by Jeff Ihnen | May 9, 2023 | Energy Rant
Last year I wrote that the Supreme Court of the United States, SCOTUS, ruling in the West Virginia case, is a sign of things to come. That case buried a fork in the Obama administration’s Clean Power Plan. The legislative and executive branches would have to modify...
by Michaels Energy | May 2, 2023 | Energy Rant
This week’s Energy Rant was guest written by Teri Lutz, Director of Sales & Marketing at Michaels Energy. Teri believes in a fair and just energy economy and hopes this Rant edition will inspire our readers to get involved and advocate for environmental justice...
by Jeff Ihnen | Apr 25, 2023 | Energy Rant
This week I’m repackaging recent news on electric vehicle (EV) developments – market, technical, and utility impacts. I like to look at scale (macro) rather than ubiquitous siloed micro thinking. Is it realistic to scale rare earth mineral mining, battery...
by Jeff Ihnen | Apr 17, 2023 | Energy Rant
The snow has melted for now, although a foot of snow is forecasted overnight as I draft this. The lake ice is gone, and folks are Jonesing for open water fishing. Back in the day, when my father was still with us, we fished to eat because he said so. In our home state...
by Jeff Ihnen | Apr 10, 2023 | Energy Rant
As we prepare to take our energy storage solutions to market, I gathered recent news reports, analyzed them all, and came to some conclusions. I concluded that utilities, and especially regulators, need to think differently. What got us here – constant load growth and...
by Michaels Energy | Apr 5, 2023 | The Big Why
In case you haven’t heard, heat pumps are a thing now. As their efficiency and performance in cold climates continue to improve, heat pumps have become the backbone of energy efficiency and decarbonization efforts and are a focal point of the Inflation Reduction Act....
by Jeff Ihnen | Apr 3, 2023 | Energy Rant
My passion is applying the right technology in the right place and at the right time for maximum effectiveness. Not coincidently, that is precisely Michaels Energy’s purpose for existence: minimizing waste and maximizing value. Last week I wrote about the gargantuan...
by Jeff Ihnen | Mar 28, 2023 | Energy Rant
Washington Post headline last week: “World is on brink of catastrophic warming, U.N. climate change report says.” Wolf! Wolf! People aren’t serious about decarb, and this post will prove it, but I provide ways to get it done. Is Solar Plus Storage Competitive? Solar...
by Jeff Ihnen | Mar 21, 2023 | Energy Rant
Although, or maybe because Michaels Energy has provided research and evaluation services for about 25 years, I’ve been a consistent critic of evaluation, measurement, and verification (EMV), and I’ll tell you why in several chapters. Chapter 1 Resource Acquisition...
by Jeff Ihnen | Mar 13, 2023 | Energy Rant
One of the nasty results of the Covid lockdowns was the meteoric growth of electric bikes. I thought, great. Let’s take the only means of exercise for some people and power it with a battery and motor to take away physical propulsion via the human body. Would you like...
