act would overhaul the federal permitting process by targeting the National Environmental Policy Act, which requires federal agencies to evaluate the environmental effects of major actions and decisions relevant to their departments.
For more on what exactly is in the bill and some of the political drama leading up to its passage in the House, read more from Callie here.
ELECTRICITY PRICES CLIMBED LAST MONTH: Electricity prices rose 6.9% for the year ending in November, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ updated Consumer Price Index report.
The report released this morning showed electricity prices rising faster than overall inflation, which stood at 2.7%, down three-tenths of a percentage point from September.
The data: The report said that energy prices more broadly rose to 4.2% for the year ending in November, up from 2.8% for September. Gasoline prices increased by 0.9%, and fuel oil prices jumped by 11.3%. Additionally, natural gas prices increased by 9.1%.
The rise in energy prices comes as voters have been frustrated by the cost of electricity and heating. That dissatisfaction showcased itself during November’s off-cycle elections, where Democrats won some races by focusing on affordability. The cost of living is expected to remain a top concern for voters in the upcoming midterm elections.
Read more by Maydeen here.
TRUMP ADMINISTRATION TO BLAME IF ELECTRICITY PRICES STAY UP: If the Trump administration fails to reverse the trend of soaring electricity prices, Energy Secretary Chris Wright is telling voters that this administration will be to blame.
During an exclusive interview with Callie at the former Three Mile Island nuclear facility in Pennsylvania yesterday, Wright encouraged voters to hold the administration accountable on its vow to slash electricity prices in half, a notable expression of confidence, given the rapid price hikes of recent months.
When asked who should be held responsible if electricity prices are continuing to rise in three years, Wright said, “us, absolutely!”
“They should kick me out, fire me!” he continued, adding that if prices fail to come down, he wouldn’t be delivering on the president’s agenda.
Read more from Callie here.
FERC ORDERS PJM TO CREATE NEW RULES TO CO-LOCATE DATA CENTERS WITH POWER PLANTS: A key priority of the Trump administration has been to boost the development of artificial intelligence, and thereby construction of large load facilities such as data centers. There are growing concerns, however, that connecting these facilities to the grid – or even co-locating them with existing power plants – could raise rates for nearby consumers.
The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission issued guidelines today to avoid just that.
The details: In its December open meeting this morning, FERC chair Laura Swett unveiled a series of orders from the commission to PJM Interconnection, the largest grid operator in the country, on its rules for co-locating data centers at power plants.
The commission determined that PJM’s existing rules regarding co-location – including behind-the-meter arrangements – are no longer “just” and “reasonable.” As such, federal regulators are calling on the grid operator to revise its rules and create new four transmission service options to ensure that large loads like data centers are paying their fair share for energy.
One of these service options would require PJM to plan all transmission and generation to service the large load facility, preventing new customers from pulling existing generation off the grid until all transmission upgrades are complete to ensure reliability. You can find a breakdown of all four options here.
FERC is also requesting that PJM submit an informational report within 30 days regarding reliability concerns associated with co-location arrangements. Swett later told reporters that this report will be crucial for addressing how to incentivize new generation that can also support these large loads.
Key quote: “Our goal here was really to clarify the rules for all types of co-location arrangements,” Swett said. “And of course, we need new generation. That is top of mind here. And while the states have exclusive jurisdiction over the siting and resource mix of generation, from FERC’s perspective, we are going to do whatever we can to help incentivize.”
For more information on behind-the-meter arrangements and what is at stake, read more from Callie here.
BP GETS NEW CEO: The British oil giant BP has named Meg O’Neill as its new CEO, making her the company’s fourth top executive in six years.
O’Neill, who is the CEO of Woodside Energy, will be replacing Murray Auchincloss, who was in the position for less than two years. Auchincloss plans to step down today.
BP’s executive vice president for supply, trading and shipping, Carol Howle, is set to serve as interim CEO until O’Neill starts the position in April. O’Neill will be the company’s first woman CEO – as well as the first woman to lead any Big Oil giant.
The move is part of BP Chair Albert Manifold’s overhaul of the company, shifting its priorities back to fossil fuel operations and away from its focus on green energy in recent years.
“Progress has been made in recent years, but increased rigor and diligence are required to make the necessary transformative changes to maximise value for our shareholders,” Manifold told Reuters in a statement.
TRUMP MEDIA COMPANY MERGES WITH NUCLEAR FUSION STARTUP: Trump Media & Technology Group, the company behind President Donald Trump’s Truth Social platform, is making a surprising investment in energy technology by merging with nuclear fusion power startup TAE technologies.
The details: TMTG announced on Thursday that it was merging with the fusion startup in an all-stock deal valued at more than $6 billion.
Under the deal, the merged companies plan to begin construction next year on the world’s first utility-scale fusion power plant, with a capacity of around 50 megawatts. They are expecting to build additional larger fusion power plants soon after, with a capacity of as much as 500 megawatts of electricity. In case you forgot, one megawatt equates to roughly the same amount of electricity consumed by 400-900 homes each year.
From our view: The unlikely merger is a major vote of confidence from Trump’s inner circles that fusion energy will become a central part of the country’s energy makeup. Fusion, which replicates the processes that fuel the sun and other stars, has been an attractive alternative source of energy for decades as it is free of greenhouse gases, has less radioactive waste than nuclear fission, and is estimated to produce 10,000,000 times more energy per unit of fuel than fossil fuels.
Despite the interest, the technology has not developed to sustain a fusion reaction for a long period of time. As of this year, the longest a nuclear fusion machine has maintained the necessary reaction to produce power is just over 22 minutes.
Today’s deal marks a major bet from Trump Media shareholders in the clean source of energy, and potentially signals confidence in technological advancements moving faster than expected.
ICYMI – APPEALS COURT AGREES TO REHEAR THE GREENHOUSE GAS REDUCTION FUND LAWSUIT: The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit yesterday agreed to rehear and vacate a ruling made earlier this year that allowed the Environmental Protection Agency to hold $20 billion in obligated grants to green groups.
As a reminder: The EPA this past year has sought to terminate $20 billion of grant money from the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund, which was established as part of the Biden administration’s 2022 Inflation Reduction Act. The program helped to fund climate projects across the country for low-income communities.
However, the EPA claimed that the money was improperly distributed to the grantees with little oversight and froze the grants. The EPA has since faced a legal battle with the grantees, which include Climate United, the Coalition for Green Capital, and Power Forward Communities.
In April, a federal judge ordered the EPA to release the funds, but the decision was overturned by a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. The grantees quickly filed a petition for a rehearing. The appeals court has agreed to rehear the case and oral arguments will begin on Feb. 24.
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