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Residents of Puerto Rico are ready for energy democracy. Specifically, a resilient, renewable electricity system with equitably shared benefits. Is this vision possible for the island, whose democratic power is limited to begin with?

For this episode of the Local Energy Rules Podcast, host John Farrell speaks with guest Ingrid Vila, environmental engineer and founder of non-profit Cambio. After Puerto Rico’s many catastrophic grid failures, Vila and Cambio have re envisioned the island’s energy future in a proposal called ‘Queremos Sol.’ Vila explains why rooftop solar should power every home in Puerto Rico, reducing residential electricity rates and covering basic needs during future crises.

Listen to the full episode and explore more resources below — including a transcript and summary of the conversation.

Episode Transcript


Promoting Sustainable and Responsible Actions

Ingrid Vila came to work in renewable energy advocacy by way of environmental engineering. She specialized in water, but through her service in Puerto Rico’s government, began working with renewable energy as well. In 2015, Vila left her role in the government and founded Cambio, a non-profit organization based in San Juan, Puerto Rico. Her new mission? To work with communities on sustainable solutions in the solid waste, water, environmental justice, governance, and energy fields.

Vila describes Cambio’s overarching mission as establishing an equitable society with greater opportunities. The organization’s efforts are spent researching, designing, and implementing socially responsible policies. Vila refers to Cambio as an “actionable think tank.”

Turmoil After Hurricane Maria

Hurricane Maria struck Puerto Rico in September 2017 and in its wake, more than a million Puerto Ricans were left without power for months. It took the local utility, Puerto Rico Electric Power Authority, nearly a year to restore power to every person affected by the blackout. The vulnerability of the island’s electric grid became the overriding topic of discussion in Puerto Rico and captured audiences around the world. Vila describes this as a “tipping point” for her, as she turned her attention to renewable energy solutions.

“The impact those events had on our grid were incredibly severe and exposed the vulnerability of our current electrical system … we couldn’t just rebuild that because it obviously was not working adequately given the current challenges and realities of climate change.”

Despite Puerto Rico’s 100% Renewable Portfolio Standard, leaders are looking to rebuild the vulnerable old system and reinforce a dependence on fossil fuels. The government first signed a 15 year contract to privatize the electric transmission and distribution system. Now, Puerto Rico’s Governor is suggesting that they privatize the generation system as well.

“They’re here pretty much to continue to administer the status quo … this is a contract that pretty much just took the failed public monopoly and passed it on to a private hand.”

We Want Sun — The ‘Queremos Sol’ Campaign

In the summer of 2018, Vila and Cambio presented ‘Queremos Sol’ as an alternative to reinforcing the status quo. Queremos Sol outlines how Puerto Rico could install solar-plus-storage on nearly all homes, powering the island with 50 percent renewable energy by 2035 and 100 percent by 2050.

Along with a rigorous public education campaign, Cambio studied how Queremos Sol would affect Puerto Rico’s electric grid through an in-depth model. In the model, they found that solar could provide 75 percent of the island’s electricity demand by 2035 and found no need to add fossil gas generation to the grid. Outage events would have less of an impact, as every home would have enough electric power to meet basic needs.

“One of the greatest results from that study is being able to demonstrate that Puerto Rico’s resiliency, and individual home and community level resiliency, could be quite different if money were put and focus were put on transforming the grid via renewable energy.”


In the 30 Million Solar Homes Impact report, we found that putting solar on just 1 in 4 homes in Puerto Rico would create 45,000 jobs.


Puerto Rico has 14 billion dollars of federal funds to use in repairing its energy sector. Using 9.6 billion of that sum, says Vila, Puerto Rico could install solar on 100% of homes and reduce electric rates by nearly 30 percent.

“We’re not just talking about infrastructure, and cables, and things like that. We’re talking about something that is essential for human lives.”

Lessons on Advancing Energy Democracy

Vila describes the road to energy democracy as “a battleground;” those holding the power won’t let it go willingly. Her best advice is to articulate the alternative in the same language as the opposition: data and evidence.

