COURTS: The legal team of the oil and gas majors want a judge to throw out the lawsuit from a suburban Philadelphia county for allegedly hiding the climate risks of their business, claiming county leaders broke the state’s Sunshine Act when agreeing to pursue legal action. (KYW; E&E News, subscription)

WIND: 

  • In Salem, Massachusetts, construction begins on what is planned to be the state’s second-largest offshore wind terminal, being developed on a former coal plant site. (RTO Insider, subscription)
  • Ørsted books a $575 million impairment loss due in part to numerous U.S. factors, ranging from halted Ocean Wind project development, a new delay in the start of Revolution Wind operations and higher interest rates. (Reuters, Providence Journal)
  • Several mid-Atlantic environmental organizations cheer the results of the Delaware and Maryland offshore wind lease auction. (news release)
  • A European power producer signs a virtual power purchase agreement with Avangrid for the output of the latter’s 35 MW Casselman wind facility on a former Pennsylvania surface mine. (news release)

BUILDINGS: 

  • Boston’s zoning board rejects the mayor’s plan to make new buildings over 20,000 square feet in size be fossil fuel-free, a surprise move in the eyes of many observers. (Boston Globe)
  • Maryland public schools are set to receive $24 million in state grants to decarbonize and electrify their buildings. (news release)

FOSSIL FUELS: 

  • A Pennsylvania township issues a de-facto rejection to a fossil fuel site management company to rezone 59 acres of office and commercial land to allow for oil and gas development, denying a request for a public advertising of a hearing on the matter. (Fox Chapel Herald)
  • A New Jersey lawmaker says she’s optimistic her bill to incentivize electric lawn equipment purchases will get support in the legislature’s environmental committee in September. (New Jersey Herald)

UTILITIES: Central Maine Power wants the state utility commission to waive review of a plan to buy the 18.4% of shares in parent company Avangrid that it doesn’t already own by Spanish-flagged Iberdrola, claiming the deal wouldn’t hurt ratepayers despite advocates’ warnings. (Portland Press Herald)

BATTERIES: 

  • A New York town board considers a 12-month moratorium on battery storage systems co-located with utility-scale solar projects. (Lockport Union-Sun & Journal)
  • Without having completed any utility-scale projects yet, Form Energy’s cofounder says the firm’s plan to install iron-air batteries at a former paper mill in Lincoln, Maine, to deliver 85 MW of power to the grid for up to 100 hours is “a very natural next step in terms of scaling up and deployments.” (Canary Media)

SOLAR: 

AFFORDABILITY: 

  • New York utility regulators authorize National Grid to incrementally raise the average bill by roughly $60 per month by the end of three years to help pay for clean energy projects.
  • Baltimore Gas and Electric’s power customers are set to see average bill increases of around $250 per year, which Maryland’s utility ratepayer advocate says is due to problems with PJM Interconnection’s grid and market planning. (Baltimore Sun)

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Bridget is a freelance reporter and newsletter writer based in the Washington, D.C., area. She compiles the Northeast Energy News digest. Bridget primarily writes about energy, conservation and the environment. Originally from Philadelphia, she graduated from Emerson College in 2015 with a degree in journalism and a minor in environmental studies. When she isn’t working on a story, she’s normally on a northern Maine lake or traveling abroad to practice her Spanish language skills.