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Tag: Energy industry

  • Feds give record $27B in loans for utility expansion in Georgia and Alabama

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    ATLANTA — Federal energy officials on Wednesday announced a record $27 billion loan to electric utilities in Georgia and Alabama, saying the loan will save customers money as the companies undertake a huge expansion driven by demand from computer data centers.

    A total of $22.4 billion will go to Georgia Power and $4.1 billion to Alabama Power. Both are subsidiaries of Atlanta-based Southern Company, one of the nation’s largest utilities. The companies plan to use the cash to build new natural-gas fueled power plants, build new transmission lines and upgrade existing power plants.

    Energy Secretary Chris Wright said the loan will result in more than $7 billion in savings over decades from a lower, federally subsidized interest rate.

    “We’re focused on driving down costs,” Wright said. He added that the loan would help ensure Southern customers “have access to affordable, reliable and secure energy for decades to come.”

    Wright and President Donald Trump have frequently made the case for their fossil fuel-friendly policies — including orders over the past nine months to keep some coal-fired plants open past planned retirement dates — as necessary to ensure reliability of the nation’s electric grid.

    Wright says the orders have saved utility customers millions of dollars and helped keep lights on during last month’s winter storm. Critics say the orders are unnecessary and have raised electric bills as utilities keep older, more expensive plants operating.

    “These loans will help lower the cost of investments in our grid that will enhance reliability and resilience for the benefit of our customers,” said Chris Womack, Southern’s chairman, president and CEO.

    The new loan comes amid scrutiny on rising utility bills, with electricity prices increasing faster than inflation in many states. There is also widespread opposition to new data centers for artificial intelligence.

    Trump in his State of the Union Tuesday announced a “ratepayer protection pledge” against higher utility bills tied to AI. He said tech companies will provide their own power as they build data centers. Trump didn’t provide details but claimed prices will go down.

    It is unclear whether any tech companies have signed pledges to build their own power plants, but Wright said on a call with reporters Wednesday that “every name you know that’s developing a data center has been in dialogue with us.”

    He cited “cooperation” from giants such as Microsoft, Google and Meta, but he didn’t specify any written agreements.

    Federal officials have long given utility loans, including $12 billion in loans that the first Trump administration and President Barack Obama’s administration guaranteed for two costly nuclear reactors at Georgia’s Plant Vogtle, partially owned by Georgia Power.

    Trump’s tax and budget bill last year reshaped the loan program to focus on increasing capacity to generate and transmit electricity. Loan guarantees under President Joe Biden focused on green energy goals.

    Gregory Beard, who directs the newly renamed Office of Energy Dominance Financing, said Wednesday that cutting interest rates and discarding Biden’s policy “will get us back on the right track in terms of affordability.”

    The loan office will review individual projects to ensure they’re financially viable, he said. “We’re not going to build this plant or deploy this capital until we are sure that it’s the right thing to do for the local community, for the local ratepayer,” Beard said in an interview.

    Those requirements don’t seem to be laid out in loan agreements that Southern released Wednesday. Jennifer Whitfield, an attorney for the Southern Environmental Law Center who represented Georgia Power expansion opponents, said the loans will save money for Georgians, but questioned their wisdom.

    “As a taxpayer, it’s hard to avoid the fact that this is a bailout paid for by every taxpaying citizen of the United States,” she said.

    Any savings for customers must be approved by the elected Public Service Commissions in Alabama and Georgia. Commissioners last July approved a three-year rate freeze requested by Georgia Power, while commissioners in Alabama approved a two-year rate freeze in December. Company officials tout the freezes when utilities nationwide have been seeking record increases. But opponents complain company-friendly regulators locked in high prices and high utility profits.

    Voters booted two Republican incumbents off the Georgia commission in November amid complaints about rising bills.

    Commissioner Peter Hubbard, one of two new Democrats, unsuccessfully tried to roll back approval for Georgia Power’s expansion in recent weeks. He said Wednesday that the declining costs of solar, wind and battery power could make new natural gas plants uneconomic over time.

    “It’s locking us into a costlier option,” he said of the federal loan. ”And so I think it just is not meeting the moment of affordability.”

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    Daly reported from Washington.

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  • Supreme Court agrees to hear from oil, gas companies trying to block climate lawsuits

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    WASHINGTON — WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court said Monday that it will hear from oil and gas companies trying to block lawsuits seeking to hold the industry liable for billions of dollars in damage linked to climate change.

    The conservative-majority court agreed to take up a case from Boulder, Colorado, among a series of lawsuits alleging the companies deceived the public about how fossil fuels contribute to climate change.

    Governments around the country have sought damages totaling billions of dollars, arguing it’s necessary to help pay for rebuilding after wildfires, rising sea levels and severe storms worsened by climate change. The lawsuits come amid a wave of legal actions in states including California, Hawaii and New Jersey and worldwide seeking to leverage action through the courts.

    Suncor Energy and ExxonMobil appealed to the Supreme Court after Colorado’s highest court let the Boulder case proceed. The companies argue emissions are a national issue that should be heard in federal court, where similar suits have been tossed out.

    “The use of state law to address global climate change represents a serious threat to one of our Nation’s most critical sectors,” attorneys wrote.

    President Donald Trump’s administration weighed in to support the companies and urge the justices to reverse the Colorado Supreme Court decision, saying it would mean “every locality in the country could sue essentially anyone in the world for contributing to global climate change.”

    Trump, a Republican, has criticized the lawsuits in an executive order, and the Justice Department has sought to head some off in court.

    Attorneys for Boulder had agued that the litigation is still in early stages and should stay in state court. “There is no constitutional bar to states addressing in-state harms caused by out-of-state conduct, be it the negligent design of an automobile or sale of asbestos,” they wrote.

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    Follow the AP’s coverage of the U.S. Supreme Court at https://apnews.com/hub/us-supreme-court.

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  • Saudi Arabia may have uranium enrichment under proposed deal with US, arms control experts warn

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    DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — Saudi Arabia could have some form of uranium enrichment within the kingdom under a proposed nuclear deal with the United States, congressional documents and an arms control group suggest, raising proliferation concerns as an atomic standoff between Iran and America continues.

    U.S. Presidents Donald Trump and Joe Biden both tried to reach a nuclear deal with the kingdom to share American technology. Nonproliferation experts warn any spinning centrifuges within Saudi Arabia could open the door to a possible weapons program for the kingdom, something its assertive crown prince has suggested he could pursue if Tehran obtains an atomic bomb.

    Already, Saudi Arabia and nuclear-armed Pakistan signed a mutual defense pact last year after Israel launched an attack on Qatar targeting Hamas officials. Pakistan’s defense minister then said his nation’s nuclear program “will be made available” to Saudi Arabia if needed, something seen as a warning for Israel, long believed to be the Middle East’s only nuclear-armed state.

    “Nuclear cooperation can be a positive mechanism for upholding nonproliferation norms and increasing transparency, but the devil is in the details,” wrote Kelsey Davenport, the director for nonproliferation policy at the Washington-based Arms Control Association.

    The documents raise “concerns that the Trump administration has not carefully considered the proliferation risks posed by its proposed nuclear cooperation agreement with Saudi Arabia or the precedent this agreement may set.”

    Saudi Arabia did not immediately respond to questions Friday from The Associated Press

    The congressional document, also seen by the AP, shows the Trump administration aims to reach 20 nuclear business deals with nations around the world, including Saudi Arabia. The deal with Saudi Arabia could be worth billions of dollars, it adds.

    The document contends that reaching a deal with the kingdom “will advance the national security interests of the United States, breaking with the failed policies of inaction and indecision that our competitors have capitalized on to disadvantage American industry and diminish the United States standing globally in this critical sector.” China, France, Russia and South Korea are among the leading nations that sell nuclear power plant technology abroad.

    The draft deal would see America and Saudi Arabia enter safeguard deals with the International Atomic Energy Agency, the United Nations’ nuclear watchdog. That would include oversight of the “most proliferation-sensitive areas of potential nuclear cooperation,” it added. It listed enrichment, fuel fabrication and reprocessing as potential areas.

