The Crystal Mall in Waterford closes permanently on March 31 as General Dynamics Electric Boat converts the space into offices and training facilities to support an ambitious plan to hire 8,000 new employees in 2026, including 4,500 in the Southeast Connecticut region.

Connecticut utilities are now incentivizing businesses to host battery systems on their properties to help flatten electricity demand spikes, creating an opportunity for commercial customers to generate income while reducing their own utility costs and gaining backup power.

IBEW Local 430 has filed plans to build an 11,500 square foot union hall in Mount Pleasant, Wisconsin to replace its current facility in Racine, serving approximately 150 members as both a business office and meeting hall.

EEI and IBEW presented Senators Susan Collins and Jack Reed with the John D. Dingell Award for their sustained bipartisan support of the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program, with Collins securing a $20 million funding increase to bring total LIHEAP funding to $4 billion in FY2026.

A UPenn Kleinman Center policy blog identifies five key risk categories reshaping the US grid: locational congestion, temporal price uncertainty, volume variability from renewables, extreme weather tail risk, and flawed regulatory design, as demand from AI data centers and electrification accelerates.

Per a new EIA report, wind and utility scale solar generated a record 17 percent of US electricity in 2025, up from less than 1 percent in 2005. Utility scale solar rose 34 percent year over year, while combined wind and solar reach 19 percent when residential installations are included.

The IBEW called for transparency and regulatory scrutiny following a second round of CBS News layoffs and plans to shut down CBS News Radio, warning that a proposed merger of CBS News with CNN raises serious questions about the future of union broadcasting jobs.