The Anatomy of a Power Outage in Michigan

The power went out. Then the ice melted. A few days later, the snow came, and the power went out– again. Now that the snow is gone, what’s next?

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Terrorists Blew Up Power Infrastructure This Weekend. The Media Barely Noticed.

To be fair, there’s a lot of weird stuff going on these days. The wealthiest man in the world, with

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Want To Municipalize Your Utility? I Mean, Really?

DTE Energy is a disaster, as evidenced by its continued embrace of fossil fuels and its apocalypse-level outages. That doesn’t mean that a public option could do better. But there are some options for improving.

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But Weight, There’s More: The Achilles Heel of Electric Vehicles

Electric cars are generally far more efficient than gas-powered ones, as a matter of thermodynamics. But a new article looks at one huge problem with electric cars, and one that is often entirely disregarded in policy, regulation, and consumer economics, and that’s the factor of how much they weigh.

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The Future Is Electric. Mostly. But It’s Complicated.

Decarbonization is the buzzword du jour in the sustainability movement. Will it make everything more expensive? Maybe– but there are a few caveats to that.

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Solar Power and EV’s, If Your Local Grid Is Up For The Challenge

Power grids are complex things. Understanding the local grid capacity– as visualized by one mapping tool- can help us plan for things like rooftop solar or electric vehicle adoption.

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Time-Of-Use Pricing Is Coming. Here’s How To Make Sure You’re Ready.

Time-of-use pricing is (most likely) coming to a utility near you, if it hasn’t arrived already. Here’s what you need to know.

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Summer Breeze: Heat Pumps, Mini-Splits, and the Magic of Thermodynamics

Mini-splits are the coolest new thing. Literally. Here is a guide to how to figure out how to navigate the sea of product options based on a simple calculation.

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EV Charging Networks: Drive Infrastructure, Not Just Cars

A few weeks ago, I had a chat with some folks from A Major Automaker, one of the Big Two-And-A-Half,

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Centralization: Economy of Scale? Looming Disaster? Lil Bit of Both?

Streetcars, gas and water pipes, power lines, and other “invisible networks,” to borrow a line from the title of Ann Durkin Keating’s book, make up a vibrant history of infrastructure in which centralization vs. decentralization is a big debate.

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