(ENVIRONMENTAL) RACISM: ‘That’s just going to anger people’: Atlanta attorney shares commentary on opening week of Derek Chauvin trial and the defense’s strategy to shift blame (Atlanta Black Star), Derek Chauvin’s murder trial: eyewitnesses relive the trauma of watching George Floyd die (NewsOne), family files lawsuit after Black teen is brutally beaten by California police officers after alleged car chase (The Root), after Hurricane Harvey, a heated debate over flood control funds in Texas’ Harris county (InsideClimate News), Fort Belknap Indian Community sues to stop mine work (AP)
VOTER SUPPRESSION: Texas woman seeks appeal of five-year sentence after an attempt to vote as a felon (The Grio), Hank Aaron's grandson to Kelly Loeffler: 'please keep my grandfather’s name out of your mouth' (Blavity)
DENIAL: Big meat and dairy companies have spent millions lobbying against climate action, a new study finds (InsideClimate News), Mike Rowe’s new Discovery+ show is Big Oil-funded propaganda (Earther)
(ALLEGED) UTILITY CORRUPTION: Ohio’s [FirstEnergy] bribery scandal could cost the public billions more than previously thought (Grist), [FirstEnergy] funded a racist ad campaign tweets how it remains ‘committed’ to antiracism (Earther)
AGENCIES: Millions to see rate hikes under new flood insurance plan (E&E $)
DOI: Future of ‘broken’ oil program under review, Interior head says (Bloomberg $), Haaland on public lands drilling: Taxpayers deserve 'a return on their investment' (The Hill)
Haaland to create unit to investigate missing and murdered Native Americans (The Hill)
DOE: Biden's plan would supercharge research. Can DOE deliver? (E&E $), DOE offers prize to advance geothermal lithium extraction (E&E $), Energy Sec. Granholm: focus on renewable energy will protect U.S. ‘manufacturing backbone’ (PBS NewsHour)
LAWSUITS: Republicans trod well-worn path to court to sue Biden (AP)
THE HILL: Biden’s big infrastructure plan hits McConnell, GOP blockade (AP), how Biden's plan squares with congressional intentions (E&E $), Louisiana Republican sees room to work with Biden on carbon capture and hydrogen (Washington Examiner), Collins, King want to grow [Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative] (AP)
WHITE HOUSE: Biden economic adviser: 'It's important we upgrade our definition of infrastructure' (The Hill), Gina McCarthy: Clean energy standard to include nuclear, CCS (E&E $)
AMERICAN JOBS PLAN: Biden U.S. infrastructure ideas popular, but support for plan is partisan: Reuters/Ipsos poll (Reuters), Joe Biden’s infrastructure plan would take on the wreckage of drilling and mining (The Verge), Biden throws weight of US government behind clean energy (FT $), Biden aims billions of dollars at environmental inequity fight (Bloomberg Law), Biden calls his infrastructure plan bold. Bernie Sanders says more work must be done (CNN), Biden infrastructure plan puts water upgrades on tap as advocates press for stricter lead rule (Pittsburgh Post-Gazette $), Biden says with infrastructure bill U.S. may add 19 million jobs (Bloomberg $), Democrats put a loophole in their climate bill (Washington Examiner, top aides fill in more blanks on Biden's climate push (Axios), what Biden's infrastructure plan could do for permitting (E&E $), why Biden’s infrastructure plan is a green jobs plan (Bloomberg $)
HELPFUL SUGGESTIONS: GOP senator: smaller infrastructure package would be 'easy win' for Biden (The Hill, Politico Pro $)
POLITICS: Biden's green energy plans clash with pledge to create union jobs (Politico), Biden team defends climate plan amid progressive grumbling (E&E $), how Joe Biden tamed the left — at least for now (Washington Post $), White House: GOP has 'struggled' to explain opposition to infrastructure plan (The Hill)
CLIMATE DIPLOMACY: Biden’s infrastructure plan may reshape U.S.-China competition (Bloomberg $), how a battery plant dispute in Georgia pits Biden's climate goals against U.S. trade policy (Politico Pro $), India demands rich nations like the U.S. clean up their climate mess, signaling a shift (HuffPost), John Kerry says Biden’s ambitious climate plan is ‘not a counter to China’ (CNBC), Kerry: U.S. 'hopeful' it can work with China to tackle climate change (Reuters, The Hill)
CITIES AND STATES: Activists hail Massachusetts law as crucial step on environmental justice (The Guardian), city dwellers gained more access to public spaces during the pandemic – can they keep it? (The Conversation), rewilding our cities: beauty, biodiversity and the biophilic cities movement (The Guardian)
TEXAS: Texas Gov. Greg Abbott names construction industry lobbyist to Public Utility Commission (Dallas Morning News, Texas Tribune, E&E $, Houston Chronicle, RTO Insider, KXAN, Bloomberg $)
INDIANA: After local pushback, Indiana bill on wind, solar standards takes a '180 degree turn' (Indianapolis Star, AP)
IMPACTS: ‘Record-breaking’ temperatures to engulf Southwest, with ‘critical’ fire weather conditions possible (Washington Post $), Hurricane Center report details $2.9 billion cost from Delta (AP), it's the US' deadliest avalanche season in years. Experts say Covid is partially to blame (CNN), life in a remote Alaskan community on the front line of climate change (Yale Climate Connections)
TRANSPORTATION: America has long favored cars over trains and buses. Can Biden change that? (New York Times $), why activists distrust this plan to cut emissions from cars and trucks (Grist), got $80 billion for rail? Amtrak has a plan to spend it (Politico Pro $)
RENEWABLES: Democrats set to clash over whether nuclear and carbon capture would avert or hasten crisis (Washington Examiner), Catholic seminary installs a solar farm shaped like a cross (Yale Climate Connections), feds counter early research on large turbines, bird deaths (E&E $), in a world of big wind, there’s still a place for tiny turbines (Bloomberg $)
OIL & GAS: Fossil fuel companies got billions in bailouts, fired thousands of workers anyway (Earther), Pioneer Natural Resources to acquire DoublePoint Energy in $6.4 billion deal (Houston Chronicle)
PIPELINES: Environmental justice central to lawsuit over Tennessee [Byhalia Connection] pipeline (E&E $), fighting pipelines to the last mile (Grist)
COAL: India delays anti-pollution rules for coal power plants again (Bloomberg $), Kansas utilities are getting a new tool to retire coal plants. Will they use it? (Energy News Network)
UTILITIES: State of the Electric Utility 2021: Gas doubts rise, DER focus wanes, and 5 other key takeaways (Utility Dive)
EVs: Biden’s plan to rev up the electric car market is complicated by battery supplies (Washington Post $), Swedish researchers have developed a new kind of structural electric car battery (Jalopnik)
WATER: This river in Canada is now a ‘legal person’ (Al Jazeera)
GEOENGINEERING: Test flight for sunlight-blocking research is canceled (New York Times $)
ACTIVISM: LCV names new board members, adds union voice (E&E $), scuffles in London as thousands join 'kill the bill' rallies across Britain (Reuters), Tesla delivered 184,800 cars in the first quarter (Axios)
AVIATION: Supersonic travel is about to make a comeback (Axios)
BUILDINGS: The dirty secret of so-called 'fossil-fuel free' buildings (The Guardian)
INTERNATIONAL: India wields oil 'weapon' to cut dependence on Saudi (Reuters), World Bank confirms key elements of new climate action plan (Reuters)