    The IAEA, based in Vienna, did not immediately respond to questions. Saudi Arabia is a member state to the IAEA, which promotes peaceful nuclear work but also inspects nations to ensure they don’t have clandestine atomic weapons programs.

    “This suggests that once the bilateral safeguards agreement is in place, it will open the door for Saudi Arabia to acquire uranium enrichment technology or capabilities — possibly even from the United States,” Davenport wrote. “Even with restrictions and limits, it seems likely that Saudi Arabia will have a path to some type of uranium enrichment or access to knowledge about enrichment.”

    Enrichment isn’t an automatic path to a nuclear weapon — a nation also must master other steps including the use of synchronized high explosives, for instance. But it does open the door to weaponization, which has fueled the concerns of the West over Iran’s program.

    The United Arab Emirates, a neighbor to Saudi Arabia, signed what is referred to as a “123 agreement” with the U.S. to build its Barakah nuclear power plant with South Korean assistance. But the UAE did so without seeking enrichment, something nonproliferation experts have held up as the “gold standard” for nations wanting atomic power.

    The push for a Saudi-U.S. deal comes as Trump threatens military action against Iran if it doesn’t reach a deal over its nuclear program. The Trump military push follows nationwide protests in Iran that saw its theocratic government launch a bloody crackdown on dissent that killed thousands and saw tens of thousands more reportedly detained.

    In Iran’s case, it long has insisted its nuclear enrichment program is peaceful. However, the West and the IAEA say Iran had an organized military nuclear program up until 2003. Tehran also had been enriching uranium up to 60% purity, a short, technical step from weapons-grade levels of 90% — making it the only country in the world to do so without a weapons program.

    Iranian diplomats long have pointed to 86-year-old Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s comments as a binding fatwa, or religious edict, that Iran won’t build an atomic bomb. However, Iranian officials increasingly have made the threat they could seek the bomb as tensions have risen with the U.S.

    Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, the kingdom’s day-to-day ruler, has said if Iran obtains the bomb, “we will have to get one.”

    ___

    The Associated Press receives support for nuclear security coverage from the Carnegie Corporation of New York and Outrider Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

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  • As electricity costs rise, everyone wants data centers to pick up their tab. But how?

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    HARRISBURG, Pa. — As outrage spreads over energy-hungry data centers, politicians from President Donald Trump to local lawmakers have found rare bipartisan agreement over insisting that tech companies — and not regular people — must foot the bill for the exorbitant amount of electricity required for artificial intelligence.

    But that might be where the agreement ends.

    The price of powering data centers has become deeply intertwined with concerns over the cost of living, a dominant issue in the upcoming midterm elections that will determine control of Congress and governors’ offices.

    Some efforts to address the challenge may be coming too late, with energy costs on the rise. And even though tech giants are pledging to pay their “fair share,” there’s little consensus on what that means.

    “‘Fair share’ is a pretty squishy term, and so it’s something that the industry likes to say because ‘fair’ can mean different things to different people,” said Ari Peskoe, who directs the Electricity Law Initiative at Harvard University.

    It’s a shift from last year, when states worked to woo massive data center projects and Trump directed his administration to do everything it could to get them electricity. Now there’s a backlash as towns fight data center projects and some utilities’ electricity bills have risen quickly.

    Anger over the issue has already had electoral consequences, with Democrats ousting two Republicans from Georgia’s utility regulatory commission in November.

    “Voters are already connecting the experience of these facilities with their electricity costs and they’re going to increasingly want to know how government is going to navigate that,” said Christopher Borick, a pollster and director of the Muhlenberg College Institute of Public Opinion.

    Data centers are sprouting across the U.S., as tech giants scramble to meet worldwide demand for chatbots and other generative AI products that require large amounts of computing power to train and operate.

    The buildings look like giant warehouses, some dwarfing the footprints of factories and stadiums. Some need more power than a small city, more than any utility has ever supplied to a single user, setting off a race to build more power plants.

    The demand for electricity can have a ripple effect that raises prices for everyone else. For example, if utilities build more power plants or transmission lines to serve them, the cost can be spread across all ratepayers.

    Concerns have dovetailed with broader questions about the cost of living, as well as fears about the powerful influence of tech companies and the impact of artificial intelligence.

    Trump continues to embrace artificial intelligence as a top economic and national security priority, although he seemed to acknowledge the backlash last month by posting on social media that data centers “must ‘pay their own way.’”

    At other times, he has brushed concerns aside, declaring that tech giants are building their own power plants, and Energy Secretary Chris Wright contends that data centers don’t inflate electricity bills — disputing what consumer advocates and independent analysts say.

    Some states and utilities have started to identify ways to get data centers to pay for their costs.

    They’ve required tech companies to buy electricity in long-term contracts, pay for the power plants and transmission upgrades they need and make big down payments in case they go belly-up or decide later they don’t need as much electricity.

    But it might be more complicated than that. Those rules can’t fix the short-term problem of ravenous demand for electricity that is outpacing the speed of power plant construction, analysts say.

    “What do you do when Big Tech, because of the very profitable nature of these data centers, can simply outbid grandma for power in the short run?” Abe Silverman, a former utility regulatory lawyer and an energy researcher at Johns Hopkins University. “That is, I think, going to be the real challenge.”

    Some consumer advocates say tech companies’ fair share should also include the rising cost of electricity, grid equipment or natural gas that’s driven by their demand.

    In Oregon, which passed a law to protect smaller ratepayers from data centers’ power costs, a consumer advocacy group is jousting with the state’s largest utility, Portland General Electric, over its plan on how to do that.

    Meanwhile, consumer advocates in various states — including Indiana, Georgia and Missouri — are warning that utilities could foist the cost of data center-driven buildouts onto regular ratepayers there.

    Utilities have pledged to ensure electric rates are fair. But in some places it may be too late.

    For instance, in the mid-Atlantic grid territory from New Jersey to Illinois, consumer advocates and analysts have pegged billions of dollars in rate increases hitting the bills of regular Americans on data center demand.

    Legislation, meanwhile, is flooding into Congress and statehouses to regulate data centers.

    Democrats’ bills in Congress await Republican cosponsors, while lawmakers in a number of states are floating moratoriums on new data centers, drafting rules for regulators to shield regular ratepayers and targeting data center tax breaks and utility profits.

    Governors — including some who worked to recruit data centers to their states — are increasingly talking tough.

    Arizona Gov. Katie Hobbs, a Democrat running for reelection this year, wants to impose a penny-a-gallon water fee on data centers and get rid of the sales tax exemption there that most states offer data centers. She called it a $38 million “corporate handout.”

    “It’s time we make the booming data center industry work for the people of our state, rather than the other way around,” she said in her state-of-the-state address.

    Energy costs are projected to keep rising in 2026.

    Republicans in Washington are pointing the finger at liberal state energy policies that favor renewable energy, suggesting they have driven up transmission costs and frayed supply by blocking fossil fuels.

    “Americans are not paying higher prices because of data centers. There’s a perception there, and I get the perception, but it’s not actually true,” said Wright, Trump’s energy secretary, at a news conference earlier this month.

    The struggle to assign blame was on display last week at a four-hour U.S. House subcommittee hearing with members of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission.

    Republicans encouraged FERC members to speed up natural gas pipeline construction while Democrats defended renewable energy and urged FERC to limit utility profits and protect residential ratepayers from data center costs.

    FERC’s chair, Laura Swett, told Rep. Greg Landsman, D-Ohio, that she believes data center operators are willing to cover their costs and understand that it’s important to have community support.

    “That’s not been our experience,” Landsman responded, saying projects in his district are getting tax breaks, sidestepping community opposition and costing people money. “Ultimately, I think we have to get to a place where they pay everything.”

