California’s cap-and-trade program is starting 2017 on a strong note ahead of its first quarterly auction on February 22. Despite an uneven performance last year, the state’s carbon market is strengthening through rising prices as legal certainty over its future takes shape.

Many states are examining a “value of solar” rate to resolve net energy metering disputes. However, by valuing only solar, they are missing the opportunity to take advantage of other growing distributed energy resources (DER) like energy efficiency, demand response, or energy storage.

The world is turning away from highly polluting, high-carbon energy sources, but America may be at risk of marching in the opposite direction. If we fail to take advantage of clean energy’s potential, we fail to control our fate. Let’s not forfeit our energy destiny to other countries.

Debates about the future of America’s electricity system have long centered on a binary choice between lowering costs or decreasing pollution. But that has changed. In many parts of the country, new renewables are simply the cheapest resource.

California, the world’s sixth-largest economy and a bastion of progressivism, is now being hailed as a kind of great blue firewall—Democrats’ most important bulwark against the retrograde policies of Donald Trump. Here’s what the Golden State is already doing to counter the president-elect on a range of major issues and defend its progressive achievements.

Days before Donald Trump becomes president, fear is running high that climate denial in the White House will accelerate global warming. At this pivotal moment, when the world is committed to fighting climate change through the breakthrough U.N.’s Paris Agreement, California can trump climate denial by pushing forward faster than ever.

According to reports… Trump is preparing for everything from a witch hunt against our government’s foremost climate scientists to de-funding the Environmental Protection Agency. Do the Bay Area’s most level-headed researchers and earth-science experts respond to Trump’s ascension with similarly grabby quips?

The California carbon market could rebound from a sluggish 2016 — assuming it survives the new year. “Emitters have an incentive to buy early, as long as prices are at the floor. In light of this, I would expect an average of at least 80 percent of offered allowances to be sold and perhaps higher,” Energy Innovation director of research Chris Busch said.

The story from Lazard’s 10th annual report on levelized cost of energy (LCOE) is clear. Rapid technology cost reductions mean wind and solar are now the cheapest form of generation in many places around the country, without federal subsidies like tax credits. The time is now to radically adjust for a paradigm where wind and solar form the backbone of our electricity grid.

Two days before the presidential inauguration, scientists are expected to announce that 2016 was the hottest year on Earth since record-keeping began in 1880 ​— news that will test national, state and economic leadership on climate change.

California’s latest carbon allowance auction could be up to 80% subscribed, a pair of analysts predicted, bucking the trend of weak bidder demand seen for much of the past year.

The power industry has always had to visualize scenarios. Many have used simulation games as part of their training processes. But never before has gaming been positioned to have the kind of impact on the energy system as it does today.

Any changes or repeal of President Obama’s signature Clean Power Plan will depend heavily on the outcome of a legal challenge by a federal appeals court in Washington D.C. If the court rules that the EPA does not have the power to regulate, Pruitt and the Trump administration could try and simply rip the plan up. But if the rule is found to be legal, then Pruitt will have to find a way to either change some provisions or begin the long and laborious process of writing an entirely new plan with much less ambitious targets.

President-elect Donald J. Trump has long pledged to undertake a profound policy shift on climate change from the low-carbon course President Obama made a cornerstone of his eight years in the White House. But will a President Trump noticeably affect the globe’s climate in ways that, say, a President Hillary Clinton would not have?

President-elect Donald J. Trump has packed his cabinet with nominees who dispute the science of global warming. He has signaled he will withdraw the United States from the Paris climate agreement. He has belittled the notion of global warming and attacked policies intended to combat it. But California, a state that has for 50 years been a leader in environmental advocacy, is about to step unto the breach.

Back in January, I suggested 2016 was the year for wholesale power market reform. So, was it? While shifts in these kinds of institutions take longer than one year, we’ve seen real progress on the four factors that made 2016 a turning point, and we believe progress will continue in 2017.

While President-Elect Trump may try reversing climate policy, other forces are reducing emissions without pause. Technology, economics, and state policy will increasingly force fossil fuels to remain where they belong: in the ground. The reality is most of the world’s coal, oil, and natural gas will remain buried underground forever, no matter who occupies the White House.

Microsoft Corp. founder Bill Gates and a cadre of billionaire partners rolled out long-awaited details yesterday for how they plan to channel billions of dollars toward development of promising new low-carbon technologies.

Donald Trump’s election and presidential transition has revived debate over the roles various energy sources should play in a secure, reliable, affordable and clean U.S. electricity system. Moving beyond rhetoric, actual data show the market forces driving clean energy are likely to continue, regardless of federal policy under a President Trump. Let’s look at the numbers.

The forces driving clean energy are likely to continue progressing regardless of efforts by President-elect Donald Trump to reverse them, a leading expert in energy policy said last week at Stanford University. “…We’re going to lose a lot of good stuff, but it’s not as bleak for this purpose as one might expect,” said Hal Harvey, CEO of Energy Innovation during a Nov. 28 lecture at Stanford.