Articles by John Farrell
John Farrell is the author of Energy Self-Reliant States and a senior researcher at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance, where he focuses on renewable energy policy.
All Articles
-
![]()
![]()
The Democratizing Promise of Energy Storage
While energy storage is a small fraction of total power generation capacity, promising examples suggest that distributed energy storage could change the electricity system during the next decade as fundamentally as distributed renewable energy has in the last decade. Right now, 95% of energy storage in the U.S. is water pumped uphill into in reservoirs, […]
-
![]()
![]()
Better Building Codes Save Bundles [Chart]
How much money could you and your neighbors save on energy? That depends a lot on the building code, which states (and sometimes cities) can use to set minimum standards for energy efficiency. The U.S. Department of Energy has a nice chart of which state has adopted which code, but the following chart is useful in […]
-
![]()
![]()
Could Minnesota’s “Value of Solar” Make Everyone a Winner?
On Wednesday, Minnesota became the first state to allow utilities a new method of contracting with distributed solar producers, called the market-based “value of solar.” If adopted by utilities, it will fundamentally change the relationship between solar-producing customers and their electric utility. Following Minnesota’s Value of Solar Process? Here are a few resources: Part 1 […]
-
![]()
![]()
Can a Novel City-Utility Partnership Green a Big City Grid?
In pursuit of a cleaner energy future last August, the city of Minneapolis came to the brink of putting a city-owned utility on the ballot. It was the culmination of a grassroots effort to get cleaner energy and local investment from the city’s energy utilities. It won’t be a city-owned utility on the agenda this […]
