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February 5, 2012
Oil & Gas Stories
Houston Chronicle
February 3, 2012
HC: BALANCE NATURAL GAS EXPORT WITH DOMESTIC EXPANSION
Rewind history back a decade or two and you will find a much different picture for natural gas production in this country than we see today. In those pre-fracking, pre-shale gas days, the future for this strategic energy resource was spelled LNG, for liquefied natural gas. And the expectation was that supplies would be imported.
In anticipation of that development, huge and expensive LNG terminals were proposed for or built at strategic locations offshore of the United States, including the Gulf of Mexico.
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February 3, 2012
Lead Stories
Politico
February 3, 2012
SIERRA CLUB TOOK $26M FROM NATURAL GAS
The Sierra Club took $26 million from one of the nation's largest natural gas companies for three years while at the same time hawking natural gas as a clean, green energy source, the group admitted Thursday.
The natural gas cash came between 2007 and 2010 as the Sierra Club was increasing its efforts to fight coal-fired powered plants, the group's executive director, Michael Brune, wrote in a blog post.
At the time, the Sierra Club, "working with the best science at the time and with extensive input from staff and volunteers, determined that natural gas, while far from ideal as a fuel source, might play a necessary role in helping us reach the clean energy future our children deserve," Brune wrote.
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Texas Tribune
February 3, 2012
TEXAS' HAUL FROM BP SPILL: $100 MILLION, AND COUNTING
At least $100 million, and possibly much more, will be funneled to Texas as part of the cleanup financing from BP after the Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010. So far, Texas officials have received more than 150 suggestions on how to spend the money, including expansion of parkland, restoration of oyster reefs and a campaign to reduce litter that ends up in the Gulf.
For environmental groups involved in coastal restoration, this money, as yet unspent, represents a huge opportunity. Besides the $100 million that BP is allocating to each of the five Gulf states, Texas can also seek a chunk of an additional $500 million in BP funds that the federal government will disburse to Gulf states. All of the money, $1 billion in total, is earmarked for “early restoration,” and the amounts could increase further, said James Tripp, senior counsel for the Environmental Defense Fund.
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Politico
February 2, 2012
CLUB FOR GROWTH AIMS TO THWART TRANSPORTATION BILL
The Club for Growth is trying to ensure that conservative Republicans revolt against a massive surface transportation bill.
The group sent a “key vote alert” Wednesday urging members to oppose the bill. It also said their votes would be part of the organization’s 2012 scorecard — meaning conservatives would be docked if they voted for the five-year, $260 billion measure.
Even procedural votes might be on the scorecard, the Club for Growth warned.
“Simply put, this is a massive 846-page bill that doesn't cut any spending at all. Indeed, it spends at least $30 billion more by supplementing fuel taxes with additional revenue from other sources,” the group said in a statement ahead of a Thursday markup at the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee.
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Oil & Gas Stories
Houston Chronicle
February 2, 2012
OHIO GROUP SEEKS TAX INCREASE ON OIL, GAS BILLIONS
As Gov. John Kasich prepares to deliver his State of the State speech in the heart of Ohio's shale drilling region, a liberal policy group is proposing that he and other policymakers bring the state's taxes on oil and gas profits in line with those of Texas.
Columbus-based Innovation Ohio said Thursday that its analysis of industry data is also leading it to seek passage of a Landowner Bill of Rights and a Hire Ohio plan to ensure residents get their fair share of proceeds and jobs from the coming shale boom.
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CNBC
February 3, 2012
IS IRAN TRYING TO DEVELOP A MISSILE THAT COULD REACH AMERICA?
Is Iran trying to develop a missile that could reach the "Great Satan"?
The missile under construction at an Iranian research-and-development facility, which was damaged by a mysterious explosion in November, was a long-range missile prototype with a range of 6,000 miles—enough to hit the United States, a senior Israeli official said Thursday in a speech to a defense and security forum.
At the time of the November 12 explosion at a facility some 30 miles outside Tehran, Iranian officials insisted that the suspicious blast was an accident. It occurred, they said, during experimentation on a medium-range missile—one capable of reaching Israel.
