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🌐 This week in Supercool: Deployed

Author

Josh Dorfman
February 04, 2026

This is Deployed — Supercool's weekly newsletter tracking where the low-carbon economy is scaling up.

If it isn't operational, it isn't Deployed.

Our third edition tracks concrete examples from across the U.S. and around the world—about how the future we want is being built.

This week, we head to Indiana, where solar is scaling faster than many realize—the state has climbed to #12 in installed capacity. To Jiangsu province in China, where a 600 MW compressed-air storage plant just went live, not far from where I taught English at the Nanjing University of Science & Technology back in 1995. And to the state of Georgia, where a commercial-scale factory has just opened to recycle old solar panels, capable of reaching 5 GW annually.

The low-carbon economy is underway everywhere. Through Deployed, we show you how it's building each week.

DEPLOYED

What went operational this past week.

Energy
Riverstart Solar IV, EDP Renewables' newest project in Randolph County, generates enough electricity annually to power 28,800 homes and brings the company's Indiana total to 2 GW, making it the state's largest wind and solar operator. Indiana currently ranks 12th among U.S. states in installed solar capacity.

Grid | Energy
The New England Clean Energy Connect, Iberdrola's completed transmission line, delivers 1.2 GW from Quebec via a 145-mile HVDC (high-voltage direct current) line running from the Canadian border through Maine, and will supply nearly 10% of Massachusetts’ electricity. The $1.65 billion line will expedite electrification in New England, enhance grid reliability, and reduce energy costs.

Grid | Waste Heat
Switzerland’s CERN is now recovering waste heat from the Large Hadron Collider and feeding it into a district-heating network in the nearby town of Ferney-Voltaire in France. Two 5-MW heat exchangers capture heat that would otherwise be lost to the atmosphere, supplying the equivalent of several thousand homes and avoiding thousands of tonnes of CO₂ emissions compared with fossil-fuel heating.

Grid | Storage
The world’s largest compressed air energy storage plant, located in Jiangsu Province, compresses air into an underground salt cave and later releases it to spin turbines and generate electricity—enough to cover the annual electricity use of about 600,000 households. The system uses no lithium, cobalt, or exotic materials—relying on compressed air, underground storage, and molten salt. BloombergNEF describes compressed-air storage as one of the most cost-effective options for long-duration energy storage.

The EcoCeres SAF plant in Malaysia.

Industry | Fuels
EcoCeres' facility in Malaysia produces 420,000 tonnes of sustainable aviation fuel annually, converting waste feedstocks into jet fuel at commercial scale. The plant makes Hong Kong–headquartered EcoCeres one of the world's leading SAF producers and positions Malaysia as a regional production hub for waste-based SAF supply.

The new All-Electric Fire Station in Somerville, MA.

Buildings
The town of Somerville's first new fire station in nearly 50 years is fully electric—no gas boilers, no combustion. The 10,000-square-foot facility in one of Greater Boston's fastest-growing districts signals the arrival of fossil-free municipal infrastructure as cities upgrade aging fire stations, libraries, and other public safety buildings.

The new Mass Timber library in Redmond, OR.

Buildings
Speaking of which—merging civic and climate infrastructure, Redmond just opened a public library built with mass timber and powered by rooftop solar. Deschutes Public Library's two-story, all-electric building features an exposed wood structure and solar panels that meet 100% of annual energy needs. The library includes flexible spaces for making, meeting, and co-working, plus a civic plaza for outdoor programming.

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SUPERCOOL ECOSYSTEM

Operational updates from companies we’ve featured.

Circular Economy
Solarcycle’s (Supercool — podcast | newsletter) 255,000-square-foot facility in Cedartown is designed to process thousands of end-of-life panels each week, recovering high-value materials such as silver, copper, aluminum, and glass. The company says it can recover up to 96% of material value while keeping panels out of landfills. Solarcycle is ramping toward 1 million panels per year and a full run rate of 5 GW annually.

Grid | Energy
Smart panel maker Span (Supercool — podcast | newsletter) is raising approximately $176 million in a Series C, according to an SEC filing, with $163 million in equity sold to date. The company is expanding beyond residential electrification into utility partnerships, pitching SPAN Edge as an at-the-meter grid tool to manage load growth from EVs, heat pumps, and other new electric demand—without the cost of upgrading poles, wires, and transformers.

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HORIZON

Not yet deployed, but we’re tracking.

Vineyard Winds’ final turbine tower heading out to sea.

Energy
Vineyard Wind shipped its 62nd and final turbine tower from the New Bedford port less than 24 hours after a federal court lifted the project suspension. What remains: 10 blade sets, 30 individual blades, to complete America’s first commercial-scale offshore wind farm.

Mobility
Pilot, America's largest travel center operator, is installing Tesla Semi chargers at locations along I-5, I-10, and other high-demand corridors across California, Georgia, Nevada, New Mexico, and Texas. Each site will operate 4 to 8 charging stalls, delivering up to 1.2 MW per stall and recharging most of a truck's 500-mile range in about 30 minutes. Construction starts in the first half of 2026.

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If you see something go live—opened, launched, commissioned, connected, shipped—to accelerate the low-carbon economy, hit reply and send it to me. 

Deployed is selective about what’s really moving the needle, and tips make it better!

Josh

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