Opponents of this private equity takeover include consumer advocates like the Attorney General, state lawmakers, utility customers, environmental groups, large power users, and a judge who reviewed the terms of the transaction. And yet!

so BlackRock is buying Minnesota Power (utility) & likely AES (utility) AND Aligned Data Centers & that's just this week cool cool

In approving this deal, Minnesota regulators made a very big bet that private equity ownership of a monopoly electric utility will yield vastly different results from private equity ownership in basically every other sector

The utility serving Indianapolis could be next to be swept up in BlackRock's spending spree on utilities, a prospect that has local ratepayer advocates "extremely concerned" www.ibj.com/articles/as-...

BlackRock is leading a consortium buying Minnesota Power in a private equity foray into utilities. The decision will be made tomorrow. Meanwhile, Gov. Walz's Department of Commerce flipped to supporting the deal, & emails show numerous contacts with the acquisition’s supporters. From James Baratta:

A group of state lawmakers is urging the Minnesota Public Utilities Commission to deny BlackRock's controversial bid to take over Minnesota Power, saying among other things that "the risks and harms would outweigh the minimal, short-term benefits" efiling.web.commerce.state.mn.us/documents/%7...

The same BlackRock subsidiary that’s trying to buy Minnesota Power over the objections of consumer advocates is also trying to buy AES, which has electric utilities in Indiana and Ohio www.reuters.com/markets/deal...

New from @apnews.com: A fight has erupted in northern MN over the proposed private equity buyout of Duluth-based utility Minnesota Power. If approved, the sale could determine how private equity firms expand their utility holdings amid a rush to cash in on data centers. apnews.com/article/big-...

Private equity firms are looking to buy electric utilities for a simple reason: there’s money to be made, and potentially quite a lot of it, on the backs of captive utility customers apnews.com/article/big-...

Private equity firms are looking to buy electric utilities for a simple reason: there’s money to be made, and potentially quite a lot of it, on the backs of captive utility customers apnews.com/article/big-...

A utility regulator had the audacity to scrutinize (and even reject) proposed rate hikes, and the utilities came for her job. A shameful indictment of a regulatory system complicit in incessant rate increases that drive profits for utility shareholders. boondoggle.substack.com/p/monopoly-u...

Netanyahu bragged about hijacking cell phones in Gaza to force the Palestinians he's starving to hear a speech that half the United Nations walked out on. What more can you say

Excellent reporting from Heated and Atmos. It looks like some of the biggest investors in the anti-trans movement are fossil fuel billionaires who are trying to use trans issues to ensure that Republicans pass policies favorable to their industry. heated.world/p/fossil-fue...

"BlackRock has a long history of investing in companies that trample tribal sovereignty. When profit is at stake, Indigenous rights are dismissed. That’s why Minnesotans should be deeply concerned about this proposed takeover of Minnesota Power." www.duluthnewstribune.com/opinion/colu...

Philadelphia's got a citywide commitment to decarbonization and a publicly owned methane gas utility that is making their customers pay for ad campaigns aimed at expanding gas use. "Why is a company that has no competition, why do they have to market at all?" YUP whyy.org/articles/pgw...

Quite an interesting revelation here given that this data center would be served by Minnesota Power, the utility that BlackRock is trying to acquire as it seeks to cash in on every part of the AI gold rush

The @sierraclub.org has been tracking U.S. utilities’ climate progress for five years. They’re doing worse now than ever before.

Who pays for wildfire damage? In the West, utilities are shifting the risk to customers. Utah laws cap wildfire damages and let utilities pass the cost onto customers. Utility lobbyists are pushing the model in other states. grist.org/wildfires/wh... #utilities #CA #California #Policy #Wildfire

St. Louis's utility provider, Ameren, almost tripled disconnections from July to August after it ended a tornado-prompted disconnection pause. This led to the Board of Aldermen passing a resolution calling for them to do more to protect customers. www.stlpr.org/health-scien...

Marissa Gillett, possibly the best utility regulator in the country, resigned from the Connecticut PURA this morning. She was forced out by Connecticut’s investor-owned utilities, who finally won their years-long, scorching campaign to oust her. A thread here about Gillett:

Proponents of BlackRock's takeover of Minnesota Power like to note the state Dept of Commerce supports the deal. But AG Ellison's office and others say many of the provisions that got Commerce on board are either already required or provide no benefit efiling.web.commerce.state.mn.us/documents/%7...

I talked to the four main Minneapolis mayoral candidates on some of the biggest crises facing the city and how they hope to govern if elected: www.mprnews.org/story/2025/0...

In Minnesota, BlackRock is attempting to acquire MN Power, a utility serving 150,000+ families and businesses. PESP's Alissa Jean Schafer told More Perfect Union why ratepayers should be wary of private equity plugging into the electrical grid: the PE playbook puts profiteering above all else.

If the Minnesota Public Utilities Commission signs off on BlackRock's plan to buy Minnesota Power, it will have ignored clear warnings from consumer advocates and a judge who've shown it's a bad deal likely to raise costs for utility customers www.duluthnewstribune.com/opinion/colu...