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CNBC
February 3, 2012
BRENT STEADY ABOVE $112 ON IRAN TENSION, US JOBS DATA EYED
Brent crude held above $112 on Friday on supply concerns as reports of a growing possibility of Israel attacking Iran heightened already simmering tensions in the region, while caution set in ahead of key U.S. jobs data.
Worries about an attack helped oil buck a trend across broader markets. Asian shares and the euro weakened as participants awaited for more clues over the state of the world's largest economy, while talks to restructure Greece's debt dragged on.
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CNBC
February 2, 2012
A SCRAMBLE FOR FUEL AS RECORD COLD SNAP BLASTS EUROPE
Hungarian villagers were scavenging for coal with their bare hands on Thursday as a blast of Siberian air killed scores in Eastern Europe and looked set to keep its icy grip on the continent for another week.
At least 139 people have died across Eastern Europe and Germany since the cold snap began, interrupting what had been an unusually mild European winter.
In the Hungarian village of Farkaslyuk, people clambered up a 30-meter spoil heap from a disused mine to scrape together enough coal to heat their homes and cook for a few days.
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Houston Chronicle
February 2, 2012
SHELL LOSING $1 BILLION A YEAR ON U.S. GULF DRILLING DELAYS
Royal Dutch Shell Plc, Europe’s largest oil company, is losing about $1 billion a year from drilling delays in the Gulf of Mexico since the 2010 Macondo disaster.
Shell’s production in the region will be curbed by about 50,000 barrels of oil equivalent this year, similar to 2011, Chief Financial Officer Simon Henry said. The company expects to return to planned operations off the Gulf coast by 2014.
“The cash flow implications are a billion dollars or more per year relative to where we want to be,” Henry said in London today. “We are catching up.”
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Politico
February 3, 2012
LEON PANETTA STORY SPARKS ISRAEL-IRAN SPECULATION
The prospect of war in the Middle East stoked media attention Thursday after a Washington Post editorial writer claimed Defense Secretary Leon Panetta believes that Israel may attack Iran this spring.
“Panetta believes there is a strong likelihood that Israel will strike Iran in April, May or June — before Iran enters what Israelis described as a ‘zone of immunity’ to commence building a nuclear bomb,” Ignatius wrote from Brussels, where Panetta is attending a conference at NATO headquarters.
“Very soon, the Israelis fear, the Iranians will have stored enough enriched uranium in deep underground facilities to make a weapon — and only the United States could then stop them militarily,” Ignatius added. “‘You stay to the side, and let us do it,’ one Israeli official is said to have advised the United States.”
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KOSA
February 1, 2012
OUT IN THE OPEN: FRACKING WATER AND CHEMICAL USE DISCLOSED ACROSS TEXAS
A controversial decision made by the Texas legislature is finally taking effect Wednesday, and now at least one expert says it will do more harm than good.
"Just the name sounds scary, anything with a hyde in it sometimes has bad connotations, they may not all be bad, they may all be bad."
Lisa Ash is going through a long list of chemicals pumped into the ground just feet from her front door step in north Midland.
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National Geographic
February 2, 2012
U.S. MAY BE ‘SAUDI ARABIA OF NATURAL GAS,’ BUT SHALE GAS RUSH IS SLOWING
Following on last week’s State of the Union address that supported hydraulic fracturing, or “fracking” in shale gas deposits, President Obama called the U.S. “the Saudi Arabia of natural gas” and unveiled a new proposal to provide tax breaks to boost the use of natural gas as a fuel for trucks.
But the market has a glut of natural gas due to widespread use of the drilling method, pushing prices to their lowest in a decade and deflating the shale gas rush, leading large producers to cut production to try to bring the price up.
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Utilities Stories
Austin American Statesman
February 2, 2012
AUSTIN ENERGY PROPOSAL KEEPS SAME RATE INCREASE BUT DIVIDES IT INTO TWO STEPS
Under pressure from an unhappy City Council, Austin Energy released a new proposal Thursday for raising electric rates.