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    Follow Marc Levy on X at: https://x.com/timelywriter

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  • US hits 9 tankers with sanctions over Iranian oil during protest crackdown

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    WASHINGTON — The United States on Friday imposed sanctions on a fleet of nine ships and their owners accused of transporting hundreds of millions of dollars in forbidden Iranian oil to foreign markets.

    The sanctions are being imposed because of Iran’s “shutdown of internet access to conceal its abuses” against its citizens during its crackdown on nationwide protests, the U.S. Treasury Department said. They “target a critical component of how Iran generates the funds used to repress its own people,” Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said.

    Iranians and Iranian businesses have been struggling under the longest and most comprehensive internet shutdown in the history of the Islamic Republic. The government blocked internet access on Jan. 8 as nationwide protests led to a crackdown on information sharing.

    The Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control said the nine targeted vessels — flagged from Palau, Panama and other jurisdictions — are part of a shadow fleet, a network of older tankers used to transport goods that are subject to international sanctions, notably from Russia and Iran. The U.S. sanctions aim to prevent the targeted Iranians from doing business with Americans or accessing U.S. accounts.

    Friday’s action is part of an ongoing buildup of tensions between the U.S. and the theocratic nation as an American aircraft carrier group inches closer to the Middle East. President Donald Trump called the group an “armada” in comments to journalists aboard Air Force One late Thursday.

    Trump added that the U.S. was moving the ships toward Iran “just in case” he wants to take action against Iran’s government. The Republican president has repeatedly boasted that his threats on Iran have prevented the execution of more than 800 dissidents.

    Iran’s top prosecutor on Friday called Trump’s repeated claims “completely false.”

    Meanwhile, the death toll in Iran from the bloody crackdown on nationwide demonstrations rose to at least 5,032, activists said.

    The U.S. issued sanctions this month against Iranian officials and firms accused of helping to repress the nationwide protests, which challenged Iran’s theocratic government, including the secretary of the Supreme Council for National Security, whom the Treasury accuses of being one of the first officials to call for violence against protesters.

    Trump on Thursday declined to say whether the Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei should be removed from office.

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  • Trump administration scraps multimillion-dollar

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    SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico — The administration of U.S. President Donald Trump has canceled solar projects in Puerto Rico worth millions of dollars, as the island struggles with chronic power outages and a crumbling electric grid.

    The projects were aimed at helping 30,000 low-income families in rural areas across the U.S. territory as part of a now-fading transition toward renewable energy.

    In an email obtained by The Associated Press, the U.S. Energy Department said that a push under Puerto Rico’s former governor for a 100% renewable future threatened the reliability of its energy system.

    “The Puerto Rico grid cannot afford to run on more distributed solar power,” the message states. “The rapid, widespread deployment of rooftop solar has created fluctuations in Puerto Rico’s grid, leading to unacceptable instability and fragility.”

    Javier Rúa Jovet, public policy director for Puerto Rico’s Solar and Energy Storage Association, disputed that statement in a phone interview Thursday.

    He said that some 200,000 families across Puerto Rico rely on solar power that generates close to 1.4 gigawatts of energy a day for the rest of the island.

    “That’s helping avoid blackouts,” he said, adding that the inverters of those systems also help regulate fluctuations across the grid.

    He said he was saddened by the cancellation of the solar projects. “It’s a tragedy, honestly,” he said. “These are funds for the most needy.”

    Earlier this month, the Energy Department canceled three programs, including one worth $400 million, that would have seen solar and battery storage systems installed in low-income homes and those with medical needs.

    In its email, the department said that on Jan. 9, it would reallocate up to $350 million from private distributed solar systems to support fixes to improve the generation of power in Puerto Rico. It wasn’t immediately clear if that funding has been allocated.

    One of those programs would have financed solar projects for 150 low-income households on the tiny Puerto Rican island of Culebra.

    “The people are really upset and angry,” said Dan Whittle, an associate vice president with the Environmental Defense Fund, which was overseeing that project. “They’re seeing other people keep the lights on during these power outages, and they’re not sure why they’re not included.”

    He noted that a privately funded project helped install solar panels and batteries on 45 homes a week before Hurricane Fiona hit Puerto Rico in September 2022.

    Whittle said he was baffled by the federal government’s decision.

    “They are buying hook, line and sinker that solar is the problem. It could not be more wrong,” he said.

    The solar projects were part of an initial $1 billion fund created by U.S. Congress in 2022 under former President Joe Biden to help boost energy resilience in Puerto Rico, which is still trying to recover from Hurricane Maria.

    The Category 4 storm slammed into the island in September 2017, razing an electric grid already weakened by a lack of maintenance and investment. Outages have persisted since then, with massive blackouts hitting on New Year’s Eve in 2024 and during Holy Week last year.

    In recent years, residents and businesses that could afford to do so have embraced solar energy on an island of 3.2 million people with a more than 40% poverty rate.

    But more than 60% of energy on the island is still generated by petroleum-fired power plants, 24% by natural gas, 8% by coal and 7% by renewables, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.

    The cancellation of the solar projects comes a month after the administration of Puerto Rico Gov. Jenniffer González sued Luma Energy, a private company overseeing the transmission and distribution of power on the island.

    At the time, González said that the electrical system “has not improved with the speed, consistency or effectiveness that Puerto Rico deserves.”

    The fragility of Puerto Rico’s energy system is further exacerbated by a struggle to restructure a more than $9 billion debt held by the island’s Electric Power Authority, which has failed to reach an agreement with creditors.

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  • Rising coal demand overshadows Southeast Asia’s transition to renewable energy

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    HANOI, Vietnam — Southeast Asia’s demand for coal is growing faster than anywhere else in the world, undermining efforts to lower carbon emissions that contribute to global warming.

    Regional coal demand will rise by more than 4% a year through the end of the decade, driven by rising needs for electricity as economies grow across the region of more than 600 million, according to a recent International Energy Agency report. Indonesia, a nation of about 285 million people, will account for more than half of that, followed by Vietnam.

    The trends raise questions over the $15.5 billion-dollar deals both countries signed in 2022 in Just Energy Transition Partnerships, or JETP, to help fund their renewable energy transitions. Moves under U.S. President Donald Trump to reverse policies meant to address climate change add to the challenges.

    This is a decisive decade for Southeast Asia as the region bears much of the burden of extreme weather and other impacts from climate change.

    “We’re standing on two opposite grounds — wanting to build clean energy, but not letting go entirely of coal,” said Katherine Hasan, an analyst with the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air, a Finland-registered think tank.

    Coal emits more planet heating emissions than other fossil fuels like oil and gas when it is burned. Pollution from coal also adds to toxic haze that often blankets many Southeast Asian cities.

    Coal supplies just over a third of Southeast Asia’s electricity, the IEA says, making it the third-largest coal-consuming region in the world after India and China.

    Global coal demand is expected to plateau as alternatives expand and major coal buyers like South Korea cut back.

    But Southeast Asia is headed in the opposite direction. The two main factors driving that trend are cost and energy security.

    “Nobody burns coal for fun,” said Paul Baruya of FutureCoal, a group backed by the fossil fuel industry, formerly known as the World Coal Association.

    “Coal still underpins a level of energy security that the region needs,” he said, noting that coal cutbacks would mean writing off billions of dollars’ worth of fossil fuel-related infrastructure including power plants and mines.

    A recent regional survey by Singapore’s ISEAS–Yusof Ishak Institute found a growing public preference for delaying giving up coal until 2030 or even 2040, as concerns over adequate power supplies and costs counter worries about climate change.

    Governments across the region are echoing that logic.

    “What is important is that our government is firm in its stance that there will be no phase-out of fossil fuels,” said Hashim Djojohadikusumo, brother to Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto and the country’s special climate envoy, last month.

    “We’ve rejected that; we’re sticking with a phase-down,” he said. “Indonesia’s economy, especially its industry and electricity sector, will continue to rely on fossil fuels.”

    Indonesia is the world’s largest coal exporter and Southeast Asia’s biggest carbon emitter making it vital for the region ’s energy transition.

