California regulators approved on Thursday a proposal that will require utilities to buy more clean power, a measure backed by environmental groups. Under the proposal, utilities will have to buy at least 11,500 megawatts (MW) of capacity from zero-emitting or renewable resources between 2023 and 2026, which is enough to power about 2.5 million homes. The order will allow the state to respond better to extreme weather events and replace capacity expected to be lost from the retirement of the Diablo Canyon nuclear plant in 2024-2025 and several natural gas plants in the middle of the decade. This is the largest capacity procurement ordered at a single time by the California Public Utilities Commission (PUC) and the largest requiring only clean resources. The […]