The city-owned utility is seeking to keep the 12.5 percent average rate increase it initially proposed but phase it in over two steps. Sometime this year, rates would rise 8.7 percent, although the increase would hit homes, churches and some other classes of customer much harder. Another 3.8 percent increase would kick in around October 2014.
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New York Times
January 31, 2012
QUAKES AND U.S. REACTORS: AN ANALYTIC TOOL
With the release of a computer model of all known geologic faults east of Denver, nearly all of the nuclear power plants in the United States are about to embark on a broad re-evaluation of their vulnerability to earthquakes. The new mapping is the first major update of the fault situation for plants since 1989.
The map has been in preparation since 2008, well before the earthquake and tsunami that caused three meltdowns at Fukushima Daiichi in Japan last March or the quake near Mineral, Va., last summer that shook a twin-reactor plant beyond the degree expected. Still, those events have lent urgency to the effort to assess the American plants’ ability to withstand quakes.
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NPR
February 2, 2012
COAL EXPORT PLAN SPARKS POLLUTION FEARS AT BORDER
These days, smoke from burning fields seems like the least of their concerns. For around 20 years a site for a strip mine has sat essentially unused next door to O’Donnell’s property. The Mexican owners of the Dos Republicas mine are now ready to start digging. They want to ship coal to Mexico and burn it in power plants outside the City of Piedras Negras, right across the border. And while some people in Maverick County welcome the jobs that could bring, many, including city and county governments, are vehemently opposed to it.
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Alternatives & Renewables Stories
New York Times
February 2, 2012
FEDERAL GOVERNMENT OPENS MORE OCEAN TO WIND PROJECTS
Enthusiasm for offshore wind projects may have cooled among developers in the United States these days, but the Obama administration is still trying to make a ribbon of wind farms off the Atlantic Coast a reality.
On Thursday, Ken Salazar, the secretary of the interior, and Tommy P. Beaudreau, the director of the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, said the government had completed an environmental review and found that selling leases for wind energy would not create environmental problems in the designated “wind energy areas” off the coasts of Maryland, Virginia, New Jersey and Delaware.
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New York Times
February 1, 2012
NEW YORK’S SOLAR BALANCE SHEET
Despite uncertainties in the solar energy market, New York officials should support the “steady and measured growth” of solar power in the state as part of a balanced renewable energy strategy, a new report recommends.
The report, by the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority, known as Nyserda, evaluated the costs and benefits of pursuing the growth of solar to an installed capacity of 5,000 megawatts by the year 2025, from around 110 megawatts now. Yet because of variables like the cost of photovoltaic technology and the future availability of federal tax credits for solar investment, the authors found it hard to estimate how much solar would really cost.
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EnergyBoom.com
January 30, 2012
DOE REPORTS CONFIRM UNITED STATES' IMMENSE WAVE AND TIDAL ENERGY RESOURCES
Two U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) reports provide back-to-back confirmation that the potential for electricity from coastal wave and tidal stream energy could reach as high as 15 percent of the total of current U.S. electrical demand.
The first, prepared with the assistance of the Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI), using a specially prepared, 51-month Wavewatch III database developed by NOAA (the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration), estimates wave power along the U.S. continental shelf in kilowatt-hours (kWHs) based on the accepted assumption that wave power densities are aggregated across a unit diameter circle, and mapped out to 50 nautical miles from shore.
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El Paso Times
February 3, 2012
PT: ENERGY SAVERS: CITY TAKES LEAD
That catch-phrase "shovel ready" helped El Paso land $3.1 million from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. That, in turn, helped the city save on energy costs.
Good deal. And that's certainly a good long-term savings for taxpayers.
As Mayor John Cook noted, "A lot of communities around the country did not even have projects planned. They were not prepared to get funding."
Recall that President Barack Obama has theorized that his plan to put more Americans to work has been tripped up a bit because of government red tape.
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Gas 2.0
February 2, 2012
THE REPUBLICAN CANDIDATES ON ALTERNATIVE ENERGY AND ELECTRIC VEHICLES
We know where our Democratic President stands of Electric Vehicles (EVs) and alternative energy thanks to President Obama’s State of the Union Address. But where do the remaining Republican challengers stand on such issues? We here at Gas2 decided to find out.