    “If Indonesia cannot transition away from coal, then why would other developing countries?” said Dinita Setyawati, with the United Kingdom-registered think tank Ember. “For Indonesia, it’s not so much a fear of the unknown, but a reluctance to change and the inertia of change.”

    A years-long effort to retire a coal plant in West Java fell through last month, highlighting Indonesia’s struggle to move beyond coal.

    Indonesia’s updated climate pledge, which dropped a promise to phase out coal by 2040, was rated “critically insufficient” by Climate Action Tracker, which said the country’s aims don’t align with the Paris Climate Agreement.

    Currently, Indonesia is considering re-opening the door for future construction of new coal plants.

    This is despite mounting costs from climate change. Last year more than 700 people were killed in deadly floods and landslides associated with extreme weather worsened by climate change.

    Continued coal use will also likely worsen Indonesia’s air pollution, especially in cities like Jakarta.

    Vietnam has stood out in fossil fuel-dependent Southeast Asia, expanding its solar generating capacity from 4 megawatts in 2015 to 16 gigawatts a decade later. It has plans to grow that to as much as 73.4 gigawatts by 2030 and up to 295 gigawatts by 2050.

    Yet coal use is still rising.

    Vietnam hit a record-high in 2025 with the import of more than 65 million metric tonnes of coal, which was up 2.6% by volume from a year earlier, according to the latest data from Vietnam’s customs department.

    That partly reflects caution over generating capacity following power shortages in 2023, when a drought sapped hydropower output, causing about $1.4 billion in losses, according to the World Bank.

    In order to sustain GDP growth of around 10% a year through 2030, Vietnam aims to increase electricity sales to the point that they are equivalent to Germany’s current annual energy consumption.

    It has allowed large companies like Danish toymaker LEGO and South Korean manufacturer Samsung, to buy electricity directly from Vietnamese wind and solar power producers to meet their climate targets. This could potentially double Vietnam’s renewable energy share from about 19% to 42%, Ember says.

    However, Vietnam’s power grid is already under strain from the rapid, uneven rollout of renewables and years of underinvestment in transmission equipment. The government estimates it needs about $18 billion by 2030 to upgrade the system. But progress has been slow, and funding committed so far covers only a fraction of the need.

    The momentum for JETP-backed projects in Indonesia and Vietnam is unlikely to pick up this year, according to Putra Adhiguna, with the Jakarta-based think tank, the Energy Shift Institute.

    Indonesia’s cancellation of the early retirement of the West Java coal plant, and the 2025 U.S. withdrawal from JETP under the Trump administration, has shaken faith in the rollout of tangible projects in 2026.

    Expectations for the billion-dollar JETP deals were set too high, Adhiguna said.

    “JETP was basically a brute force attempt to do a transition,” he said. “Governments were trying to bulldoze through … But fundamentally there are things that take a bit of time and political commitment to happen.”

    ___

    Delgado reported from Bangkok. Associated Press writer Edna Tarigan in Jakarta contributed to this report.

    ___

    The Associated Press’ climate and environmental coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. The AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP’s standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org.

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  • Trump highlights false claims as he reviews past year

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    President Donald Trump marked his first year back in office Tuesday by presiding over a meandering, nearly two-hour press briefing to recount his accomplishments, repeating many false claims he made throughout 2025.

    Among the topics about which he continued to spread falsehoods were the 2020 election, foreign policy, the economy and energy.

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    By MELISSA GOLDIN – Associated Press

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  • Philippines discovers new gas deposit near disputed South China Sea

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    MANILA, Philippines — Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. announced Monday the discovery of a new natural gas deposit near the disputed South China Sea, which could shield his country from a potential power crisis.

    The “significant discovery” northwest off Palawan province, close to an existing gas field in waters adjacent to the critical waterway, could eventually supply power to more than 5.7 million households or nearly 200,000 schools for a year, Marcos said, adding further tests and another drilling in the area would be done “to pursue more potential gas resources.”

    The undersea reservoir is estimated to contain about 98 billion cubic feet (2.7 billion cubic meters) of gas. Initial tests showed 60 million cubic feet (1.6 million cubic meters) of gas could be extracted daily from the well, Marcos said, without providing further details, including when commercial production could start.

    “This helps Malampaya’s contribution and strengthens our domestic gas supply for many years to come,” Marcos said. “Aside from the natural gas, the discovery also includes condensate, which is a high-value liquid fuel.”

    The new gas deposit, called Malampaya East 1, was discovered by a consortium about 5 kilometers (3.1 miles) east of the main Malampaya gas field, where commercial gas production started more than two decades ago and was projected to considerably decline in a few years.

    “We’re proud that Filipinos led this drilling and, more importantly, they completed it without any accident or environmental incidents,” Marcos said.

    The Malampaya gas-to-power facility has generated more than 20% of Luzon’s electricity, the most populous northern Philippine island region. In 2023, Marcos extended an exploration contract in Malampaya by 15 years.

    Experts have predicted Malampaya could run out of gas in a few years, sparking fears of a potential power crisis in Luzon, where the bustling capital and main financial and business district is located.

    The offshore gas field lies within the country’s Exclusive Economic Zone of the Philippines, a 200-nautical-mile (370-kilometer) stretch of water from a country’s coastline where it has exclusive rights to explore and harness resources under the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea.

    Philippine efforts to explore for oil and gas in another offshore region, the Reed Bank, have been stalled for years because of opposition from Beijing, which claims sovereignty over the area along with most of the South China Sea. The Reed Bank also lies in the fringes of the South China Sea west of the Philippine island province of Palawan.

    China has opposed Vietnam’s oil and gas exploration in the disputed region. Beijing claims virtually the entire South China Sea and has reinforced its presence, including coast guard and naval patrols in the disputed waterway in recent years.

    Malaysia, Brunei and Taiwan have also been involved in the region’s long-simmering territorial standoffs.

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  • Climate activist predicts high electricity prices and Trump’s attacks on green energy will hurt GOP

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    RIPTON, Vermont — At a time when the Trump administration rolled back numerous environmental regulations while global temperatures and U.S. carbon pollution spiked, longtime climate activist Bill McKibben finds hope in something that didn’t seem that strong on a recent single-digit-temperature day: the sun.

    That sun has provided him cheap power for 25 years, and this month he installed his fourth iteration of solar panels on his Vermont home. In an interview after he set up the new system, he said President Donald Trump’s stance against solar and other cheap green energy will hurt the GOP in this year’s elections as electricity bills rise.

    After the Biden and Obama administrations subsidized and championed solar, wind and other green power as answers to fight climate change, Trump has tried to dampen those and turn to older and dirtier fossil fuels. The Trump administration froze five big offshore wind projects last month but judges this week allowed three of the projects to resume. Federal clean energy tax incentives expired on Dec. 31 that include installing home solar panels.

    Meanwhile, electricity prices are rising in the United States, and McKibben is counting on that to trigger political change.

    “I think you’re starting to see that have a big political impact in the U.S. right now. My prediction would be that electric prices are going to be to the 2026 election what egg prices were to the 2024 election,” said McKibben, an author and founder of multiple environmental and activist groups. Everyday inflation hurt Democrats in the last presidential race, analysts said.

    The Trump administration and a bipartisan group of governors on Friday tried to step up pressure on the operator of the nation’s largest electric grid to take urgent steps to boost power supplies in the mid-Atlantic and keep electricity bills from rising even higher.

    “Ensuring the American people have reliable and affordable electricity is one of President Trump’s top priorities,” said White House spokesperson Taylor Rogers.

    Globally, the price of wind and solar power is plummeting to the point that they are cheaper than fossil fuels, the United Nations found. And China leads the world in renewable energy technology, with one of its electric car companies passing Tesla in annual sales.

    “We can’t economically compete in a world where China gets a lot of cheap energy and we have to pay for really expensive energy,” McKibben told The Associated Press, just after he installed a new type of solar panels that can hang on balconies with little fuss.

