** A Senate Democratic deal includes a new $4,000 tax credit for used electric vehicles and other new tax credits and grants for automakers to retool factories to build greener cars.
** The Biden administration is announcing several initiatives aimed at boosting the deployment of solar energy. One of the initiatives, from the Department of Housing and Urban Development, would better enable people in government-assisted housing to access solar energy.
** The Senate Environment and Public Works Committee did not vote Wednesday on the nomination of Joe Goffman to lead the Environmental Protection Agency’s air and radiation office, as originally scheduled, instead advancing two other nominees by voice vote.
** Oil and gas industry employment levels remain below pre-pandemic levels even though drilling activity and oil company profits have increased.
** A conservation group sues Colorado regulators for allowing a coal mine in the western part of the state to operate without air quality permits.
** A federal investigation finds evidence of pervasive racial discrimination at Tesla’s San Francisco factory.
** A mining company proposes extracting lithium from abandoned oil and gas wells in southeastern Utah.
World
** A senior manager at Russia’s Gazprom said on Wednesday that the company was still awaiting the return of a Siemens Energy turbine for the Nord Stream 1 gas pipeline, blaming the German company for the delay.
** Russia delivered less gas to Europe on Wednesday in a further escalation of an energy stand-off between Moscow and the European Union that will make it harder, and costlier, for the bloc to fill up storage ahead of the winter heating season.
** BASF SE may sell unused natural gas back to Germany’s grid in case Russian deliveries grind to a sudden halt, according to people familiar with the matter, a move that would aid Europe’s last-ditch efforts to conserve the fuel.
** Libya, plagued by port blockades and protests at oil facilities in recent months, has now managed to raise its oil production to 1.1 million barrels per day (bpd), the oil minister of the Tripoli-based government said in a text message sent to Reuters on Tuesday.
** A Bolivian startup is betting on the Andean nation’s unlikely push to mine the world’s largest lithium deposits, building tiny electric cars that it hopes can be adopted throughout Latin America with locally made batteries.