Commentary: Administrative Law Judge Megan McKenzie’s conclusion could not be clearer. The sale “would result in net harm to the public interest.” Will the PUC listen? PUC must unplug Minnesota Power’s pending sale to world’s largest private equity firm minnesotareformer.com/2025/09/18/p...

Xcel Energy cut off power to 52,549 Minnesotans who fell behind on their bills in 2024, far more than any other year in at least a decade. Meanwhile, the utility has pocketed over $1 billion in profits every year since 2015 and is seeking to raise rates yet again. www.startribune.com/xcel-is-cutt...

Wild fact from the utility/large-business settlement proposal in FPL’s rate case, via @shelbyisgreen.bsky.social. Every time I hear a politician describe the pro-monopoly, pro-utility, pro-rate hike position as “pro-business,” a part of me dies inside. energyandpolicy.org/key-decision...

Gas stove makers quietly delete air pollution warnings as they fight mandatory health labels. Manufacturers sued to stop a Colorado law requiring air quality warnings, arguing gas stoves are safe. Some of their websites once said the opposite. grist.org/accountabili... #Stove #Health #Gas #Policy

"Assault rifles turn survivable injuries into fatal ones. They turn small tragedies into mass tragedies." – Dr. Tim Kummer, first physician on the scene at the mass shooting at Church of the Annunciation. You can read his powerful testimony below, in full. minnesotareformer.com/2025/09/17/l...

An inspiring anti-corruption model for other states.

It's been over 10 years since Xcel Energy and CenterPoint Energy signed agreements to help advance the City of Minneapolis' clean energy goals yet a new report shows they're still way behind on every metric except the ones the city most fully controls mplscleanenergypartnership.org/documents/20...

RIP the man in the greatest one-shot five-minute phone call to Minnesota in movie history m.youtube.com/watch?v=Qeem...

Q: Do you think it would've been fitting to lower the flags to half staff when Melissa Hortman, the Minnesota House Speaker, was gunned down by an assassin? TRUMP: I'm not familiar. The who?

More than 6,000 public commenters have weighed in on Xcel Energy's latest proposal to hike Minnesota customers' rates, an unprecedented show of opposition with many citing exorbitant profits and executive pay www.eenews.net/articles/uti...

Chris Wright is genuinely a con man selling climate denial to the world in order to enrich himself and his gas industry friends. This should be a much bigger story.

Imagine if everyone policing how others talk about the dead stopped for a minute and applied just a fraction of those standards to how they speak about other living human beings

Minnesota Public Utilities Commission staff on BlackRock's proposal to buy Minnesota Power: "the private equity model is a poor choice for regulated utilities in general" efiling.web.commerce.state.mn.us/documents/%7...

🎶 Follow the money and you may find, a financial relationship, and opinions aligned 🎶 (about this Minnesota utility merger): vist.ly/46g3b

For the first time in our state's history, we are introducing major legislation known as the "RATEPAYER BILL OF RIGHTS" 🙌🏾 We were highlighted in the Michigan Advance. You can read more here: michiganadvance.com/2025/09/09/m...

"school shooting industry"

The Trump administration has already added nearly $40 billion in new federal subsidies for oil, gas, and coal in 2025, a report released Tuesday finds, sending an additional $4 billion out the door each year for fossil fuels over the next decade. And guess what, taxpayers are going to pay for it.

The Minnesota Public Utilities Commission will soon decide whether to approve BlackRock's acquisition of Minnesota Power which consumer advocates, environmental groups, and a judge warn would harm utility customers www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...

Michigan utilities DTE Energy and Consumers Energy awarded their executives bonuses for service reliability even as their customers suffered through some of the longest power outages in the nation www.mlive.com/news/2025/09...

The Michigan League of Conservation Voters lambasted Consumers Energy for failing to push back on a Trump Administration order to keep an aging coal plant open past its scheduled retirement, costing utility customers an estimated $1 million per day www.detroitnews.com/story/opinio...

holy shit dude using a fake deployment for wildland fire crews from a fire that’s only 13% contained during peak western US fire season to detain multiple firefighters and remove the crews from the fire is a scale of evil & dangerous I can’t fully communicate to people not from wildfire regions

JD Vance has arrived at Annunciation Catholic School in Minneapolis. Protestors chanted “shame” and “enough is enough” as the motorcade passed through.

If you're in the Twin Cities and have been meaning to switch to solar, now's the time. Federal tax credits expire at the end of the year plus there's a @solarunitedneighbors.org group buy program that reduces upfront costs and guides you through the process: www.mobilize.us/solarunitedn...

Even when they have strong bipartisan support, clean energy policies in Michigan are often thwarted by powerful monopoly utilities that are among the most prolific political donors in the state www.wmuk.org/wmuk-news/20...

"By the time Dan Besse clicked open the email message from [email protected], he knew something strange was going on with the campaign to support a local gas pipeline expansion." www.eenews.net/articles/how...

By me from Mohave county: ‘It happened so fast’ - the shocking reality of indoor heat deaths in Arizona as energy bill rise and federal aid shrinks www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...