How can listeners support Puerto Rico? Vila asks that renewable energy advocates apply federal pressure. She hopes that the U.S. will create clear guidelines for federal funds and prohibit FEMA funding of fossil fuel investments.

“Energy democracy means taking all that power, and that wealth… and redistributing among a wider population. So the resistance is incredible to be able to move towards that and implies understanding energy as a common good and as a human right, and not as a commodity left to the market forces.”

Episode Notes

See these resources for more behind the story:


This is the 138th episode of Local Energy Rules, an ILSR podcast with Energy Democracy Director John Farrell, which shares powerful stories of successful local renewable energy and exposes the policy and practical barriers to its expansion.

Local Energy Rules is Produced by ILSR’s John Farrell and Maria McCoy. Audio engineering by Drew Birschbach.

This article originally posted at ilsr.org. For timely updates, follow John Farrell on Twitter, our energy work on Facebook, or sign up to get the Energy Democracy weekly update

Featured photo credit: Dept. of Energy Solar Decathlon via flickr (CC BY-ND 2.0)

 

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Hyundai is recalling nearly 600,000 vehicles, including the Palisade and IONIQ EVs

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Hyundai is recalling nearly 600,000 vehicles, including the Palisade and IONIQ EVs

Hyundai issued a recall for nearly 600,000 vehicles in the US, including the popular Palisade SUV and several IONIQ electric vehicles.

Hyundai Palisade and IONIQ EV recall details

In a notice to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) on September 12, Hyundai announced a recall of 568,580 2020-2025 model year Palisade vehicles.

The recall is due to faulty seat belt buckles in the front and rear, which may fail to latch. Although Hyundai expects only about 1% of the Palisade models actually have the defect, it’s issuing the recall out of an abundance of caution.

Hyundai said those with impacted vehicles may notice a lighter-than-normal “click” when fastening the seatbelt. You can bring it to a Hyundai dealer, where they will fix the seatbelt, free of charge.

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Owner notification letters are expected to be mailed on November 10, 2025. You can contact Hyundai’s customer service at 1-855-371-9460 with any questions. Hyundai’s recall number is 283.

Hyundai-IONIQ-6-recall
Hyundai IONIQ 6 Limited (Source: Hyundai)

In a separate notice sent to the NHTSA on September 12, Hyundai issued another recall for 31,042 2023 – 2025 IONIQ 6 EV models because the charging port door panel could detach.

Again, Hyundai expects only about 1% of them to have the defect. Those impacted can bring their vehicle to a local Hyundai dealer, where they will fix the port, free of charge.

Owner notification letters will also go out on November 10. Hyundai’s recall number for the IONIQ 6 is 282. Owners can contact Hyundai’s customer service hotline (listed above) with any questions.

Hyundai-IONIQ-5-recall
The 2025 Hyundai IONIQ 5 at a Tesla Supercharger (Source: Hyundai)

But, wait, that’s not all. Hyundai issued a third recall on September 12 for just eight 2025 IONIQ 5 models due to improperly tightened fasteners that could loosen over time. Dealers will replace the bolts, align the wheels, and even replace the tires if needed, free of charge.

If you own any of the recalled vehicles, you can contact Hyundai’s customer service or NHTSA hotline (1-888-327-4236) with questions. You can also visit NHTSA.gov for more information.

Hyundai’s recalls follow Toyota, which issued a recall for over 590,000 vehicles in the US. Between the two, a combined 1.1 million cars have been recalled.

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Tesla loses another Optimus robot leader, and upsets TSLA stock gamblers

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Tesla loses another Optimus robot leader, and upsets TSLA stock gamblers

Tesla has lost another leader of its Optimus humanoid robot program, which is upsetting those who bet on Tesla’s stock (TSLA), as CEO Elon Musk says most of Tesla’s value is tied to the robot.

Musk claims that 80% of Tesla’s future earnings would come from its humanoid robot, which he believes would bring in trillions of dollars and finally justify Tesla trading at more than 200 times earnings.

That’s been hard to believe considering the state of the Optimus program.

All of Tesla’s public demonstrations so far have involved remote control by humans, and the company has not been entirely forthcoming about that.

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In June, Milan Kovac, the head of the Optimus program, left Tesla, just months after being promoted to senior vice-president by Musk.

Shortly after, we learned that Tesla was delaying production due to an unexpected redesign.

Now, we learn that another leader of the Optimus program has left Tesla: Ashish Kumar, who led Tesla’s Optimus AI team for the past two years.

Kumar received a phD in artificial intelligence from Berkeley in 2023 and quickly joined Tesla’s humanoid effort. He was believed to be leading the AI aspect of the program, while Kovac led the overall program, including robotics.

He announced his departure on X:

Kumar confirmed that he joined Meta’s AI team as a researcher. Meta has been aggressively poaching AI researchers over the last year, but Tesla has remained largely unaffected by this effort.

The Facebook owner has been reported to be offering substantial compensation packages worth hundreds of millions of dollars and even billions to AI researchers, but this hasn’t been confirmed.

Some Tesla shareholders were visibly upset by Kumar’s announcement and some quickly accused him of taking Meta’s money:

Kumar responded and claimed that Tesla was actually giving him a better deal than Meta:

Financial upside at Tesla was significantly larger. Tesla is known to compensate pretty well, way before Zuck made it cool. If I wanted to optimize for money, I would have stayed at Tesla.

It didn’t stop many Tesla sharehodlers to be mean to him for simply deciding to work on something else than Optimus:

Electrek’s Take

It will not come as a surprise to anyone here, but damn, the Tesla community is really becoming toxic.

This individual dedicated two years of his life working at Tesla. The only appropriate thing to say is: thanks for your hard work and good luck in your next endeavor.

The reason they are being so mean is that they believe Elon Musk’s lies that Optimus will justify Tesla’s insane valuation and become the most valuable company in the world; this guy’s departure challenges their view.

Why would he give up working on the most important product of all time and likely become a billionaire in the process? Maybe because these things won’t happen?

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Controversial electric moto influencer ‘Surronster’ appears to have been arrested

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Controversial electric moto influencer 'Surronster' appears to have been arrested

It looks like electric motorcycle influencer Surronster has landed himself in trouble south of the border, based on an arrest video posted to his social media channels.

A heavily edited video posted on his Instagram page shows the controversial rider in handcuffs being led into a police vehicle by officers in Tijuana, Mexico. The reel appears to have been filmed by a companion in the influencer’s entourage. No additional context was provided in the post, and at the time of writing, details surrounding the arrest remain unclear.

The incident comes just two days after the influencer posted another update to his social media showing that he was being denied entry into Mexico with his Sur Ron electric off-road motorcycle loaded in the bed of his truck.

In the more recent clip, the Tijuana Municipal Police appear to be questioning him and an associate before handcuffing them both. An officer is seen starting to remove the influencer’s helmet, then the clip jumps to a shot of the influencer entering the back of the police truck, edited to avoid showing his unhelmeted face. Surronster has long concealed his identity, always being filmed while wearing a full-face dirt bike helmet.

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Surronster has gained a large following online by pushing the limits of electric motorcycles – especially the Sur Ron Light Bee and similar lightweight electric dirt bikes. His content often shows him performing stunts, riding in traffic without a license plate, and usually on electric dirt bikes that are not street legal for use on public roads. His 1M+ following is comprised mainly of young male viewers in their teens and twenties, with many attempting to imitate the riders’ style and stunts. He has risen to become one of the leading influencers in the electric motorbike industry, all while promoting a rebellious image and racking up millions of views on social media.

That notoriety has earned him plenty of fans, but also a long line of critics. Many in the e-bike and e-moto community have called out the influencer for encouraging illegal and unsafe behavior that risks drawing increased regulation and public backlash against electric two-wheelers, not to mention the danger to young riders who may attempt to recreate his stunts. Others defend him as a thrill-seeking entertainer similar to traditional motorsport stunt riders.

A large proportion of his videos feature illegal riding activities, but his strict control over his anonymity has meant that he has effectively operated with impunity. But getting arrested in a foreign country is a serious matter, and it remains to be seen what charges – if any – he’ll face. At the time of publishing, the Tijuana Minicipal Police have not responded to a request for comment.

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