    When Trump took office in January 2025, the national average electricity cost was 15.94 cents per kilowatt-hour. By September it was up to 18.07 cents and then down slightly to 17.98 cents in October, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.

    That’s a 12.8% increase in 10 months. It rose more in 10 months than the previous two years. People in Maryland, New Jersey and Maine have seen electricity prices rise at a rate three times higher than the national average since October 2024.

    At 900 kilowatt-hours per month, that means the average monthly electricity bill is about $18 more than in January 2025.

    This week, Democrats on Capitol Hill blamed rising electric bills on Trump and his dislike of renewable energy.

    “From his first day in office, he’s made it his mission to limit American’s access to cheap energy, all in the name of increasing profits for his friends in the fossil fuel industry. As a result, energy bills across the country have skyrocketed,” Illinois Rep. Sean Casten said at a Wednesday news conference.

    “Donald Trump is the first president to intentionally raise the price of something that we all need,” Hawaii Sen. Brian Schatz, also a Democrat, said Wednesday on the Senate floor. “Nobody should be enthused about paying more for electricity, and this national solar ban is making everybody pay more. Clean is cheap and cheap is clean.”

    McKibben has been sending excess electricity from his solar panels to the Vermont grid for years. Now he’s sending more.

    As his dog, Birke, stood watch, McKibben, who refers to his home nestled in the Green Mountains of Vermont as a “museum of solar technology” got his new panels up and running in about 10 minutes. This type of panel from the California-based firm Bright Saver is often referred to as plug-in solar. Though it’s not yet widely available in the U.S., McKibben pointed to the style’s popularity in Europe and Australia.

    “Americans spend three or four times as much money as Australians or Europeans to put solar panels on the roof. We have an absurdly overcomplicated permitting system that’s unlike anything else on the rest of the planet,” McKibben said.

    McKibben said Australians can obtain three hours of free electricity each day through a government program because the country has built so many solar panels.

    “And I’m almost certain that that’s an argument that every single person in America would understand,” he said. “I don’t know anyone who wouldn’t say: ‘I’d like three free hours of electricity.’”

    __

    Swinhart reported from Vermont. Borenstein reported from Washington. Matthew Daly contributed to this report from Washington.

    __

    The Associated Press’ climate and environmental coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP’s standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org.

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  • Meet the self-made billionaire who bought a nearly bankrupt company off Warren Buffett for $1,000 and turned it into a $98 billion giant | Fortune

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    A small investment made at the right moment has the power to launch ordinary people to millionaire status. All it took was $1,000 and an out-there idea for Jeffrey Sprecher, the founder and CEO of Intercontinental Exchange, to set his business on a path to becoming a $98 billion behemoth.

    “I had this idea that you should be able to trade electric power, buy and sell electric power, on an exchange,” Sprecher recalled recently at the Rotary Club Of Atlanta. But there was a huge caveat: He “had no idea how to do that. I’d never worked on Wall Street, I never traded.” 

    At the time, Sprecher had heard that Continental Power Exchange—owned by Warren Buffett’s electric utility company, MidAmerican Energy—was about to go bankrupt. Despite Buffett’s business pumping $35 million into it, the company was still struggling. And so Sprecher saw this as an opportune moment to swoop in and pursue his entrepreneurial vision. 

    “I bought the company for a dollar a share, and there were a thousand shares. So I bought it for $1,000, and I used that as the basis to build Intercontinental Exchange.”

    Thanks to his quick thinking and business savvy, Sprecher now boasts a net worth of $1.3 billion. But the journey to the top was not very glamorous. 

    Living in a 500-ft studio and driving a used car while scaling the business 

    That measly $1,000 investment made back in 1997 served as the launchpad for Intercontinental Exchange, founded just three years later. A small team of nine employees set off to build the technology in 2000; setting up shop in Atlanta, Georgia, Sprecher and his staffers went all-in on building the business up from its former demise. 

    It was all hands on deck, and even as the founder and CEO, Sprecher was doing the menial labor to keep everything in order. With money being tight, the entrepreneur lived in a small apartment and drove a used car to the office to keep Intercontinental Energy afloat.

    “I bought a 500-foot, one room studio apartment in Midtown…I bought a used car that I kept and I’d go into the office from time to time,” Sprecher explained, adding that he “took the trash out, shut the lights out, answered the phone, bought the staplers and the paper for the photocopier. That was the way the company started.”

    Nearly 26 years later, the company boasts a market cap of $98 billion and a team of more than 12,000 employees—and has proudly owned the NYSE for over a decade. 

    Entrepreneurs who made a key investment at the right moment

    Some of the wealthiest entrepreneurs made their billions by spotting the perfect window to invest small and earn big. 

    Take Kenn Ricci as an example: the serial American aviation businessman and chairman of private jet company Flexjet is a billionaire thanks to his intuition to buy a struggling business four decades ago. After being put on leave from his first pilot job out of the Air Force, he turned a sticky situation into a 10-figure fortune.

    “I worked for [airline] Northwest Orient for a brief period of time. I get furloughed. Unemployed, back living with my parents,” Ricci told the Wall Street Journal in a 2025 interview, reminiscing on how he made his first $1 million.

    But instead of throwing in the towel, he spotted a golden opportunity. Ricci took a contract pilot job at Professional Flight Crews, and one of the companies he flew for was private aviation company Corporate Wings. The budding businessman was intrigued when its owners put the business up for sale at $27,500 in 1981—and jumped on the opportunity to buy it. By the early 1990s, the business was pulling in $3 million a year.

    But people don’t need to buy and scale a company to make a worthwhile investment; millennial investing wiz Martin Mignot became a self-made millionaire thanks to his ability to spot unicorn companies before they make it big. One of his biggest wins was an early investment in Deliveroo—back when the business was just a small, London-based operation. 

    “They had eight employees. They were in three London boroughs. Overall, they had a few 1000 users to date, so it was very, very early,” Mignot told Fortune last year. “They didn’t have an app. Their first website was pretty terrible and ugly, if I’m frank, but the delivery experience was incredible.”

    Lo and behold, Deliveroo grew to become a $3.5 billion company with millions of global customers. And as a partner at Index Ventures, Mignot is part of a team reaping billion-dollar rewards from forward-thinking investments in tech businesses including Figma, Scale AI, and Wiz. Aside from his day job, Mignot has also strategically put money towards iconic European start-ups including Revolut, Trainline and Personio. Before he was even 30, he solidified himself as a notable investor—and advised others that “It’s about owning equity, that is the key.”

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    Emma Burleigh

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  • Asian shares are mixed and US futures edge higher after Wall Street steadies

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    BANGKOK — Asian shares were mixed Friday after Wall Street broke a two-day losing streak and edged back toward record levels, helped by advances for Big Tech companies like Nvidia.

    U.S. futures advanced and oil prices slipped.

    Tech shares regained momentum after Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co., a major supplier to the industry, reported strong profits and investment plans. TSMC gained 3% early Friday and Taiwan’s benchmark Taiex was up 1.9%.

    The frenzy around AI has sent Nvidia and other superstar stocks to dizzying heights, stirring criticism that their prices had shot too high. Nvidia rose 2.1% on Thursday after TSMC’s Chief Financial Officer Wendell Huang said it’s seeing “continued strong demand” in an encouraging signal for the entire AI industry.

    TSMC’s stock that trades in the United States rose 4.4% on Thursday.

    The gains also followed the signing of a U.S.-Taiwan trade deal involving $250 billion in new investments by Taiwan’s semiconductor and tech companies in the U.S. In exchange, the Trump administration will cut tariffs on Taiwanese goods. The deal aims to establish a strategic economic partnership and upgrade U.S. industrial infrastructure.

    In Tokyo, the Nikkei 225 shed 0.3% to 53,936.17, while Hong Kong’s Hang Seng gave up 0.6% to 26,770.56. The Shanghai Composite index lost 0.3% to 4,101.91.

    China is due to report its economic growth data for 2025 on Monday. Forecasts are for the economy to have expanded at about a 4.5% annual pace, slowing from earlier in the year.

