Navigating and addressing rural and remote energy issues is a key priority for State Energy Offices as they seek to advance their states’ energy affordability, resiliency, reliability, decarbonization, and economic development goals. Specific topics of interest include the energy-agriculture nexus, clean energy project and infrastructure siting, economic development and workforce opportunities, community engagement, energy program and project development, and partnerships with other state agencies, the federal government, and the private sector. To identify and address these areas, State Energy Offices are setting up programs targeting rural and remote communities, establishing advisory task forces and committees, conducting feasibility studies, and bringing on staff to facilitate energy outreach. The recent influx of federal funding has also provided additional pathways for states to support rural and remote communities in addressing their energy needs. 

The NASEO Rural Energy Working Group meets on a quarterly basis in the form of educational webinars and forums; depending on the topic, these engagements may be open to all NASEO members or by invitation only. These meetings provide an opportunity for peer-sharing and information exchange by bringing in expert speakers from the private sector, federal government, and rural communities to share insights.

Through the Rural Energy Working Group, State Energy Officials can explore fellow state approaches to rural energy access and clean energy deployment; identify opportunities and impediments (technical and non-technical); identify and express state priorities and interests; inform policy, planning, programs, and regulation; consider unregulated and member-driven electric sector investments and implications; and advance road map and pilot options.

Upcoming Webinars:

  • September 19 2025, 2:00 p.m. – 3:00 p.m. ET – NASEO Rural Energy Working Group Webinar: Bioenergy Market and Policy Overview for States - Please join NASEO for our 2025 Q3 Rural Energy Working Group Meeting, which will kick off a series of educational webinars on bioenergy, exploring federal programs and resources as well as how states can drive economic development opportunities, emerging research and development, and comprehensive state energy planning around bioenergy. Please register here and reach out to Jasmine Xie (jxie@naseo.org) with any questions.

Past Webinars and Events:
  • April 29, 2025, 4:00 – 5:00 PM ET - NASEO Rural Energy Working Group Webinar: State Roles in Bolstering Agricultural Energy Efficiency
    This NASEO Rural Energy Working Group webinar featured presentations from state agencies in Oregon, New York, and Colorado about boosting agricultural energy efficiency through end-to-end grant and technical assistance programs. Panelists discussed state initiatives to develop educational materials, assist in grant writing and identifying stackable incentives or funding, and providing no-cost site audits to inform future resources and programming. 
  • January 14, 2025, 2:00 – 3:00 p.m. ET: NASEO Rural Energy Working Group Webinar: Building Capacity and Energy Investments for Rural Communities - This webinar featured presentations from Climate United and the Appalachian Regional Commission on their organizations’ initiatives to financially support and build capacity among rural communities for energy development, transition, and resilience. The speakers shared insights into how State Energy Offices could support this work and approaches to engaging underserved communities.
  • October 28, 2024, 2:00-3:15 p.m. ET: NASEO-IEDC State Clean Energy-Based Economic Development Working Group Meeting (State and Territory Energy Offices and Economic Development Organizations Only) - NASEO and IEDC's State Clean Energy-Based Economic Development Working Group convened a joint meeting, in partnership with NASEO’s Rural Energy Working Group, focused on rural workforce development and supporting clean energy development in rural areas. The State Clean Energy-Based Economic Development Working Group, jointly facilitated by NASEO and the International Economic Development Council (IEDC), brings together State Energy Offices and state and regional Economic Development Organizations to strategize on common priorities, learn from experts, and share best practices to promote clean energy-related economic development and maximize the potential of federal clean energy investments.
  • July 17, 2024, 3:00 – 4:00 p.m. ET: NASEO Rural Energy Working Group Meeting (States, Territories, and Affiliates Only) - The NASEO Rural Energy Working Group relaunched with its first quarterly meeting of 2024 to present the objectives and mission of the Working Group. The Working Group will address key issues impacting energy use on rural lands and agricultural operations. Key focus areas include options for renewable energy development on rural lands, efficient energy and water use in agricultural operations, and geographic equity in developing energy efficiency programming. This meeting also welcomed remarks from several states on relevant partnerships and funding available from the federal government to advance rural energy priorities and support communities.
  • May 7, 2024, 2:00 – 3:00 p.m. ET: NASEO-NARUC Microgrids State Working Group Webinar: Improving Energy Resilience with Rural and Remote Microgrids – The NASEO-NARUC Microgrids State Working Group and NASEO Rural Working Group convened a webinar on microgrids in rural and remote areas. Microgrids are an important avenue for improving resilience, reliability, and decarbonization in rural and remote communities and states are key leaders in facilitating RD&D of those projects. This webinar featured presentations on state initiatives, coordination with rural electric cooperatives and rural and remote communities, and specific projects under development.
  • Tuesday, November 14, 2023, 2:00 – 3:00 pm ET: NASEO Rural Energy Working Group Webinar: Agrivoltaics - The Benefits and Potential of Dual Use Solar on Agricultural Lands – Agrivoltaics (solar generation systems co-located on farmland) avoid disruptive land use, help productive agricultural land remain operational while preserving the natural environment, and allow farmers and ranchers to diversify their income. Several states are exploring the ability of agrivoltaics to simultaneously support food production, land conservation, and energy production, and incentives, programs, and policies that can accelerate research and construction of agrivoltaics. This webinar featured presentations from Jordan Macknick of the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, Grace Fletcher of the Massachusetts Department of Energy Resources, and Samantha Levy of the American Farmland Trust on some of these activities and provide an opportunity for states to better understand the technology and what role it can play in their agricultural communities. Preceding the webinar, NASEO held a states-only meeting of the Rural Working Group from 1:30 - 2:00 pm ET to discuss the webinar topic in more detail, along with doing a round robin of state rural energy topic priorities.
  • August 15, 2023, 3:00 – 4:00 pm ET: NASEO Rural Energy Working Group Webinar: Carbon Sequestration in the Agricultural Sector: Challenges and Opportunities – Farmers and ranchers have an opportunity to manage sector wide and nationwide greenhouse gas emissions through soil carbon sequestration. States, the federal government, and the private sector are advancing soil carbon sequestration through incentives, technical assistance, and data collection, which presents an economic development opportunity for rural areas and agricultural stakeholders. This webinar provided information on the process for carbon sequestration in soil, the benefits and challenges, and practitioner perspectives from experts at the Iowa State University, the California Department of Food and Agriculture, and the Western Sustainability Exchange. Following the webinar, NASEO held a states-only meeting of the Rural Working Group from 4:00 – 4:30 pm ET to discuss the webinar topic in more detail along with other rural priorities. 
  • June 8, 2023: NASEO Rural Energy Working Group Webinar: State Energy Office Approaches to the Energy-Agriculture Nexus – The intersection between the energy and agriculture sectors is being explored across the country as states look for opportunities to support clean energy, lower costs, and increase resilience along the agricultural value chain. Farmers and ranchers can leverage funding opportunities (e.g., programs through the U.S. Department of Agriculture) to deploy such strategies as agricultural facility and equipment energy efficiency improvements, energy and water efficient growing and harvesting technologies, soil-based carbon sequestration, and clean energy deployment. This webinar featured presentations from Abigail Hasenfus of the Rhode Island Office of Energy Resources and Kari Heinrich of the Wisconsin Public Service Commission Office of Energy Innovation that discussed programs that engage rural and agricultural communities, along with success stories and challenges.
  • June 15, 2023: NASEO Webinar: Fostering Economic Diversification in Coal Communities - State and local governments are exploring a variety of pathways to foster economic diversification in coal communities across the country through just transition roadmaps, state-local task forces, and targeted grant and workforce training programs. These efforts and partnerships will help identify and provide alternative revenue streams to local communities and support the transition to a more decarbonized economy. During this webinar, speakers shared insights and resources on successes and challenges in identifying economic diversification opportunities on the state, local, and federal level.

