1.  Decades ago, when gas was seen as the future of home heating, the practice of having existing utility customers pay for the connection of new customers was built into their bills as a fixed charge every month. The Minnesota Public Utilities Commission (PUC) is considering ending this policy as the installation of new pipelines to large users (for example, hyperscale data centers) will not only increase our costs, but also our use of fossil fuels, adding to carbon emissions.  Greenhouse gas emissions from Minnesota homes and apartment buildings have increased 38% over the past 17 years, and the largest source of these emissions is natural gas used for home heating and appliances.  That number has to go down in order to meet our state's climate goals, which is why the state Legislature has directed the PUC to review current gas policies.  Be aware of how we can stop expanding this fossil fuel system and move to cleaner, healthier technologies for home heating that benefit us all.  

2.  According to the Minnesota Center for Environmental Advocacy (MCEA), Minnesota gas utility customers pay roughly $34 million dollars each year to expand the gas utility system to add new customers, a practice that began decades ago to expand fossil fuel use in home heating and appliances.  The state Legislature has asked the Minnesota Public Utilities Commission (PUC) to reconsider this policy as large-scale new users (such as data centers) drive up the costs of subsidizing this current "free" option.  If a new customer had to pay to connect the gas line, they might instead opt for technologies that are better for our climate, such as heat pumps that are starting to take off as an alternative to gas furnaces.  Minnesota is also working on enabling broad-scale geothermal energy, so let policy makers know that our state policies should support the investment in these alternatives.

3.  Pope Leo XIV recently issued an open letter to "all people of goodwill" that set out a sweeping vision for corporate executives, politicians and individuals who will determine the future of artificial intelligence (AI).  The pope warns that we all will also be shaped by AI, requiring the safeguarding of humanity from AI's most disruptive effects.  Energy analysts at the Union of Concerned Scientists (ucs@ucs.org) have shown that utilities and other power managers are passing the costs of the massive amounts of energy for data processing onto consumers - because current regulatory practices allow them to do this.  UCS and others are working to prevent the data center boom from raising electricity bills, straining the electricity grid, and increasing reliance on polluting fossil-fueled power.  Legislation has been filed in Congress and several states that would prioritize clean energy generation to meet demand and ensure that corporations driving this demand assume a share of the costs.  Visit act.ucs.org/sp26-data-centers to stay updated on these efforts.  

4.  The Minnesota Conservation spring newsletter observes that the states in our region using the most wind and solar are the ones with the lowest electricity rates.   When we work together, Minnesotans can achieve clean, affordable energy, and already more than half of our electricity comes from clean sources.  That number is climbing, thanks to the 100% Carbon Free Electricity by 2040 law we passed in 2023, although we will need to keep protecting that law from efforts to weaken it with loopholes and workarounds.  Clean, renewable energy is a crucial part of mitigating the 51% increase in carbon dioxide and other man-made, heat-trapping greenhouse gases since 1850 that have triggered global warming, with the last three years being the warmest on record, worldwide.  Minnesota Star Tribune columnist Aaron Brown writes that "climate is about much more than carbon; it's the way we live, as cultural as it is ecological.  Climate solutions will improve people's lives, or they aren't solutions at all."