    Elsewhere in Asia, South Korea’s Kospi rose 0.9% to a record 4,840.74. The benchmark has been trading at record highs for weeks, helped by a recovery in confidence in AI-related shares. Samsung Electronics gained 3.5%.

    In Australia, the S&P/ASX 200 gained 0.5% to 8,903.90. India’s Sensex rose 0.4%.

    Wall Street steadied on Thursday as stocks related to artificial-intelligence bounced back.

    The S&P 500 rose 0.3% and the Dow Jones Industrial Average added 0.6%. The Nasdaq composite rose 0.2% to 23,530.02.

    Easing oil prices also helped to calm investors’ jitters.

    Early Friday, a barrel of benchmark U.S. crude cost $59.21, up 14 cents from a day earlier. It sank 4.6% on Thursday after Trump said he had heard “on good authority” that plans for executions in Iran had stopped amid widespread protests against the country’s leadership.

    Brent crude, the international standard, added 10 cents to $63.86 per barrel. It dropped 4.1% on Thursday.

    Financial markets took Trump’s comments about Iran as a signal that tensions flaring above some of the world’s largest oil deposits could ease, which in turn could lower the possibility of disruptions to oil supplies.

    Earnings reporting season for big U.S. companies continued to pick up pace, meanwhile, with several more big financial companies delivering their results for the last three months of 2025.

    “As we dive into the heart of earnings season in the coming weeks, tech results will be scrutinized in far greater detail.,” Ipek Ozkardeskaya of Swissquote said in a commentary.

    “Concerns around circular AI deals, leverage and delayed returns on investment remain front of mind for investors. These are compounded by rising electricity and metals costs, higher memory-chip prices, and the risk of supply disruptions,” she said.

    BlackRock, the giant that’s now overseeing more than $14 trillion in investments, rose 5.9% after reporting stronger profit and revenue than analysts expected.

    Encouraging reports on the U.S. economy contributed to the upbeat mood.

    One said fewer workers applied for unemployment benefits last week in an indication layoffs may be slowing. Other reports said manufacturing was significantly stronger in the mid-Atlantic region and in New York state than economists had forecast.

    The stronger-than-expected data on the U.S. economy helped stocks of smaller companies to lead the market. Their profits can be tied more closely to the strength of the U.S. economy than their bigger, multinational rivals, and the Russell 2000 index rose 0.9%.

    In other dealings early Friday, the U.S. dollar fell to 158.19 Japanese yen from 158.63 yen.

    The euro rose to $1.1614 from $1.1609.

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  • How the White House and governors want to fix AI-driven power shortages and price spikes

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    The White House and a bipartisan group of governors are pressuring the operator of the mid-Atlantic power grid to take urgent steps to boost energy supply and curb price hikes, holding a Friday event aimed at addressing a rising concern among voters about the enormous amount of power used for artificial intelligence ahead of elections later this year.

    The White House said its National Energy Dominance Council and the governors of several states, including Pennsylvania, Ohio and Virginia, want to try to compel PJM Interconnection to hold a power auction for tech companies to bid on contracts to build new power plants,

    The Trump administration and governors will sign a statement of principles toward that end Friday. The plan was first reported by Bloomberg.

    “Ensuring the American people have reliable and affordable electricity is one of President Trump’s top priorities, and this would deliver much-needed, long-term relief to the mid-Atlantic region,” said Taylor Rogers, a White House spokeswoman.

    Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro is expected to be at the White House, a person familiar with Shapiro’s plans said, speaking on condition of anonymity ahead of the announcement. Shapiro, a Democrat, made his participation in Friday’s event contingent on including a provision to extend a limit on wholesale electricity price increases for the region’s consumers, the person said.

    But the operator of the grid won’t be there. “PJM was not invited. Therefore we would not attend,” said spokesperson Jeff Shields.

    It was not immediately clear whether President Donald Trump would attend the event, which was not listed on his public schedule.

    Trump and the governors are under pressure to insulate consumers and businesses alike from the costs of feeding Big Tech’s energy-hungry data centers. Meanwhile, more Americans are falling behind on their electricity bills.

    Consumer advocates say ratepayers in the mid-Atlantic electricity grid — which encompasses all or parts of 13 states stretching from New Jersey to Illinois, as well as Washington, D.C. — are already paying billions of dollars in higher bills to underwrite the cost to supply power to data centers, some of them built, some not.

    However, they also say that the billions of dollars that consumers are paying isn’t resulting in the construction of new power plants necessary to meet the rising demand.

    Pivotal contests in November will be decided by communities that are home to fast-rising electric bills or fights over who’s footing the bill for the data centers that underpin the explosion in demand for artificial intelligence. In parts of the country, data centers are coming online faster than power plants can be built and connected to the grid.

    Electricity costs were a key issue in last year’s elections for governor in New Jersey and Virginia, a data center hotspot, and in Georgia, where Democrats ousted two Republican incumbents for seats on the state’s utility regulatory commission. Voters in New Jersey, Virginia, California and New York City all cited economic concerns as the top issue, as Democrats and Republicans gird for a debate over affordability in the intensifying midterm battle to control Congress.

    Gas and electric utilities sought or won rate increases of more that $34 billion in the first three quarters of 2025, consumer advocacy organization PowerLines reported. That was more than double the same period a year earlier.

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  • How the White House and governors want to fix AI-driven power shortages and price spikes

    [ad_1]

    The White House and a bipartisan group of governors are pressuring the operator of the mid-Atlantic power grid to take urgent steps to boost energy supply and curb price hikes, holding a Friday event aimed at addressing a rising concern among voters about the enormous amount of power used for artificial intelligence ahead of elections later this year.

    The White House said its National Energy Dominance Council and the governors of several states, including Pennsylvania, Ohio and Virginia, want to try to compel PJM Interconnection to hold a power auction for tech companies to bid on contracts to build new power plants,

    The Trump administration and governors will sign a statement of principles toward that end Friday. The plan was first reported by Bloomberg.

    “Ensuring the American people have reliable and affordable electricity is one of President Trump’s top priorities, and this would deliver much-needed, long-term relief to the mid-Atlantic region,” said Taylor Rogers, a White House spokeswoman.

    Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro is expected to be at the White House, a person familiar with Shapiro’s plans said, speaking on condition of anonymity ahead of the announcement. Shapiro, a Democrat, made his participation in Friday’s event contingent on including a provision to extend a limit on wholesale electricity price increases for the region’s consumers, the person said.

    But the operator of the grid won’t be there. “PJM was not invited. Therefore we would not attend,” said spokesperson Jeff Shields.

    It was not immediately clear whether President Donald Trump would attend the event, which was not listed on his public schedule.

    Trump and the governors are under pressure to insulate consumers and businesses alike from the costs of feeding Big Tech’s energy-hungry data centers. Meanwhile, more Americans are falling behind on their electricity bills.

    Consumer advocates say ratepayers in the mid-Atlantic electricity grid — which encompasses all or parts of 13 states stretching from New Jersey to Illinois, as well as Washington, D.C. — are already paying billions of dollars in higher bills to underwrite the cost to supply power to data centers, some of them built, some not.

    However, they also say that the billions of dollars that consumers are paying isn’t resulting in the construction of new power plants necessary to meet the rising demand.

    Pivotal contests in November will be decided by communities that are home to fast-rising electric bills or fights over who’s footing the bill for the data centers that underpin the explosion in demand for artificial intelligence. In parts of the country, data centers are coming online faster than power plants can be built and connected to the grid.

    Electricity costs were a key issue in last year’s elections for governor in New Jersey and Virginia, a data center hotspot, and in Georgia, where Democrats ousted two Republican incumbents for seats on the state’s utility regulatory commission. Voters in New Jersey, Virginia, California and New York City all cited economic concerns as the top issue, as Democrats and Republicans gird for a debate over affordability in the intensifying midterm battle to control Congress.

