** U.S. regulators approved proposals to speed up the connection of new power projects to the electric grid, reforms that could ease a growing backlog of requests from wind and solar energy developers. Today there is more than 2,000 gigawatts of renewable power waiting to be connected to the grid — nearly double the amount of current U.S. generation capacity, Federal Energy Regulatory Commission Acting (FERC) Chairman Willie Phillips said at a press conference following the unanimous vote.
** The Biden administration proposed modest increases to fuel efficiency standards for the vehicles most Americans drive. The proposal fits alongside the administration’s push for increasing the share of electric vehicles on the roads.
** General Motors warned the Biden administration’s planned changes to vehicle emissions rules could cost the auto industry hundreds of billions of dollars in penalties by 2031, which the Biden administration said was wrong.
** A large bipartisan coalition in the House introduced legislation that would reverse a provision in the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) targeting oil and gas producers. The Promoting Domestic Energy Production Act — authored by Reps. Mike Carey, R-Ohio, and Vicente Gonzalez, D-Texas, and joined by more than a dozen fellow members — would aim to ensure the oil and gas industry is able to enjoy the same tax benefits as other capital-intensive industries.
** Maine will procure at least 3,000 megawatts of electricity from offshore wind turbines by 2040 under a bill signed Thursday by Democratic Gov. Janet Mills, enough to power about half of the state’s electricity load.
** A Vietnamese company planning an electric vehicle plant in central North Carolina that would employ 7,500 workers met a milestone Friday as its top executive joined Gov. Roy Cooper and others for a ground-breaking ceremony.
World
** Speaking from the G-20 Environment and Climate Sustainability meeting in Chennai, Denmark’s Climate Minister tells CNN’s Eleni Giokos that developed countries should be doing more to combat the climate crisis.
** Mexico’s state oil giant Petroleos Mexicanos received 70 billion pesos ($4.2 billion) from the Finance Ministry as the company seeks to pay off mounting debts.
** South Africa is enduring massive blackouts because it agreed to be a “guinea pig” for the West’s green transition and close its coal-fired power stations, the country’s electricity minister has claimed.
** A massive cargo ship burning off the coast of the Netherlands is igniting concerns over fire risks from electric vehicles. The Fremantle Highway, a 656-foot Panama-flagged ship built in December 2013 was transporting 3,000 vehicles from Germany to Singapore when a fire broke out a week ago just off the Dutch coast, according to Shoei Kisen Kaisha, the ship’s Japanese owner.
