RMI

05/31/2026

From starting state energy efficiency programs to coordinating with wholesale market operators, US governors have multiple avenues to address rising energy costs for households in their states.

As governors design affordability packages and tackle the challenge of balancing near-term relief with long-term affordability, they can consider the timing of impact, the size of benefits, and the persistence of relief provided by different policies.

RMI’s analysis explores insights from 37 states and provides a blueprint for promoting energy affordability through governor action. https://ow.ly/7TxS50Z2jJJ

05/30/2026

Grid reliability concerns are rising along with electricity demand growth. As regulators and grid planners prepare for potential future outages, current experienced outages need to also be evaluated to make sure that customers are paying for grid investments that actually meet their needs.

To produce an affordable, reliable grid, regulators and grid planners can:

➡️ Use RMI’s new Reliability Dashboard to learn more about state reliability, inform system planning practices, and improve the way that reliability data is tracked and reported.

➡️ Deploy available technologies that address the specific reliability issues localities face today, keeping in mind the evolving grid.

➡️ Intentionally plan for resilience to major events via improved forecasting and infrastructure.

As utilities ask consumers to pay more for their investments amid soaring bills, data-backed and informed decisions matter now more than ever.

RMI’s new grid Reliability Dashboard can bhelp grid planners target solutions to reduce customer outages.

05/23/2026

US governors can work independently or with a variety of other actors to promote energy affordability for households and businesses in their states.

Energy affordability is a complex problem that needs holistic solutions. There’s no one-size-fits-all approach to address the challenges driving energy costs. RMI’s Electricity Affordability Toolkit identifies affordability policies across four key focus areas: safeguards for vulnerable customers, cost control, cost distribution, and customer agency.

Across the country, we found that governors addressed each of these types of policies, with cost control policies being the most popular. https://ow.ly/jXWQ50Z2jvB

05/22/2026

Grid reliability concerns are rising along with electricity demand growth in the US. Regulators and grid planners need to evaluate current outages to make sure that customers are paying for grid investments that actually meet their needs.

Over the past decade, extreme weather and failures on the distribution system — the lower-voltage wires connecting homes and businesses to the bulk electric grid — have been the primary causes of customer outages in the US.

Recent policy decisions have focused on energy generation to address reliability, but the amount of energy available and where it comes from matters little to a customer if their distribution system fails to deliver it to them. Intentional planning for resilient infrastructure is key to advancing reliability for all customers.

Use RMI’s new Reliability Dashboard to learn more about your state’s reliability, inform system planning practices, and improve the way that reliability data is tracked and reported so that grid investments truly reduce customer outages ➡️ https://ow.ly/3TcG50Z3mxH

05/21/2026

Electric vehicles (EVs) and conventional cars and trucks share a common challenge: Both perform best in moderate temperatures and lose range in very cold or very hot weather. That’s a key reason why weather plays such a big role in aggregate power demand to charge growing numbers of EVs. Grid-wide, seasonal temperature shifts can have big implications for grid planning.

RMI’s latest update to the GridUp EV load forecasting tool examines how seasonal changes affect EV charging demand. When temperatures move away from that middle range, EVs use more energy for heating or cooling, leaving less for travel.

Thus, for utilities and regulators, there’s a big difference between planning for an average day versus another day in frigid January or sweltering August. Real-world conditions put more pressure on the grid.

The tool’s new seasonal scenarios are designed to help planners better understand and prepare for these patterns. As EV adoption grows, factoring in how extreme weather amplifies charging demand will be key to making smart, cost-effective infrastructure decisions.

Learn more: https://ow.ly/5VVo50Z2XBo

05/21/2026

Virtual power plants (VPPs) can help utilities meet growing electricity demand in the United States more quickly and cost-effectively than building traditional power plants — if they are properly modeled in the grid planning process.

VPPs aggregate distributed energy resources such as batteries, electric vehicles, smart thermostats, and other connected devices that can provide utility-scale and utility-grade services.

Although VPPs have become increasingly prevalent in state regulatory filings, these mentions do not indicate that utilities are fully accounting for the value that VPPs are providing to their systems.

RMI’s insight brief shares how utilities can include VPPs in their modeling on equal footing with other planning elements: https://ow.ly/5ntQ50Z2eWM

05/20/2026

The United States needs more grid hardware to meet surging electricity demand, integrate new energy generation resources, and upgrade aging poles and wires. Lead times and prices for transformers, switchgear, and power cables have soared in recent years, which is already impacting electricity bills, threatening reliability, and stalling critical projects.

Manufacturing more grid components in the US can help reduce supply chain risk while creating jobs, supporting economic growth, and improving energy security and affordability: https://ow.ly/sk6F50Z2cRR

05/19/2026

Carbon Dioxide Removal (CDR) has grown fast in the last decade. Researchers, entrepreneurs, and early buyers have been launching companies, funding projects, and testing innovative ways to remove and store CO₂, from mineralizing it in concrete to pulling it from the ocean.

But it needs to go faster still to achieve the multi-gigaton scale needed by 2050. And to do that, we need to strengthen demand signals that are currently concentrated and uneven.

In a new insight brief, we highlight three important demand trends already gaining traction in the CDR space. For each trend, we share case studies that illustrate existing successes and actions that can support and scale emerging demand.

Learn more 👉 https://ow.ly/HBpg50YZM0S

05/18/2026

On a global scale, the estimated 81 million metric tons of methane that the oil and gas industry squanders annually through venting and leaking its gas has an estimated economic value today of $20 billion to $50 billion a year, depending on highly variable gas prices.

Taking action to stop methane leaks helps bolster energy, economic, and environmental security: https://ow.ly/4ECN50Z0kGp

05/17/2026

Governors are in a unique position to promote energy affordability because of their role as state decision makers and their ability to affect change through a variety of tools like executive orders, legislative agendas, and regulatory directives.

RMI compiled data on governor-led actions between January 2023 and January 2026 and analyzed them across several dimensions to understand how governors are choosing to address this complex issue and to identify examples that others might replicate: https://ow.ly/VCQ950Z0jyo