    Gas and electric utilities sought or won rate increases of more that $34 billion in the first three quarters of 2025, consumer advocacy organization PowerLines reported. That was more than double the same period a year earlier.

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  • Machado says she presented her Nobel Peace Prize to Trump

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    WASHINGTON — Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado said she presented her Nobel Peace Prize medal to President Donald Trump at the White House on Thursday even as he has questioned her credibility to take over her country after the U.S. ousted then-President Nicolás Maduro.

    The Nobel Institute has said Machado could not give her prize to Trump, an honor that he has coveted. Even if it the gesture proves to be purely symbolic, it was extraordinary given that Trump has effectively sidelined Machado, who has long been the face of resistance in Venezuela. He has signaled his willingness to work with acting President Delcy Rodríguez, who had been Maduro’s second in command.

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    Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.

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    By WILL WEISSERT, JOEY CAPPELLETTI and REGINA GARCIA CANO – Associated Press

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  • California wants to mix hydrogen with gas to cut climate pollution. Critics say that poses risks

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    Alma Figueroa began to worry when she learned that her gas provider wanted to test a controversial solution to curb global warming: blend hydrogen with natural gas to power her stove and other appliances. Figueroa, who has asthma and recently learned her lung cancer is back, worries about health risks.

    “I don’t want to be anyone’s experiment,” said Figueroa, 60, a resident of Orange Cove in California’s Central Valley.

    The Southern California Gas Co. wants to blend and inject hydrogen into the town’s gas infrastructure, after the state agency that regulates utilities directed them and other companies to launch pilot projects. Proponents see it as key to helping California reduce planet-warming pollution by curbing reliance on gas while integrating cleaner energy into existing infrastructure. It’s part of a statewide effort to create safety rules for hydrogen blending. But opponents say it poses unnecessary risks, and Orange Cove’s mostly Latino and low-income residents say processes are happening without transparency or their input. Projects in states such as Colorado and Oregon have also raised concerns.

    Interest in deploying hydrogen boomed during the Biden administration but has been hard hit with the Trump administration’s cancellation of billions of dollars for hydrogen technology and other clean energy projects, including $1.2 billion for a hydrogen hub in California.

    The Orange Cove project is one of five proposed in California to test how gas pipelines and the appliances they fuel hold up with different amounts of hydrogen. Hawaii has been blending for decades.

    Natural gas is mostly methane, a potent planet-warming gas that’s supercharging extreme weather worldwide, which often impacts low-income and communities of color the most.

    Supporters see green hydrogen as one way to cut emissions. It’s made with renewable energy sources such as solar or wind to power an electrolyzer, which splits water into oxygen and hydrogen, a carbon-free gas that can be used to generate electricity and complement intermittent renewable energy. California Gov. Gavin Newsom has touted it “an essential aspect of how we’ll power our future and cut pollution.”

    Some see the 18-month proposed project in Orange Cove as one step in that direction. A solar farm would power the technology and direct the mixture, up to 5% hydrogen, to businesses and the town’s roughly 10,000 residents. The estimated $64.3 million project would be paid for with ratepayer money.

    A Minneapolis utility company estimated a blend of up to 5% green hydrogen would reduce carbon pollution by about 1,200 tons annually, the equivalent of removing 254 gas-powered cars.

    Janice Lin of the Green Hydrogen Coalition said it’s important to test blending. The U.S. has a vast network of gas pipelines — about 3 million miles, according to the Department of Energy — which can be used to move clean hydrogen while reducing reliance on gas, she said. If scaled, it could be cost-competitive and help industries that can’t fully electrify pollute less.

    “The way to move us away and really clean our air and minimize our reliance on fossil fuels is by having a viable alternative,” she said.

    California needs to demonstrate that it can blend like other countries but there are still unknowns, said Alejandra Hormaza, who teaches renewable energy at California State Polytechnic University, Pomona. The consensus is that up to 20% hydrogen by volume is safe, she said, but “we need more experimental work that uses real natural gas infrastructure to fully understand the impacts of hydrogen.”

    In 2022, several gas companies filed a joint application to pursue hydrogen blending. The California Public Utilities Commission is expected to make a decision this year.

    SoCalGas first proposed testing hydrogen blending in facilities at the University of California, Irvine, in an affluent community. But it scaled back and revised its proposal following protests. When Orange Cove leaders expressed interest, the gas company identified the city an ideal candidate — it has various pipeline materials, including steel and polyethylene, a type of plastic, and only one gas feed coming in, allowing them ample control of the blend.

    Orange Cove city leaders voted unanimously in support. They did not respond to multiple calls and emails seeking comment. But in an August public hearing, Mayor Diana Guerra Silva said the project would provide workforce opportunities for youth and boost business from visitors, according to a transcript.

    At the hearing, resident Angelica Martinez said the town could become a “pioneer” in hydrogen blending and “deserves the national recognition and attention for its willingness to implement such an innovative project.”

    Orange Cove is a citrus farming town home to mostly Spanish-speaking Latino immigrants, with 39% of the total population living in poverty, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. It’s an area with much pollution and the highest rate of asthma in Fresno County.

    Figueroa said the community historically hasn’t gotten involved in city politics, though they have launched a petition against the project and voiced concerns at public meetings. “I think the only reason they are wanting Orange Cove is because they don’t think there’s going to be pushback,” she said. Some residents said they’ve asked city officials to host a town hall about the pilot, but it has yet to happen.

    Research shows that burning hydrogen-blended gas into older appliances not designed for it can increase emissions of nitrogen oxides, pollutants that worsen asthma and are linked to other respiratory issues. It can deteriorate certain materials and leak more easily, increasing the risk of explosions because hydrogen is more flammable.

    Ryan Sinclair, an environmental microbiologist at Loma Linda University, said homes with older appliances are more vulnerable to these risks — in older infrastructure, a 5% mix can bump nitrogen oxides emissions an average of 8%. Residents can’t opt out unless they replace their gas appliances with electric ones, and Sinclair worries Orange Cove’s low-income residents don’t have the means to replace or maintain older ones. He said more health risk assessments are needed before starting hydrogen blending.

    Cal Poly’s Hormaza, who’s researched hydrogen leakage from gas systems for the last decade, said there’s insufficient research on whether hydrogen can increase leaks.

    There are also concerns about hydrogen’s potential to increase Earth’s warming. Research shows hydrogen can indirectly heat the planet by interacting with other gases.

    Environmental groups say hydrogen should only be used in high-energy industries such as aviation, cement or steel-making, which can’t easily be electrified. Others say that electrifying appliances, for example, are more efficient ways to reduce emissions.

    “To me, it’s just an absurd project. It’s (a) boondoggle” that exposes residents to unnecessary risks, said Michael Claiborne, directing attorney with Leadership Counsel for Justice and Accountability, an advocacy group representing residents.

    If the projects are approved, SoCalGas has said it will employ safety measures before, during and after the project, including with leak surveys and detection technology, backflow prevention to keep hydrogen within the controlled area, and developing emergency responses.

    Orange Cove resident Francisco Gonzalez has friends with asthma and siblings with respiratory issues, so he worries about the health risks. His community is not against change or clean energy, he said, “but we are against being left out of the conversation.”

    ___

    Associated Press writer Jennifer McDermott contributed to this report from Providence, Rhode Island.

    ___

    The Associated Press receives support from the Walton Family Foundation for coverage of water and environmental policy. The AP is solely responsible for all content. For all of AP’s environmental coverage, visit https://apnews.com/hub/climate-and-environment

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  • Meta signs three nuclear power deals to help support its AI data centers

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    Facebook parent Meta has reached nuclear power deals with three companies as it continues to look for electricity sources for its artificial intelligence data centers.

    Meta struck agreements with TerraPower, Oklo and Vistra for nuclear power for its Prometheus AI data center that is being built in New Albany, Ohio. Meta announced Prometheus, which will be a 1-gigawatt cluster spanning across multiple data center buildings, in July. It’s anticipated to come online this year.