In July 2023, NASEO, in partnership with the Mississippi Development Authority (MDA), Energy and Natural Resources Division (the State Energy Office), was awarded an Energizing Rural Communities Prize by the U.S. Department of Energy Office of Clean Energy Demonstrations. The objective of the Prize was to support innovative partnerships in Mississippi that could alleviate energy reliability and energy burden challenges faced by the rural community of Blue Mountain, Mississippi.

Phase One of the project was implemented from July 2023 to July 2024, during which NASEO and MDA assisted in identifying additional project team partners. These project partners included the Blue Mountain Mayor’s Office; New Albany Light, Gas & Water (NALGW), a municipal utility servicing the town of Blue Mountain and its surrounding area; and the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA), which provides bulk power to the municipal utility through a power purchase agreement. The team came together to identify a pathway for mitigating frequent energy outages in Blue Mountain. A solar and storage microgrid was identified as the most affordable, resilient, and clean solution for Blue Mountain that would also provide economic, decarbonization, and health benefits for the community.

Through this project, NASEO and MDA advanced this productive and strategic partnership, convened in-person meetings to promote peer learning and facilitate community engagement among local residents and decision-makers, and developed written and presentation materials on best practices around this teaming approach that other states could leverage for their own rural community engagement. In September 2024, Blue Mountain, Mississippi was announced as one of 33 communities awarded funding through Phase Two of the Prize, which will enable NALGW to develop and issue a solicitation to conduct a feasibility study for the clean energy microgrid in Blue Mountain. This will provide valuable data and information on cost, location, permitting, and sizing for the eventual construction of the clean energy microgrid to alleviate energy outages experienced by the town.

Federal Program Highlights:

  • The Environmental and Energy Study Institute showcases three rural cooperatives that were awarded clean energy grants by the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Powering Affordable Clean Energy in Rural Areas (PACE) program. This partially forgivable loan program supports solar and storage battery projects for rural communities and has a $1 billion budget authority. These three case studies were part of a first cohort of five awardees announced in March 2024, receiving a total of $139 million.
  • The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) launched their Communities Sparking Investment in Transformative Energy (C-SITE) Funding Opportunity to provide $18 million in financial awards and technical assistance to advance community-identified energy priorities, spanning various technology areas including building efficiency and/or electrification, energy infrastructure upgrades, microgrid development and deployment, renewable energy, workforce development, and more. Eligible recipients include local government and tribal entities, which have until May 31, 2024, to submit full applications.
  • The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) and U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) launched the Rural and Agricultural Income and Savings from Renewable Energy (RAISE) Initiative to help farmers reduce costs and increase income through the use of underutilized renewable energy technologies such as distributed wind. Some of the activities include technical assistance to support Rural Energy for American Program (REAP) applications, funding for research into and outreach on new business models for collaborations of farmers to earn income from distributed wind, funding for a distributed wind Competitiveness Improvement Project (CIP) which will fund technology development and commercialization, a joint educational webinar series from DOE and USDA, and the development of a guide for farmers on distributed wind that will include technical, economic, and geospatial analysis.

State Program Highlights:

Written Resources:

Selected Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act Provisions:

Selected Inflation Reduction Act Provisions:

Annual Programs through the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA):

For more information about the NASEO Energizing Rural Communities Prize Project, please watch the video below: