News

As the Beatles said, we get by with a little help from our friends — Senators Jim Webb and Mark Warner realize oil and gas is mother nature’s cash crop and urge Obama to lift moratorium Washington Times (7/6/11) reports: Sens. Jim Webb and Mark Warner have introduced legislation to lift a moratorium on drilling off the Virginia coast enacted by President Obama after last year’s oil rig explosion in the Gulf of Mexico…The bill from the Virginia Democrats would allow oil and natural gas exploration and production and direct half of any leasing revenues to be paid to Virginia to support a range of projects including land and water conservation, clean energy development, transportation and other infrastructure improvements in the state…Virginia was set to become one of the first East coast states to drill offshore for oil and natural gas. But after the Deepwater Horizon oil rig exploded in April 2010, spewing millions of gallons of oil into the gulf, Mr. Obama pulled the plug on a lease sale planned for 2012…“Opening up and expanding Virginia’s offshore resources to responsible natural gas and oil exploration holds significant promise for boosting needed domestic energy production, while bolstering the commonwealth’s economy,” Mr. Webb said…The U.S. will import almost 10 million barrels a day of crude oil and refined petroleum products in 2011, which is about half of all U.S. fuel consumption, according to forecasts by the U.S. Energy Information Administration…“We should not be sending hundreds of billions of dollars each year to oil-producing countries that do not like us,” Mr. Warner said. “Senator Webb and I firmly believe that Virginians should benefit from any energy resources that are developed off of our coast, and our legislation specifically requires the federal government to make reasonable royalty payments to the Commonwealth.”

There are two things Canadians get right — hockey and oil. Americans don’t care much about the former, but it’s Aboout damn time we start accepting the latter WSJ (7/7/11) reports: With 9.1% unemployment and gasoline prices in the stratosphere, President Obama must sometimes wish that some big corporation would suddenly show up and offer a shovel-ready, multibillion-dollar project to create 100,000 jobs and reduce U.S. reliance on oil from dictatorships…Oh, wait. His Secretary of State has had that offer sitting on her desk since she was sworn in. The trouble is that the Administration can’t approve it without upsetting its anti-fossil fuel constituency. And so the proposal sits…In September 2008 TransCanada applied to build a new pipeline—the Keystone XL—to bring diluted bitumen from the oil-rich tar sands of Alberta to thirsty American refineries on the Gulf Coast. It is hardly a radical proposal. Canadian crude has been flowing to the U.S. for decades. Another Canadian company—Enbridge—operates the Clipper pipeline across the Canadian border to Chicago. In July 2010 TransCanada began operating its Keystone pipeline from Alberta to Cushing, Oklahoma, which is a major storage and pricing depot…The Keystone XL would cut a slightly different path, through the American heartland to Port Arthur, Texas. Judging from its past experience and that of Enbridge, TransCanada expected that permitting would take roughly 23 months. Thirty-three months, two State Department studies and 208,000 public comments later, TransCanada is still waiting. On current trend, the company will be lucky to get its permit by January, or after 40 months. But even that is far from certain.

Psst….government….wanna save some money?  Stop buying $50 per gallon jet fuel when you can buy better stuff for $3.03.  Trillions in debt, and the geniuses downtown can’t figure this out? E&E News (7/7/11) reports: The policy provision preventing the federal government from buying alternative fuels with a higher greenhouse gas footprint than traditional petroleum is a boost for the Navy as it aims to become more energy independent, an official from the service said yesterday…The provision, known on Capitol Hill simply as “Section 526″ for its place in the 2007 Energy Independence and Security Act, has come under attack in Congress in recent weeks. Several stand-alone bills to repeal the rule have been introduced, including one by Rep. Morgan Griffith (R-Va.) (Greenwire, June 1) and one by Sens. John Barrasso (R-Wyo.) and Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.), at the same time that provisions have been tacked onto other bills exempting individual agencies such as the Defense Department from the provision (Greenwire, May 12)…Critics say the ban limits the military’s fuel choices, especially with respect to coal-to-liquid fuels. They also question whether the provision prevents the government from purchasing fuel made from Canadian oil sands…”If not repealed, Section 526 could increase fuel costs for our military and severely restrict the Pentagon’s ability to get fuel from our strongest ally, Canada,” Martin Durbin, executive vice president of the American Petroleum Institute said in a statement in March. “The DOD is the biggest consumer of jet fuel. At a time when American forces are combating terrorists abroad, it is especially necessary for the Pentagon to have the versatility to secure and develop alternative sources of fuel from a friendly ally.”…Chris Tindal, the Navy’s deputy director for battlefield energy, pushed back against that argument yesterday, saying that the department supports the goals and intent behind the provision.

This is why we do what we do — Brits are living in ‘energy poverty’ because their government will not let them develop or use affordable and reliable energy Mirror (7/7/11) reports: As energy prices go through the roof, shocking figures reveal one in four families has been plunged into fuel poverty…Single parents are the hardest hit with 39% of mother or father and child households struggling to pay bills…The figures are higher than the one in five first estimated and show for the first time wealthier families have also been hammered by spiralling fuel costs with 15% of middle classes now fuel poor…Research from price comparison website uSwitch found the number would leap to one in three if housing costs were added in…It means at least 18 million people are spending 10% or more of their take home pay on energy bills. Based on the new way of calculating fuel poverty, 47% of working class families and 22% of the middle classes fall into this bracket…A quarter of families with a stay-at-home parent are fuel poor but uSwitch argues this figure would soar to 44% if mortgages or rents were included. The number of fuel poor single parent families would jump from 39% to 52% while pensioner numbers would rise from 33% to 36%.

The U.N. says that going green will cost a mere $1.7 trillion a year–or $76 trillion over the next 40 years. Where do we sign? Fox News (7/7/11) reports: Two years ago, U.N. researchers were claiming that it would cost “as much as $600 billion a year over the next decade” to go green. Now, a new U.N. report has more than tripled that number to $1.9 trillion per year for 40 years…So let’s do the math: That works out to a grand total of $76 trillion, over 40 years — or more than five times the entire Gross Domestic Product of the United States ($14.66 trillion a year). It’s all part of a “technological overhaul” “on the scale of the first industrial revolution” called for in the annual report. Except that the U.N. will apparently control this next industrial revolution…The new 251-page report with the benign sounding name of the “World Economic and Social Survey 2011” is rife with goodies calling for “a radically new economic strategy” and “global governance.”…Throw in possible national energy use caps and a massive redistribution of wealth and the survey is trying to remake the entire globe. The report has the imprimatur of the U.N., with the preface signed by U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon – all part of the “goal of full decarbonization of the global energy system by 2050.”

Writing letters to the government can be therapeutic, especially when you’re asking the powers that be to allow more drilling in Alaska. Go on, give it a try Reuters (7/5/11) reports: The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency on Friday said it would begin collecting public comments on draft permits for Royal Dutch Shell’s (RDSa.L: Quote) planned oil exploration off Alaska’s coast…Shell has been working to revive its long-delayed Arctic oil program, submitting plans to begin drilling in the Chukchi and Beaufort Seas next year…The EPA had approved permits for Shell to drill at least one Beaufort Sea well this year, but those permits were revoked by an agency appeals boards…The public comment period on the revised permits, which set limits on air pollution from the drilling operations, will run from July 6 through Aug. 5. The EPA will issue the final permits after considering the public’s input…To address concerns raised by the appeals boards, the agency revised the permits, reducing the emissions of most key air pollutants by more than 50 percent from the levels in the earlier permits.

Just like the firework displays last night, governments have been burning money on renewable programs and the taxpayers watche their ‘investments’ go up in smoke Time (7/5/11) reports: Big solar producers should be feeling very, er, sunny. New solar power doubled last year globally, with the world adding 16 gigawatts worth of new photovoltaic energy. In the first quarter of 2011, installations of solar power increased 66% over the previous year in the U.S. Just last week the Obama Administration offered a $1.4 billion loan guarantee to help fund what will be the world’s largest rooftop solar project, which put at least 733 megawatts worth of photovoltaic panels on commercial buildings across nearly 30 states while creating 10,000 jobs. Even bad news for the industry is good: a front-page story in Monday’s Washington Post raised questions about why more than half of President Obama’s out-of-town private-business visits had been to renewable-energy companies. Considering that the renewable-energy industry had to fight for any attention from Obama’s hydrocarbon-loving predecessor, being criticized for getting too close to the White House seems like a significant step up…But there are clouds on the horizon for solar power — especially for big producers who want to build utility-scale projects, not just slap panels on rooftops. The miniboom in solar in the U.S. is being driven chiefly by U.S. Treasury grants — most funded by the 2009 stimulus — which have helped fill the gap created by the evaporation of private capital after the recession. The only problem is that stimulus funding is just about tapped out, the tax credits are set to expire in December and the mood on Capitol Hill is utterly hostile to more spending. If that government money simply vanishes and private capital fails to appear, the U.S. renewable-energy industry could be set back by years. And no one is at greater risk than those who want to build large-scale solar.

Good news — the Obama Administration created jobs. Bad news — each one cost the taxpayer $278,000 Weekly Standard (7/3/11) reports: When the Obama administration releases a report on the Friday before a long weekend, it’s clearly not trying to draw attention to the report’s contents. Sure enough, the “Seventh Quarterly Report” on the economic impact of the “stimulus,” released on Friday, July 1, provides further evidence that President Obama’s economic “stimulus” did very little, if anything, to stimulate the economy, and a whole lot to stimulate the debt… The report was written by the White House’s Council of Economic Advisors, a group of three economists who were all handpicked by Obama, and it chronicles the alleged success of the “stimulus” in adding or saving jobs. The council reports that, using “mainstream estimates of economic multipliers for the effects of fiscal stimulus” (which it describes as a “natural way to estimate the effects of” the legislation), the “stimulus” has added or saved just under 2.4 million jobs — whether private or public — at a cost (to date) of $666 billion. That’s a cost to taxpayers of $278,000 per job…In other words, the government could simply have cut a $100,000 check to everyone whose employment was allegedly made possible by the “stimulus,” and taxpayers would have come out $427 billion ahead…Furthermore, the council reports that, as of two quarters ago, the “stimulus” had added or saved just under 2.7 million jobs — or 288,000 more than it has now.  In other words, over the past six months, the economy would have added or saved more jobs without the “stimulus” than it has with it. In comparison to how things would otherwise have been, the “stimulus” has been working in reverse over the past six months, causing the economy to shed jobs.

How good is your memory? Better yet, how much of that cheap gas can you fit in your tank before prices go back up? Wall Street Journal (7/5/11) reports: When the time comes to cast their ballot in November 2012, one may predict U.S. motorists hitting Route 66 this summer will be grateful to President Barack Obama. But will they?..By giving the nod to half of a global release of oil from emergency stockpiles decided by oil-consuming nations worldwide, Mr. Obama spoon-fed instant pain relief into the mouth of every driver north of the Rio Grande. The move knocked $5 a barrel off crude prices as drivers were preparing to take the road for the 4th of July weekend…But once the full effect of the magic pill sets in, watch out for the upset stomach…Interfering in markets might end up pushing prices up in the long run and doesn’t resolve issue number one: America’s addiction to oil runs deep into both Wall Street and Main Street…Though statistics do show an uptick in crude-oil demand in the second half of the year, the release is adding confusion at a seriously messed-up moment for the global refining industry…The drop in crude prices is depressing margins at refineries with some markets already swamped with products. Indeed, despite claims the release is to make up for lost Libyan barrels, the U.S. only depended on Mr. Gadhafi’s country for 0.5% of its crude imports…On paper, glut is good for consumers—it makes prices cheaper. But with the International Energy Agency, which oversaw the move, warning it may repeat it, refiners and oil producers will have little visibility on future supply. And, next time, they may let prices slip without further ado. For instance, if much of the U.S. crude is snatched by traders, it could go straight to build up commercial inventories…That may trigger more worries for Gulf members of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries. Many of them were already taken aback by the release—they had pledged to boost output unilaterally after the group failed to act collectively on June 8.

What the author misses is that the short con sets up the long con. Isn’t that right, Mr. President? Politico (7/5/11) reports: President Barack Obama has pressed repeatedly for a long-term energy policy, devoting five weekly radio addresses to the subject in the past three months and blasting other politicians during a March press conference for pursuing short-term political fixes for high gas prices…“Every few years, gas prices go up; politicians pull out the same old political playbook and then nothing changes,” Obama said. “And when prices go back down, we slip back into a trance. And then when prices go up, suddenly we’re shocked. I think the American people are tired of that. I think they’re tired of talk.”.. But this weekend as an anticipated 39 million Americans drive 50 miles or more for the holiday, the Obama administration is preparing to release 30 million barrels of crude from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve. Meanwhile, AAA reports the price of gasoline per gallon has declined from $3.63 just before the announcement to $3.55 on Friday. Gasoline prices peaked this year at nearly $4 a gallon on May 5…Some critics say the president’s action betrayed his lofty rhetoric about energy…“This is the shortest of short-term fixes,” said Spencer Abraham, who served as President George W. Bush’s energy secretary from 2001-05. “It very much falls in the category of politically expedient actions.”

Good news for the Chevy Volt keeps on coming — Toyota is about to crush the EV game with the forthcoming Prius redesign. Thanks for playing, GM CNN Money (7/1/11) reports: Enthusiasts who are raving about the range assisted, battery-powered Chevrolet Volt are ignoring the 800-pound elephant in the room: Toyota, which in addition to its vast knowledge base and production volume in hybrid cars, has a better idea…It is the Prius Plug-in, it is already in test fleets, and it will be arriving in showrooms in less than a year from now. It will be more efficient and less expensive than the Volt, and Toyota (TM) actually stands the possibility of making a profit on it — something General Motors concedes it can’t do with the Volt… To date, the Prius Plug-in has been ignored by EV enthusiasts who are being revved up by the flood of favorable publicity coming out of Detroit, which for all its pretensions to global sophistication, remains a house of mirrors whose view of the outside world stops at Eight Mile Road…Whenever somebody congratulates Volt for winning multiple car of the year awards, they should remind themselves that those same award-giving bodies passed over the original Prius hybrid in 2001 in favor of the PT Cruiser. Toyota has gone on to sell two million Priuses, the most revolutionary car of the last 75 years; the Cruiser, a novelty car with no technological pretensions, has since gone out of production.

Sure, the oil will be sold from the Sagging Poll Reserve, but will the voters? Reuters (7/1/11) reports: Oil buyers have expressed strong interest in the crude that the United States is selling from its emergency reserves, the U.S. Energy Department said, calling the oil sale “substantially oversubscribed.”…The sale represents half of the 60 million barrels that industrialized nations are releasing jointly to fill a gap in supply caused by political strife in Libya…Analysts have said the global release has been disorganized and has the potential to backfire…The Obama administration was slammed for its decision last week to tap the Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR) by the oil industry lobby and other critics, who said there was already plenty of oil supplies in the United States and cast the move as a political tactic…”The oversubscription of the (U.S.) SPR auction indicates both that supply disruption is a factor and that we will be able to place all 30 million barrels into the market,” an administration official said…Almost a dozen oil companies and trading firms sought more information about the opportunity on a conference call earlier this week, and the Energy Department said it received more than 90 offers for its 30.2 million barrels of SPR crude.

What’s a few billion between friends? First Solar wins a $4.5. Billion dollar loan guarantee and you’re the guarantor Wall Street Journal (7/1/11) reports: The U.S. Energy Department said it is offering to guarantee about $4.5 billion in loans for First Solar Inc. to finance three renewable energy projects in California that the solar-panel maker is developing… The government’s conditional offer to support the projects drew funds from the stimulus-funded loan guarantee program, which expires on Sept. 30 and currently has less than 25% of its funds remaining…Once built, First Solar, of Tempe, Ariz., said that two of the projects would be the largest capacity solar-panel farms in the world…First Solar’s California plan includes two 550-megawatt plants in Riverside and San Luis Obispo counties that will be supported by $1.88 billion and $1.93 billion in loans, respectively, according to the Energy Department…Under the loan guarantee the department offered Thursday, taxpayers would cover as much as 80% of the borrower’s obligation in the event of a default…A third project, First Solar’s 230-megawatt Antelope Valley Solar Ranch, received a conditional offer for a $680 million taxpayer-backed guarantee.

Owl, it’s what’s for dinner — new government plan involves hiring snipers to shoot competing owl. What could go wrong? New York Times (7/1/11) reports: It has been two decades since the fate of a bashful bird that most people had never seen came to symbolize the bitter divide over whether to save or saw down the ancient forests of the Pacific Northwest. Yet it was not until Thursday that the federal government offered its final plan to prevent the bird, the northern spotted owl, from going extinct… After repeated revisions, constant court fights and shifting science, the Fish and Wildlife Service presented a plan that addresses a range of threats to the owl, including some that few imagined when it was listed as a threatened species in 1990…The newer threats include climate change and the arrival of a formidable feathered competitor, the barred owl, in the soaring old-growth evergreens of Washington, Oregon and California where spotted owls nest and hunt…One experiment included in the plan: shooting hundreds of barred owls to see whether that helps spotted owls recover…Even after all these years since the spotted owl became the cause célèbre of the environmental movement, it is far from clear that the plan is a solution. Advocates on both sides say it will inevitably be challenged, and both sides have expressed frustration with the Obama administration on the issue.

Obama must have shorted oil last week and then speculated prices would bounce along with his poll numbers; why else would he dump oil from the Sagging Poll Reserve? Wall Street Journal (6/30/11) reports: By the look of oil prices, last week’s announcement of a globally coordinated stockpile release is already old news…The initial decline to below $90 on the International Energy Agency’s decision to offer 60 billion barrels of oil has been all but erased. Crude-oil futures traded as high as $95.84 on Wednesday, above the price of $95.41 a barrel set before the IEA’s June 23 announcement. Oil futures on Wednesday settled $1.88, or 2%, higher at $94.77 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange…To be sure, oil prices may have been higher still without the IEA move. But crude’s quick rebound has dashed hopes it would be the beginning of a sustained move down…Half of the 60 million barrels will come from the U.S., which was scheduled to close bidding for its high-quality crude on Wednesday. The U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserves first oil auction in six years has been dogged by multiple changes to its terms, deepening uncertainty over how much new supply will make it to global crude markets. The SPR declined to comment on the status of the auction. Results are expected next week…Analysts say the release of strategic stockpiles has shifted oil’s trading range lower by several dollars but hasn’t precluded the return of triple-digit prices for the U.S. oil benchmark…”Let’s face it: Sixty million barrels is not that much,” said Kyle Cooper, managing partner at IAF Energy Advisors. “From the low $90s to $100 is probably a range that makes a lot of sense.”

Are we going to eat at the trough of public treasure or are we going to create value and produce real energy? I doubt we have 10 years to make our choice; let’s choose correctly Reuters (6/30/11) reports: The Trans Alaska Pipeline System, Alaska’s main economic artery, may only have 10 years of service left if oil flows continue to dwindle at current rates, according to a report issued on Wednesday by the system’s operator…The pipeline can operate reliably with oil flows as low as 350,000 barrels per day, but throughput below that threatens its viability, said the report by Alyeska Pipeline Service Co, which manages the pipeline for owners BP, ConocoPhillips, Exxon Mobil and other oil companies…That threshold — expected to be reached in about a decade if oil production continues to decline at current rates — is the first ever identified as a specific minimum throughput for reliable operations…The 800-mile pipeline shipped an average of about 605,000 barrels per day in May, less than a third of the 2 million barrel peak achieved in 1988. The pipeline system carries all of the crude oil produced on Alaska’s North Slope, at Prudhoe Bay and other fields, to the shipping port at Valdez. Flow has declined as production from maturing fields dwindles…Alyeska, the consortium that operates the pipeline and its Valdez marine terminal, issued the report at the conclusion of a $10 million, two-year research project…Operating safely at 350,000 barrels per day would require a series of improvements, the report said. They include enhanced insulation or introduction of heat sources to keep oil warm, better storage and shipping management to prevent interruptions, better use of corrosion inhibitor and an overhaul of the cold-restart procedures to help prevent freezing problems.

Hypothetically renewable energy could save the U.S. economy a lot of money and hypothetically I could still make the pros…I’m coming for you Peyton Manning Huffington Post (6/30/11) reports: Google made two major announcements yesterday. One was about a new Google social network, Google +, expected to compete with the likes of Facebook. The other announcement was that saving the world could also save us a lot of money. The latter revelation somehow fell unnoticed amid debate over the plus and minuses of Google +, but it is significant nonetheless…Google’s report, “The Impact of Clean Energy Innovation,” aimed to measure the potential effects of clean energy on both the energy landscape and the U.S. economy…The analysis was conducted by assuming that there were “aggressive hypothetical cost breakthroughs (BT) in clean power generation, grid-storage, electric vehicle, and natural gas technologies and compares them to Business as Usual (BAU) scenarios modeled to 2030 and 2050.”…They found that, when compared to BAU in 2030, aggressive energy innovation alone could grow the U.S. economy by over $155 billion in GDP/year, create over 1.1 million new net jobs, and save U.S. consumers $942/household/year. Not to mention the environmental and security benefits – this model could reduce U.S. oil consumption by over 1.1 billion barrels/year and cut U.S. total greenhouse gas emissions by 13%.

Obama could goof up easy mac, so how do you think they are doing on energy policy? Billings Gazette (6/30/11) reports: When President Barack Obama said that America hopes to be Brazil’s best energy customer, Americans shook their head in confusion…Apparently, the White House didn’t understand or care about their concern…The administration repeated the exact same mistake last week when it irresponsibly released 30 million barrels of oil from our Strategic Petroleum Reserve…Secretary of Energy Steven Chu explained that this SPR release was “intended to complement the production increases recently announced by a number of major oil-producing countries.” He went on to say that “the United States welcomes those commitments and encourages other countries to follow suit.”…With all due respect, when will America step up and follow suit?…Instead of needlessly tapping into our emergency oil supplies and encouraging other countries to produce more energy, this administration needs to take a hard look in the mirror…The president has handcuffed American energy developers and made our dependence on foreign energy worse…Political move…First, our strategic reserve was created as a safeguard against national security emergencies and severe supply disruptions. President Obama just treated the SPR like it’s his Strategic Political Reserve. While all Americans want gas prices to be lower, tapping the SPR isn’t the answer. The only severe supply disruption today is this administration’s self-imposed shutdown of American energy.

Kill it. Cut its head off and rip out the heart. Let’s make sure ethanol subsidies never grow back to walk God’s green earth again The Hill (6/30/11) reports: Several Senate Democrats are using GOP support for killing ethanol subsidies as a political weapon against Republican leaders’ resistance to including increased tax revenues in a broad deficit-cutting deal…Thirty-four Senate Republicans — including Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) — this month voted to quickly end the multibillion-dollar ethanol blenders’ credit, albeit as part of economic development legislation that was subsequently derailed…Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.), a top strategist for Senate…Democrats, on Wednesday said this should open the door for ending tax breaks as part of the high-stakes deal that the White House and lawmakers are negotiating around raising the debt ceiling…l“It makes no sense for Leader McConnell to, on the one hand, say that he agrees that ethanol subsidies are wasteful but then say — just to stick to ideological, way-out-there principle that we can’t eliminate that subsidy in the debt-limit deal,” said Schumer, the chairman of the Senate Democratic Policy Committee, at a press conference in the Capitol.

We don’t have a revenue problem; we have an energy and spending problem The Hill (6/30/11) reports: President Obama pressed lawmakers Wednesday to cut a slew of oil industry tax breaks as part of a deal to raise the debt ceiling, arguing that the alternative is to slash funding for education, medical research and food safety…The repeal of certain oil industry tax breaks is one of a number of provisions Obama and Democrats in Congress want included in the debt-limit package. But Republicans have blasted the proposals…Here’s what Obama said Wednesday during a White House press conference:…“If we choose to keep those tax breaks for millionaires and billionaires, if we choose to keep a tax break for corporate jet owners, if we choose to keep tax breaks for oil and gas companies that are making hundreds of billions of dollars, then that means we’ve got to cut some kids off from getting a college scholarship, that means we’ve got to stop funding certain grants for medical research, that means that food safety may be compromised, that means that Medicare has to bear a greater part of the burden.”…Obama’s comments come as policymakers face the Treasury Department’s Aug. 2 deadline to raise the debt ceiling.

I hope Bryson gets caught with his hand in the taxpayer cookie jar! Go get ‘em, Eric Thorson! Bloomberg (6/29/11) reports: Government investigators are auditing some of President Barack Obama’s more than $7 billion in renewable energy grants to determine whether the money was awarded properly and the recipients were eligible…Examiners are reviewing 14 of the 2,600 projects that received tax dollars under the initiative to promote wind and solar power created in the 2009 stimulus bill, according to Richard Delmar, counsel to the Treasury Department’s inspector general. Under the program run by the Treasury, developers receive as much as 30 percent of the cost of a project…The audits by Eric Thorson, the Treasury’s inspector general, aim to determine whether the department has “established (and followed) appropriate procedures for awarding the grants,” and whether developers meet eligibility requirements, Delmar said in an e-mail…He declined to identify projects under review. The office expects to issue reports on five of the audits by the end of September, and the remaining nine reports in 2012, he said… The audits, which began in February 2010, involve visits to the headquarters of companies that received grants and to project sites, Delmar said. The last site visit was in February of this year.

Goodbye minivans, goodbye pickup trucks, goodbye SUV’s, goodbye sedans….goodbye Chevy Volt! — the Obama administration is trying to impose a fleet-wide 56 mpg mandate CNBC (6/28/11) reports: With the White House and regulators informing automakers that they intend to push for fuel economy standards in the US to rise to an average of 56.2 MPG by 2025 you can count on an industry to push back and say “slow down.”…The automakers (and not just the Big 3) are looking for a more measured increased in the CAFE standards, which currently average 30.2 MPG for new vehicles and will rise to 34.1 MPG by 2016…From the auto industry’s stand point, increasing fuel economy 5% annually between 2016 and 2025 will be too costly for automakers and for consumers. From the perspective of regulators in Washington, the cost incurred by consumers will be recouped fairly quickly with the money people save on gas…Both sides have valid arguments. But unlike 2009 when the Obama administration pushed for, and secured higher fuel economy standards, the auto industry is in a position where it can and will push back. This is one of several reasons why many believe the next CAFE standards will wind up being lower than 56.2 MPG. I can already hear people on both sides howling that anything under 50 MPG will be too little or too much.

And Goodbye to Senator Levin who didn’t realize 56.2 mpg was the plan all along! E&E News Reports: Sen. Carl Levin (D-Mich.) expressed frustration yesterday that the Obama administration had not been forthcoming about its plan to discuss a 56.2 mpg fuel economy target with automakers…Levin said he had spoken to administration officials, including White House regulatory czar Cass Sunstein, as recently as the day before the White House began talking to automakers about the proposed target. Reports of the 56.2 mpg target, which would represent an annual 5 percent increase in fuel economy, were first reported in The Detroit News…”The day before that was proposed, we were told that there had been no decision made and we, of course, were stunned to find out the next morning that they had decided to at least propose something,” Levin said. “We all took umbrage at the failure of the White House to tell us truthfully they had already made a decision to begin at that number.”

Now it’s our turn, New York Times — a collection of a few humbling facts and opinions to put the natural gas debate in perspective Energy In Depth (6/28/11) reports: Say this about The New York Times and its ongoing attack series targeting natural gas: These guys sure know how to elicit a reaction. In his latest piece, Times reporter Ian Urbina turns the page over to well-known opponents of the industry, who argue that shale is too expensive to produce and will therefore disappoint investors. Urbina targets the Barnett, Haynesville, and Fayeteville shales in particular – but forgets to mention that natural gas production from each continue to defy even the most optimistic expectations, even with fewer rigs in service and historically low natural gas prices…The first reactions to The Times’ story started rolling in about 18 seconds after it was posted. EID’s rebuttal was sent around the next day. Thirty-six hours after first contact, here’s just a brief sampling of what folks are saying about the piece: Government U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA): Agency’s Perspective on Shale Gas “Differs Significantly” from NYT report. From the EIA press release: “EIA was contacted by a Times reporter in advance of the story, and provided a response that described the agency’s approach to developing its shale gas projections. Those interested in EIA’s views on shale gas, which differ in significant respects from those outlined in the June 27 article, may want to review the EIA response to the inquiry from the Times, the Issues in Focus discussion of shale gas included in the Annual Energy Outlook 2011, and a recent presentation on domestic and international shale gas.

Greenies are down to wishing for genie…let’s show some charity and not count that wish as part of their three New York Times (6/29/11) reports: For a moment, re-imagine Aladdin as an engineer. He finds his magic lamp in an industrial park in Silicon Valley or Boston or the Research Triangle in Raleigh-Durham, and the genie who emerges offers him three technological wishes. What should Aladdin wish for? Could any of his wishes go wrong?…On Tuesday morning, Google released a study of the potential impacts of “aggressive hypothetical cost breakthroughs” in clean energy technologies, from electricity generation and storage to electric vehicles to natural gas. The genie was not offering any energy efficiency wishes this time around, although Google acknowledges that those are crucial and says it has taken major steps to improve energy efficiency in its operations…Google used a computer model developed by McKinsey & Company to explore how energy innovations could create jobs in manufacturing and construction and how cheaper clean energy might improve the overall economy…So what should Aladdin, P.E., ask for?..At the top of Google’s list was better electric cars and gas-electric hybrids because they could create large savings by 2030. While big advances in clean energy generation could yield big benefits by 2050, in 2030 these would not show major financial benefits when compared with electricity from coal and natural gas, the study predicted.

Eat your heart out peak oilers — new government report claims the Cook Inlet still has more to give after 50 years of development Reuters (6/29/11) reports: Alaska’s Cook Inlet basin still has potential for abundant natural gas and oil discoveries even after five decades of production, according to a federal report issued on Tuesday, signaling potential revenue for the state and more interest from developers…In the first resource assessment issued since 1995, the U.S. Geological Survey said the inlet area likely holds 19 trillion cubic feet of recoverable natural gas — nearly nine times the last estimate — and 600 million barrels of recoverable crude oil…The new report is much more optimistic about remaining natural gas in the inlet than the assessment issued 16 years ago, a difference the USGS attributed to improved data, new geologic information and better technology for recovering the oil and gas…In 1995, the USGS estimated that Cook Inlet likely had 2.14 trillion cubic feet of gas remaining to be discovered…The new report includes the first-ever estimates for unconventional natural gas in Cook Inlet, most of which is coal gas and which accounts for a quarter of total estimated undiscovered natural gas resources. That was not included in the 1995 report as it was not then considered recoverable…The Cook Inlet basin, in production since the 1950s, is older than the more prolific North Slope. Since 1958 the Cook Inlet basin has produced 1.3 billion barrels of oil and 7.8 trillion cubic feet of natural gas, according to the USGS. Oil has been mostly refined for regional markets, while natural gas has fueled regional utilities and been liquefied for export to Japan and other countries.

Put this in your pipe and smoke it with natural gas Energy In Depth (6/27/11) reports: The United States produced more natural gas in 2010 than at any point in the previous 37 years, a stunning reversal of fortune given the country’s supply picture earlier this decade, and one that could not have been possible without the massive volumes of American energy that continue to be generated from shale…So what happens from here? By now, you’ve likely heard the stories and seen the estimates: with everyone from IEA to EIA to PGC to MIT projecting a future in which shale’s production trajectory continues along an aggressive upward path, delivering literally quadrillions of cubic feet of clean-burning natural gas to generations of consumers not only in the United States, but around the world. It’s a view that’s supported by the preponderance of science and a majority of scientists, not to mention one that’s continuously reinforced by new data…Over the weekend, The New York Times sought to advance a contrarian view on the subject, and to that view The Times (and reporter Ian Urbina) is more than entitled. What it’s not entitled to, at least in our view, is to represent its piece as an original investigation; not when the story was essentially outsourced to a well-known critic of the industry whose predictions on shale’s imminent collapse grow less defensible (and more difficult to find on his website) by the day. Nor do we believe The Times is entitled to mislead its readers on the expertise of those whose “leaked” emails — many written in 2008 and 2009 – are used to form the basis of the story, especially when real-world production numbers from 2010 and 2011 directly contradict those speculative accounts…Trick #1: Suggest that the Barnett, Haynesville, and Fayetteville shales are “not performing as industry expected” without actually defining what that means – and exclude mention of the extraordinary production growth currently being witnessed across all three plays:…WSJ sets the stage: “As recently as 2000, shale gas was 1% of America’s gas supplies; today it is 25%. Prior to the shale breakthrough, U.S. natural gas reserves were in decline, prices exceeded $15 per million British thermal units, and investors were building ports to import liquid natural gas. Today, proven reserves are the highest since 1971, prices have fallen close to $4 and ports are being retrofitted for LNG exports.” (Wall Street Journal editorial, June 25, 2011)

So what’s it going to be, Congress? We’ve been dancing since 2007 and they are about to turn on the lights Financial Times (6/28/11) reports: The Arctic seas north of Alaska are one of the three great remaining oil and gas prospects in the US, along with the onshore shales and the deep waters of the Gulf of Mexico. They are the least known and hence the most intriguing. They are also the most controversial…The prospect of oil drilling in the as-yet barely touched Arctic, with its unique ecosystem and wildlife, has outraged environmentalists…The fact that exploration has been facilitated by the shrinking Arctic ice, thought to be a consequence of global warming caused by burning fossil fuels, is an irony that has made the protests even fiercer…Royal Dutch Shell, Europe’s largest oil company, which hopes to be a pioneer in developing the US Arctic, has been repeatedly frustrated in its plans, first launched in 2007, to explore the Beaufort and Chukchi seas off Alaska…Yet in spite of opposition and delays, it is likely that sooner or later the resources of the region will be developed…US political opinion, which was encouraged to be suspicious of drilling by BP’s Deepwater Horizon disaster in the Gulf of Mexico in April 2010, has been swinging back in favour, driven by persistently high unemployment and petrol prices that have come close to $4 a gallon…Victories of the generally more pro-oil Republican party in the midterm elections last November have given fresh impetus to the campaign by the oil companies to be allowed to drill in more parts of the US, including the Arctic…The administration of President Barack Obama has been unenthusiastic about Arctic drilling, but the strength of its scepticism has wavered…In March 2010, while proposing to open up other areas of the US coast, it was cautious about allowing more exploration in the Arctic, although companies that bought licences in sales under George W. Bush, the preceding president were still allowed to drill.

You’ve got to be kidding me — ‘small’ wind is complaining about the permit process and zoning laws USA Today (6/28/11) reports: Nearly 10,000 units were sold nationally in 2009, the latest available data, according to the American Wind Energy Association. In 2001, only 2,100 units were sold…Advocates of small wind turbines say they can be an important source of clean energy in windy parts of the country. Key hurdles to widespread use rest with local governments, their zoning ordinances and public acceptance…”Zoning and permitting is a big issue in small wind,” says Larry Flowers, the deputy director for distributed and community wind for the American Wind Energy Association…”There’s progress being made in some places and struggles in others,” he says… In Brandon, S.D., resident Charlie Cross wants to add a small, 200-watt turbine to supplement his solar power system. Before that can happen, Cross needs to convince the city to issue permits for residential turbines…Robert Westall, the owner of Cleaner, Greener Energies in Sioux Falls, S.D., says one of the biggest problems is that communities don’t have zoning rules for small wind turbines.

Why tap the SPR when we could be tapping our natural resources of the coast of Gulf of Mexico, Alaska, California, Virginia, etc. Forbes (6/27/11) reports: Last week, President Barack Obama announced that, in response to the loss of Libyan crude to the global market, he was ordering the largest release of crude oil from the federally owned Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR) in U.S. history; 30 million barrels over the course of the next 30 days, to be supplemented by another 30 million barrels from various other reserves controlled by other oil consuming nations. Republican politicians and corporate oil executives cried foul. We certainly oppose the political management of oil inventories, which this is. But unlike Republicans, we oppose the existence of the SPR…Although critics charged that the release was merely a political gesture that would not reduce oil prices given how small it is in relation to the global market (about two-thirds of one day’s worth of global oil consumption), investors thought otherwise. The day the release was announced, the price of West Texas Intermediate crude oil for July delivery dropped $4.39 per barrel and the price of Brent Sea crude for July delivery fell even further on the London exchange. Goldman Sachs ( GS – news – people ) did some quick math and reported that the release could reduce oil prices by $10 to $12 per barrel over the next three months and by $5 to $7 per barrel in 2012… If anything, the market may be underestimating the price drop that is to come. One of the nation’s top oil economists– Timothy Considine from the University of Wyoming–recently constructed a model of the global oil market and simulated the impact of a 30 million barrel release of crude from the SPR. He concluded that oil prices would likely drop about 3.5%, so a 60 million barrel release would suggest a 7% price drop, which in today’s market translates into a $6.68 decrease in crude oil prices (off the pre-release announcement price of $95.41) which, in turn, translates into a 16 cent decline in the price of a gallon of gasoline.

With the Obama Admin studying and restudying and restudying whether a plain and simple pipeline to bring the world’s most important substance…oil….to the U.S., the Chinese are circling, circling, circling Anchorage Daily News (6/27/11) reports: In the northern reaches of Alberta lies a vast reserve of oil that the U.S. views as a pillar of its future energy needs.. China, with a growing appetite for oil that may one day surpass that of the U.S., is ready to spend the money for a big piece of it…The oil sands of this Canadian province are so big that they will be able to serve both of the world’s largest economies as production expands in the coming years. But that will mean building at least two pipelines, one south to the Texas Gulf Coast and another west toward the Pacific, and that in turn means fresh environmental battles on top of those already raging over the costly and energy-intensive method of extracting oil from sand…Most believe that both pipelines will eventually be built. But if the U.S. doesn’t approve its pipeline promptly, Canada might increasingly look to China, thinking America doesn’t want a big-stake share in what environmentalists call “dirty oil,” which they say increases greenhouse gas emissions.

I can’t tell if this article is satire or blind love. The Chevy Volt only gets 30 MPG and takes 10 hours to charge, which is apparently just fine if you only need to run to the Hamptons from Manhattan. Also, the car runs on electricity from coal or natural gas and gasoline New York Times (6/25/11) reports: The moment I realized that driving the new Chevrolet Volt was fundamentally a new experience was not when I first turned it on and went around the block. Yes, it was whisper-quiet, powered by its 16 kilowatt-hour, 400-pound battery, but it still felt like a “normal” automobile. And it wasn’t when I drove the 100 or so miles from Manhattan to Southampton, N.Y., either. Although the battery’s range is only about 40 miles, the car kept going even after the battery was drained; it just switched to its gasoline engine, in a transition so seamless I barely noticed it. It wasn’t even when I arrived in Southampton that evening and plugged a special cord into an electrical outlet in the garage, to recharge the battery overnight…No, what made the experience truly different — and what got me thinking about the Volt’s potential to change the way we think about gas consumption — was what happened after that…You know the story of the Volt, don’t you? As the General Motors entry in the race to build a viable electric car — a race that includes the all-electric Nissan Leaf, a raft of Fords in various stages of development and an electric sedan that Tesla will soon begin selling — it may well be the most hyped American automobile since Lee Iacocca rolled out the Chrysler minivan. Begun four years ago, and championed by the legendary auto executive Bob Lutz, the Volt project managed to survive G.M.’s descent into bankruptcy, and emerge as the company’s great, shining hope, a symbol of what American car manufacturers could accomplish. Or so it’s been claimed.

If you want to see Obama’s transportation policy in action, look to Europe New York Times (6/27/11) reports: While American cities are synchronizing green lights to improve traffic flow and offering apps to help drivers find parking, many European cities are doing the opposite: creating environments openly hostile to cars. The methods vary, but the mission is clear — to make car use expensive and just plain miserable enough to tilt drivers toward more environmentally friendly modes of transportation…Cities including Vienna to Munich and Copenhagen have closed vast swaths of streets to car traffic. Barcelona and Paris have had car lanes eroded by popular bike-sharing programs. Drivers in London and Stockholm pay hefty congestion charges just for entering the heart of the city. And over the past two years, dozens of German cities have joined a national network of “environmental zones” where only cars with low carbon dioxide emissions may enter.

Crony Capitalism: you make a donation to a politician and then the politician gives you taxpayer money Washington Post (6/26/11) reports: A few months later, Celgard won more praise. In July, Obama lauded its technology in a Kansas City speech, and days later, Labor Secretary Hilda L. Solis showed up at Celgard to signal more good news: Since Obama’s visit, the company had added 40 workers…Amid this flurry of White House interest, some competitors questioned why Celgard warranted so much attention…During the official visits, federal regulators were pursuing a case against Celgard’s parent company, Polypore. The Federal Trade Commission had charged the company with trying to monopolize several battery markets and control prices by buying one of its few U.S. competitors. Obama’s visit came a month after an administrative judge agreed that Polypore’s purchase created an illegal monopoly and that it must sell the competitor. The case is under appeal…“Generally, we’re concerned with what kind of due diligence the administration did before throwing out that kind of money and attention,” said Bryan Godber, vice president of Trojan Battery, which faced the prospect of higher prices for Polypore products. “They are giving some companies massive advantages over others.”

In case you needed more reasons to dislike the Obama Administration’s energy policy Human Events (6/26/11) reports: You may have noticed that gas prices are sky-high as Recovery Summer II begins, and wondered why the cost for a fill-up has more than doubled since President Obama took office, even as the economy remains in the tank.  It shouldn’t be a surprise, as Obama has made it clear all along that higher gas prices can help usher in his green utopia of windmills, solar panels and unicorns—all for the sake of his environmental backers.  Here are the Top 10 Examples Proving Obama Wants High Energy Prices: 1.  Energy dollars wasted on pricey green jobs:  During his acceptance speech at the 2008 Democratic National Convention, Barack Obama promised that if elected President, he would “invest $150 billion over the next decade in renewable energy—an investment that will lead to new industries and 5 million new jobs.”  Nearly a quarter of the way into that dream, Obama’s own Council of Economic Advisers says that only 225,000 green energy jobs were created or “saved” after an $80 billion down payment from the stimulus package—an astounding $335,000 per job.  The President has consistently called for funding his green job plans with measures that would increase the cost of using fossil-fuel energy for everyone.

Definition of insanity: doing the same thing again and again, but expecting different results. The Obama Administration doubles down on planning the economy from the White House with the release of oil from SPR National Journal (6/27/11) reports: Market manipulation for political purposes is never a good thing and in this case is likely to have unintended consequences greater than the intended ones. If this sounds cynical, the Obama Administration has provided reasons for cynicism…So, let’s get this straight. The conflict in Libya has been underway since February and the Obama Administration is just deciding that the loss of 1.5 million barrels a day is a problem. Why wasn’t it a problem sooner. The Secretary of Energy claims that the release is to “relieve pressure on oil markets”. Since prices were declining before the announcement, you have to ask, what pressure? And, to make matters worse, this decision came shortly after the Saudi’s pledged to increase their production. Strained relations won’t get any better from this decision…Libyan oil is sweet–low sulfur– crude that is used primarily by european refineries. Nigeria is also a source of sweet crude and the problems there could exacerbate the loss of Libyan crude but all of that is primarily a european problem; not a US or global one. Is the oil being dumped on the market low sulfur sweet crude? If it isn’t, how does it compensate for the loss of Libyan crude?

After working for two years to drive up the price oil, the administration tries to temporarily lower the price in an effort to drive up the President’s approval numbers. Also, the editorial notes the fun fact that we can get ONE MILLION barrels a day if we are allowed to drill more in Alaska WSJ (6/24/11) reports: It wasn’t long ago that the Obama Administration was trying to drive up the price of fossil fuels to reduce carbon emissions, promote “green jobs” and save the planet from global warming. Gasoline at $3.50 or $4 a gallon has ended that. And yesterday the White House went so far as to join a global effort to release 60 million barrels from oil stockpiles to further reduce prices…The U.S. will release one million barrels a day for 30 days from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve—the nation’s 727 million barrel oil stockpile located in salt domes in Texas and Louisiana. The spot price of oil dropped about $5 a barrel on the news, and if that decrease holds it could be the equivalent of a 10 cent a gallon reduction in gas prices. One irony is that a million barrels a day is about how much oil experts believe we could be producing from the vast oil fields in Alaska’s wildlife reserve. President Obama has said that tapping Alaska wouldn’t affect oil prices but now says a temporary spurt will do so. How about opening up Alaska, and dropping the de facto Gulf moratorium too?

We have a theme: President Obama is using his executive powers to increase his poll numbers — this time to waive the Jones Act Washington Examiner (6/24/11) reports: Soon after the Deepwater Horizon disaster began, with raw crude pumping out of the seabed into the Gulf of Mexico in the worst oil spill in American history, foreign nations began offering help with the clean up…Especially notable was the Belgian firm DEME, which specializes in ocean-going clean-up work and which offered to bring the best equipment in the world for the operation to the Gulf. But it didn’t happen because President Obama refused to waive the Jones Act, a protectionist law sought by the maritime unions to keep foreign-crewed vessels out of U.S. waters…The Jones Act has a national emergency provision that allows the president to waive its requirement of American crews, as President George W. Bush did during the Hurricane Katrina disaster that nearly destroyed New Orleans. But Obama resolutely refused last year to waive the Jones Act in order to allow the DEME and other equipment to be employed in the Deepwater Horizon cleanup. An operation that could have been completed in four months instead stretched into nearly a year…But this week we have learned that under certain well-defined conditions Obama is more than willing to set aside his reservations about waiving the Jones Act. And those conditions have mainly to do with the fact Obama wants to be re-elected in 2012…Among the biggest obstacles to Obama’s re-election effort is the prospect that gas will still be around $4 a gallon next year. So what does Obama do? Not only does he authorize using 60 million gallons of oil from the U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve, he waives the Jones Act to allow foreign crewed ships to deliver the SPR oil to U.S. ports.

The NYT might not realize it, but they just got a lesson in economics: when you increase supply to meet growing demand, the price drops New York Times (6/24/11) reports: The United States and its allies will release 60 million barrels of emergency oil reserves to replace lost Libyan oil production and assure adequate supplies for the summer, officials announced on Thursday… The action accelerated the drop in oil prices that began in late April, taking them to levels not seen since Libyan oil exports were virtually halted by political turmoil four months ago…Italy in particular was dependent on Libyan crude, taking nearly a third of the 1.3 million barrels a day that Libya was exporting before hostilities began. Other European nations like France, Germany and Spain were also large buyers of oil from Libya…Of the total amount of oil to be released, about half would come from reserves in the United States, with the rest to be provided by the other 27 industrialized nations who belong to the International Energy Agency. Negotiations for the coordinated response have been going on in secret for weeks, American officials said. Similar unified action was taken in 1991 at the outbreak of the first Persian Gulf War.

What’s going to happen after 60 days of tapping the SPR? Something tells me speculators think long term… WSJ (6/24/11) reports: Just as the Federal Reserve prepares to turn off one spigot, members of the International Energy Agency turned on another, catching investors off guard and upending financial markets…The decision on Thursday to release more oil into the market drove crude prices to their lowest settle in four months, sent stocks down sharply, and gave the dollar a lift…While the move was intended to ease pressure on the global economy, many investors saw it as yet another sign that policy makers are particularly worried about recent signs of a slowdown…But late-day headlines indicating that Greece had reached a breakthrough on a five-year austerity plan with the European Union and International Monetary Fund pushed stocks, the euro and oil back off their lows…The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 59.67 points, or 0.49%, to 12050.00, with energy stocks among the biggest losers.

This isn’t news, but it’s worth mentioning that Google and Soros are still up to no good Bloomberg (6/24/11) reports: Transphorm Inc. closed a $25 million round of financing from an investment fund managed by Soros Fund Management LLC and existing investors such as Google Inc. (GOOG) to fund its power waste reduction technology…Quantum Strategic Partners Ltd. joined Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, Google Ventures, Foundation Capital and Lux Capital in the Series D round of financing to bring the total raised by the Goleta, California-based company to $63 million since its founding in 2007, Transphorm said in a statement..The company will use the funding announced today to speed development of its technology to reduce electricity waste on industrial equipment, Primit Parikh, president of Transphorm, said in the statement…Transphorm says its products reduce power waste by 90 percent and simplify the design and manufacturing of electrical devices such as motor drives, power supplies and inverters for solar panels and electric vehicles.

Employment Prevention Agency gets spanked by House Members for 6 year delay in issuing permit to allow drilling in Rich Alaskan Waters. Senators, rumored to never buy their own gas, now on the Hot Seat, as Americans ask, “Hey Senate….are YOU the holdup on getting more jobs and cheaper gas?” Fuel Fix (6/22/11) reports: The House today passed legislation that would accelerate offshore drilling in the Arctic by curtailing environmental reviews of coastal oil exploration projects…The measure, sponsored by Rep. Cory Gardner, R-Colo., and Rep. Gene Green, D-Texas, aims to remove legal and regulatory barriers that have stalled Shell Oil Co.’s bid to drill in Arctic waters near Alaska. But the bill’s reach extends beyond the Arctic, and Democrats said the legislation could chip away at the power of California and other states to regulate air pollution…Bill backers said the legislation would fix  “a broken bureaucracy” that has mired critical Clean Air Act permits in tussles between the Environmental Protection Agency and its administrative review panel, the Environmental Appeals Board…“The EPA needs to have a permit approval system in place that is predictable (and) workable,” Green said. Instead, “we continue to see air permits for offshore exploration wells go back between the EPA, the producer and the Environmental Appeals Board with no movement to a solution.”…Although Shell hoped to launch work on its first exploratory well in the Beaufort Sea near Alaska after ice cleared this summer, the company scrapped those plans in February, after the appeals board revoked two EPA-issued air quality permits. The panel faulted the EPA for not fully reviewing potential emissions from a drill ship and support vessels.

Give ‘em hell Senator Murkowski! New bill echoes the House call for more drilling in Alaska E&E News (6/18/11) reports: Following the lead of House Republicans, Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) is pushing to tweak the Clean Air Act and clear permitting hurdles blocking Royal Dutch Shell PLC’s plan to drill for oil in the Arctic Ocean…Murkowski introduced a bill (S. 1226) yesterday as a companion to a measure that easily cleared the House Energy and Commerce Committee earlier this month…House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) has said the bill from Rep. Cory Gardner (R-Colo.) will head to the House floor before the July 4th recess. It is one of a series of bills aimed at a “tangle of red tape” that is stopping the United States from developing its own energy supplies, he wrote in a letter to the Republican conference last week (E&ENews PM, May 10)…Murkowski said it is unreasonable that Shell and its partners have “spent more than five years and billions of dollars attempting to conduct offshore exploration and production in Alaska, but have been unable to secure the necessary permits from EPA.”…”It’s clear that this process is not just overly costly and time-consuming, but simply does not work,” she said in a statement today…Her bill, like its House equivalent, would spare offshore drilling permits from being challenged to the Environmental Appeals Board, an administrative law panel that EPA created to review its own decisions. The bills would also answer some of the questions raised by the EAB in December when it told EPA to do a better job of showing that Shell’s drilling rig would comply with federal air pollution rules…Shell responded by pushing back its plan to start drilling exploratory wells in the Beaufort and Chukchi seas until next summer. It was a blow for the company, which has pumped more than $3 billion into a region of the Arctic Ocean that may hold the nation’s second-largest oil and gas reserves after the Gulf of Mexico.

Do you Bing? Google has ‘invested’ almost $1 billion in renewable energy and most of it has been guaranteed by taxpayers Reuters (6/22/11) reports: Google has already put $55 million into that 1.5 GW wind farm, dubbed the Alta Wind Energy Center, which is being built by Terra-Gen Power. Google is structuring the deal in the same way as its previous investment in Alta Wind, and is again working with Citibank to create a leveraged lease, where Google and Citibank purchase part of the project, then lease it back to Terra-Gen, who will manage and operate it. Google now has invested $157 million into 270 MW of wind generation at Alta Wind…Google says it’s not buying the electricity directly from the project, and says the returns are reason enough for the investment. The wind power will be sold to utility Southern California Edison under a power purchase agreement that was signed in 2006. But as I’ve written before (GigaOM Pro subscription required), giving Google more control over the energy it needs for its data centers could be a smart investment in the long run…However, the amount of money that Google is investing in clean power is truly awe-inspiring (or maybe terribly shocking if you are a Google shareholder). Just earlier this month Google created a $280 million fund for solar installer SolarCity, its largest clean power investment to date, and its first in residential solar rooftops. Here’s a run down of what Google has backed in the clean power space.

This is going to be a fun election cycle: Huntsman (and T-paw and Gingrich) have a lot of explaining to do for their support of cap-and-trade The Hill (6/22/11) reports: Republican White House hopeful Jon Huntsman has found a way to explain his embrace of cap-and-trade when he was governor of Utah: Everyone was doing it…Huntsman backed cap-and-trade last decade as a way to curb greenhouse gas emissions, but distanced himself from it in an interview Wednesday, casting it as a policy solution from another era…“Every governor was talking about dealing with emissions back many, many years ago only to find that with the economic implosion, we can’t afford anything that is going to put any kind of hamper on economic growth. So cap-and-trade is not something that is viable today,” Huntsman told Fox News…“Everybody talked about it. At least a lot of people did, consulting with CEOs, consulting with all the experts. Everyone took it seriously,” he said…As governor, Huntsman signed on in 2007 to a program among Western states and Canadian provinces called the Western Climate Initiative aimed at cutting regional greenhouse gas emissions 15 percent by 2020.

This green project was a fluke, but it will work out next time — green technology company is now defunct, leaving taxpayers on the hook for over a million dollars Michigan Capital (6/22/11) reports: In September of 2009, Fisher Coachworks was mentioned in a press release from Gov. Jennifer Granholm as a “green technology” company that was part of the “new energy economy for Michigan.” Two years later, the state says Fisher Coachworks is out of business and the state has to write off $1.6 million it loaned the electric bus manufacturing company…Edgar Benning, general manager of Flint’s Mass Transportation Authority, said in an email that Fisher Coachworks went out of business in the development phase of making two $1.1 million electric buses that Flint was going to purchase with grants from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, commonly referred to as the “stimulus plan.”…Fischer Coachworks officials could not be reached for comment…Michael Psarouthakis, vice president of business acceleration for the Michigan Economic Development Corp., said Fisher Coachworks would not repay $1.6 million in loans it had received from the state. The MEDC had approved Fisher Coachworks for a $2.6 million loan, but never gave out the final $1 million because the company was struggling, Psarouthakis said…“It was clear that they were going to have some serious financial difficulties even with our funding,” Psarouthakis said. “They needed significant funding above and beyond that.

When Congress’s Two Top Chemists – posing as Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Majority Leader Harry Reid — mandated 500 million gallons of cellulosic ethanol be created out of thin gruel to power our 250 million vehicles by next year, they figured willing it was enough E&E News (6/21/11) reports: U.S. EPA today released proposed requirements for 2012 biofuels use under the federal renewable fuel standard (RFS), keeping levels for conventional ethanol and advanced biodiesel in line with the gradually increasing utilization called for by law while acknowledging the failure of cellulosic ethanol to appear in the marketplace….EPA expects to require that between 3.45 million and 12.9 million gallons of cellulosic biofuels be blended into the domestic fuel supply in 2012, representing between 0.002 and 0.010 percent of total fuel usage…That range falls far short of the 500 million gallons called for under the 2007 Energy Independence and Security Act and takes advantage of flexibility in that law for EPA to adjust the required volumes based on market availability of the advanced fuels…”EPA will continue to evaluate the market as it works to finalize the cellulosic standard in the coming months,” officials said. “The agency remains optimistic that the commercial availability of cellulosic biofuel will continue to grow in the years ahead.”

It’s not about Energy or the Environment — It’s about Power. The EPA finally admits what is behind its quest for regulation E&E News (6/21/11) reports: U.S. EPA stepped closer yesterday to updating air pollution rules for the oil and gas industry, sending draft rules to the White House Office of Management and Budget as it prepares to come out with a proposal later this summer…The agency is reviewing the New Source Performance Standards for oil and gas producers, which set limits on emissions that lead to soot and smog, as well as the rules for toxic emissions such as benzene. Both sets of rules cover facilities, such as storage tanks, processing plants and compressor stations — but not refineries — that handle the oil and gas between the wellhead and the pump…Under existing EPA rules that date back to 1985, gas processors must fix leaks that allow volatile organic compounds (VOCs) to escape and prevent the sulfur in their gas from being released into the air. Some facilities and pieces of equipment have no federal standards, though they can also be regulated at the state level…In reviewing the rules, which were last updated in 1999, EPA is looking broadly across the industry to find air pollution sources and ways to address them, top officials said last year when they held public meetings in Dallas and Denver.

Denise Bode, eat your heart out. Oklahoma tribe says no to wind, yes to oil and gas Newsok (6/21/11) reports: It comes in the form of a challenge this week by the Osage Nation, which says the proposed farms could interfere with the extraction of oil and gas in the county. The tribe owns all mineral rights in the county, with royalties from oil and gas drilling disbursed to tribal members.
Principal Chief John D. Red Eagle also cited ecological and cultural concerns, although he said the tribe isn’t opposed to alternative energy development in general…This is common refrain where alternative energy is concerned. Going green is a big deal for many, but when doing so affects people individually — by altering the scenic view, or by running transmission lines across their property — it doesn’t seem like such a good idea…The Osage complaint isn’t the first about this particular plan. Environmentalists previously said the huge windmills could damage the habitat of the greater prairie chicken. But the tribe’s involvement, and its ability to spend large sums to fight the plan, is sure to give the two companies second thoughts.

I love when Obama is between a rock and a legislative hard place – White House comes out against House plan that would make energy cheaper for Americans The Hill (6/21/11) reports: The White House on Tuesday attacked a GOP-led bill to speed up oil drilling off Alaska’s coast, but continued a recent trend by declining to threaten a veto…The House is slated to debate a bill Wednesday aimed at speeding up EPA air pollution permits for Royal Dutch Shell and other companies that want to drill in Arctic waters off Alaska’s coast…The formal “statement of administration policy” issued Tuesday touts the White House commitment boosting oil production, but cautions that the bill would “curtail” EPA’s power to ensure it “proceeds safely, responsibly, and with opportunities for efficient stakeholder input.”…The GOP-led bill, which won five Democratic votes in the Energy and Commerce Committee, would set new deadlines for EPA action on offshore air permit applications, limit challenges and ease air pollution standards for offshore projects. (We’ve got more on the legislation here.)

We can file this story under the “stating the obvious” category Politico (6/22/11) reports: A few months back, the specter of $5-per-gallon gasoline this summer spread panic through the country…Record prices at the pump would rip into already tight household budgets. A fragile economy appeared teetering as hiring slowed in May. Approval ratings tumbled for President Barack Obama, who pledged to investigate price manipulation…Well, the country can relax a bit. Summer arrived Tuesday with gas averaging $3.64 per gallon, according to the American Automobile Association…And fuel prices are now expected to drop further, with several analysts predicting crude oil will fall to $85 per barrel. Based on recent history, that might cut another 50 cents off a gallon of gas…It’s essentially a stimulus package at the height of vacation season, when families are more likely to splurge…How did we avert the nightmare scenario? Certainly, there’s lower demand coupled with higher supplies. But Phil Flynn, an analyst for the Chicago brokerage PFGBEST, said it’s also because a Federal Reserve program to buy $600 billion of U.S. Treasury bonds is about to end.

When in doubt, go with what works. House Republicans are cutting renewable funding and greenies are crying foul Reuters (6/21/11) reports: Even though Republicans have vowed an “all-of-the-above” approach to America’s energy future, Democrats are accusing them of clinging to a narrow, antiquated, hydrocarbon-heavy past…Members of the House Sustainable Energy and Environment Coalition are furious about a 2012 energy and water appropriations bill that they claim shortchanges President Obama’s efforts at innovation and competition in favor of an addiction to oil, coal and natural gas…”Now is the worst possible moment to slash funding for the research and development of sustainable energy technologies,” coalition member Rep. Rush Holt (D-N.J.) said about the $30.6 billion bill that advanced out of the House Appropriations Committee last Wednesday…”At a time when our economy is already fragile, abandoning scientific research would cause the United States to lose even more high-tech jobs to our foreign competitors.”

America’s business is business and we need affordable energy CNN Money (6/21/11) reports: Jack Gerard has pretty much been in crisis mode since taking over as president and CEO of the American Petroleum Institute in November 2008. Shortly after he arrived at the powerful oil-industry lobbying group, President Obama and a wave of Democrats swept into office, promising to fund alternative energy sources and take action on climate change. Last year the BP disaster poured more than 200 million gallons of oil into the Gulf of Mexico, and Gerard spent the summer prepping his members for more than 50 congressional hearings and eight separate investigations related to the spill and its aftermath. Then, in mid-May, executives from five oil companies appeared before a committee of the U.S. Senate and defended their earnings, which could hit record highs in 2011. “Don’t punish our industry for doing its job well,” Chevron CEO John Watson said. The performance was, by all accounts, a public relations disaster…Indeed, Big Oil could scarcely be less popular than it is now: Gasoline prices on average are hovering around $4 a gallon, up more than a dollar from a year ago; turmoil in the Middle East and strong global demand contribute to high prices, but try telling that to the guy spending $75 to fill his tank at an Exxon station. President Obama, on the hunt for ways to cut debt, has targeted oil companies’ tax breaks, and an NBC/Wall Street Journal poll in February found 74% of all respondents favor such a move. “Emotionally, no one is on their side,” Robert Passikoff, president of the brand-loyalty consultancy Brand Keys, says of the industry. “No one feels bad for the oil companies.”