    Financial terms of the deals with TerraPower, Oklo and Vistra were not disclosed.

    The Mark Zuckerberg-led Meta said in a statement on Friday that the three deals will support up to 6.6 gigawatts of new and existing clean energy by 2035.

    “These projects add reliable and firm power to the grid, reinforce America’s nuclear supply chain, and support new and existing jobs to build and operate American power plants,” the company said.

    Meta said its agreement with TerraPower will provide funding that supports the development of two new Natrium units capable of generating up to 690 megawatts of firm power with delivery as early as 2032. The deal also provides Meta with rights for energy from up to six other Natrium units capable of producing 2.1 gigawatts and targeted for delivery by 2035.

    Meta will also buy more than 2.1 gigawatts of energy from two operating Vistra nuclear power plants in Ohio, in addition to the energy from expansions at the two Ohio plants and a third Vistra plant in Pennsylvania.

    The deal with Oklo, which counts OpenAI’s Sam Altman as one of its largest investors, will help to develop a 1.2 gigawatt power campus in Pike County, Ohio to support Meta’s data centers in the region.

    The nuclear power agreements come after Meta announced in June that it reached a 20-year deal with Constellation Energy.

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  • Lebanon signs gas exploration deal with international consortium amid economic crisis

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    BEIRUT — BEIRUT (AP) — Lebanon ’s government on Friday signed a deal with an international consortium to explore gas in an offshore area bordering Israel.

    The deal for exploration at the so-called Block 8 off the coast of southern Lebanon comes after Lebanon and Israel signed a 2022 agreement over their maritime border. The new deal is the latest to be granted by Lebanon to international companies to search for gas in its territorial waters.

    Cash-strapped Lebanon hopes that future gas discoveries will help the small Mideast nation pull itself out of the worst economic and financial crisis in its modern history.

    The deal was signed at the government’s headquarters in downtown Beirut by Energy Minister Joe Saddi from the Lebanese side and officials from the international consortium consisting of France’s TotalEnergies, Italy’s ENI, and state-owned oil and gas company Qatar Energy.

    TotalEnergies said in a statement that the consortium plans to start with a 1,200-square kilometer (463 square mile) 3D seismic survey to assess the area’s exploration potential.

    In 2017, Lebanon approved licenses for France’s TotalEnergies, Italy’s ENI and Russia’s Novatek to move forward with offshore oil and gas development for two of 10 blocks in the Mediterranean Sea, including one that was at the time in a disputed part with neighboring Israel.

    The companies did not find viable amounts of oil and gas in one of the blocks north of Beirut, and drilling in another in the south was repeatedly postponed because of the maritime border dispute with Israel. Lebanon and Israel later signed a deal over their maritime border in 2022.

    In August 2023, an offshore drilling rig began operations in the Mediterranean Sea off Lebanon’s coast.

    That did not give positive results, but Patrick Pouyanné, Chairman and CEO of TotalEnergies, said in a statement that they will keep trying in other areas.

    “We remain committed to pursue our exploration activities in Lebanon,” said Pouyanné. ” We will now focus our efforts on Block 8, together with our partners Eni and QatarEnergy and in close cooperation with Lebanese authorities.”

    On Oct. 8, 2023 Lebanon’s Hezbollah started firing rockets toward Israeli posts along the border to back its Hamas allies a day after the Palestinian group attacked southern Israel. The war lasted 14 months during which Hezbollah was severely weakened.

    In January 2023, Lebanon, ENI, TotalEnergies and state-owned oil and gas company Qatar Energy signed an agreement in which the Qatari firm replaced Novatek. Under the deal, Qatar Energy takes Novatek’s 20% stake in addition to 5% each from ENI and TotalEnergies, leaving the Arab company with a total stake of 30%. TotalEnergies and ENI will each have 35% stakes.

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  • Asian shares and US futures advance, as Tokyo’s Nikkei 225 hits a record high

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    BANGKOK — Asian shares logged strong gains, with Tokyo’s benchmark closing at a record high on Tuesday, after a broad rally on Wall Street.

    Oil prices fell back after surging Monday following the capture by U.S. forces of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro in a weekend raid.

    Japan’s Nikkei 225 gained 1.3% to 52,518.08, beating its Oct. 31 record, on strong buying of tech related shares like precision tools maker Disco Corp., which jumped 6.1%.

    South Korea’s Kospi also pushed further into record territory, gaining 1.5% to 4,525.98, buoyed by gains for automakers and some electronics manufacturers.

    Hong Kong’s Hang Seng surged 1.5% to 26,748.80, and the Shanghai Composite index was up 1.5% at 4,082.36, it’s highest level in four years.

    In Australia, the S&P/ASX 200 slipped 0.5% to 8,682.80.

    Taiwan’s Taiex climbed 1.6%, while in India, the Sensex shed 0.5%.

    Monday’s gains on Wall Street were broad, with particularly big jumps for energy companies and banks. Elsewhere, industrial companies and retailers joined in to help boost major indexes.

    The S&P 500 rose 0.6%, ending just below its record set in late December. The Dow Jones Industrial Average set a record, adding 1.2% to 48,977.18.

    The Nasdaq composite rose 0.7%.

    Smaller company stocks had a particularly strong day, outpacing other indexes, in a sign of broader investor confidence. The Russell 2000 rose 1.6%.

    Energy companies and the oil market were a key focus after the capture of Maduro by U.S. forces. The price of U.S. crude jumped 1.7% to $58.32 per barrel. The price of Brent crude, the international standard, rose 1.7% to $61.76 per barrel.

    However, oil fell back early Tuesday. U.S. crude shed 18 cents to $58.14 per barrel, while Brent crude lost 12 cents to $61.64 per barrel.

    Chevron jumped 5.1%, Exxon Mobil rose 2.2% and Halliburton surged 7.8% for some of the strongest gains in the market after President Donald Trump floated a plan for U.S. oil companies to help rebuild Venezuela’s oil industry.

    Venezuela’s oil industry has been decimated by neglect and international sanctions and may require years of substantial investments to restore past production levels.

    Investors will get several updates on the U.S. economy this week.

    On Monday, the Institute for Supply Management released its manufacturing index for December showing the sector continued shrinking. More importantly, the business group will release its December report on the services sector on Wednesday. The services sector makes up the bulk of the U.S. economy and it grew, even if only slightly, throughout most of 2025.

    Reports on the job market later this week, which include updates for job openings and overall employment, will be a bigger focus for the Federal Reserve. The U.S. central bank has been weighing a slowing job market against risks for rising inflation as it decides whether to cut interest rates. It cut its benchmark rate three times late in 2025, but inflation has remained above its 2% target and that has made the Fed more cautious.

    Wall Street still expects the Fed to hold rates steady at its upcoming meeting later in January.

    Technology companies, especially artificial intelligence, were in the spotlight Monday as the industry kicked off the annual CES trade show in Las Vegas. Nvidia fell 0.4% and Applied Materials jumped 5.7%.

    AI advances helped propel the broader market to a series of records in 2025. Updates from influential technology companies could help shed more light on whether the big investments in AI are worth the potential financial risks.

    In other trading early Tuesday, the U.S. dollar slipped to 156.28 Japanese yen from 156.40 yen. The euro rose to $1.1739 from $1.1724.

    Gold gained 0.5% after a 2.8% jump on Monday. The price of silver added another 2.9% after soaring 7.9% on Monday. Such assets are often considered safe havens in times of geopolitical turmoil. The metals have notched record prices over the last year amid lingering economic concerns brought on by conflicts and trade wars.

    Bitcoin fell back 1.3% after rising to its highest level since mid-November, falling to about $93,700.

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  • Trump’s plan to seize, revitalize Venezuela’s oil industry faces major hurdles

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    President Donald Trump’s plan to take control of Venezuela’s oil industry and ask American companies to revitalize it after capturing that country’s president in a military raid isn’t likely to have a significant immediate impact on oil prices. Venezuela’s oil…

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    By JOSH FUNK – AP Business Writer

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