The current state of America is not great. The housing market has not returned, unemployment is high, and the price of good just keeps going up. To top things off 2012 also happens to be a Presidential election year – so that means not a lot of is actually going to get done on the real issues and instead all eyes are going to be on the race.
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Regulatory Stories
Houston Chronicle
February 2, 2012
GOP URGES FEDS TO SCRAP CLIMATE RULE FOR NEW POWER PLANTS
House Republicans yesterday asked the Obama administration to withdraw a pending rule that would implement the first-ever standards on greenhouse-gas emissions from new power plants, saying it would “impose additional energy costs on a struggling American economy.”
In a letter to the Office of Management and Budget, GOP leaders on the House Energy and Commerce Committee said the EPA “may be seeking to do precisely what Congress and the American public rejected in the last Congress” when Democrats unsuccessfully pushed for cap-and-trade climate legislation.
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Houston Chronicle
February 2, 2012
ENERGY SECRETARY BACKS NATURAL GAS EXPORTS
The low price of natural gas is hurting domestic job growth, and exporting a small amount of the fuel will boost the economy, U.S. Energy Secretary Steven Chu told a Houston audience Thursday.
Speaking at a town hall at Houston Community College, Chu said a modest increase in the price of natural gas wouldn't significantly raise its cost to U.S. consumers who use it to heat their homes and manufacturers who need it to make products.
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Politico
February 2, 2012
ANWR BILL CLEARS HOUSE NATURAL RESOURCES COMMITTEE
House Republicans have officially resuscitated the age-old fight over the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
The House Natural Resources Committee fired its latest shot Wednesday, with a bipartisan 29-13 vote for a bill that would open a portion of ANWR to oil and gas drilling. It was the first action on an ANWR bill during this Congress.
The bill will be part of a larger House Republican strategy to use energy production and other revenue to finance popular infrastructure projects. It’s expected on the House floor later this month.
The modern debate over ANWR drilling stretches back to at least the Clinton administration.
"This bill has been well thought out," Rep. Don Young (R-Alaska) said. “We have passed this bill 11 times out of this committee. The Senate passed this once. Bill Clinton vetoed it.”
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Politico
February 1, 2012
OPPOSITION TO ARCTIC NATIONAL WILDLIFE REFUGE DRILLING TAKES RIGHT TURN
long-term “jobs bill” funded by oil drilling: For a conservative, what’s not to love?
Plenty, it turns out. Opening the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to drilling has been a conservative dream for years — but using it to pay for transportation wasn’t part of the plan.
Conservative policy watchers aren’t thrilled that House Republicans are moving swiftly on a sweeping transportation funding bill that will include billions of dollars in funding derived from expanded energy production.
The drilling provisions are intended to lure Republican support for a bill that doesn’t cut spending, a stated goal of many rank-and-file conservatives.
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Bloomberg
February 2, 2012
LAWMAKERS FAULT EPA IN FRACKING HEARING DELAYED BY ARREST
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency released 622 documents related to its study of water contamination tied to hydraulic fracturing in Pavillion, Wyoming, as Republican lawmakers criticized the findings.
The discussion over Wyoming took place in a Capitol Hill building where Josh Fox, the maker of the anti-fracking documentary “Gasland,” was arrested before the hearing began. Fox was trying to record the hearing, which the committee Republican leadership said requires prior accreditation.
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NBC4i
February 2, 2012
REPORT: RAISE TAXES ON OIL COMPANIES
A new report released today by Innovation Ohio, a progressive think tank, calls on Governor John Kasich and state lawmakers to raise taxes on oil companies and take several other steps to ensure that all Ohioans get "a fair share and a fair shake" from the anticipated growth in the oil and gas drilling business.
The report, “Fracking, Fairness and the Future: Making Sure Ohio Taxpayers and Workers Share in Benefits,” is being released just days before Kasich delivers his State of the State address. Oil and gas companies are gobbling up land and drilling rights in eastern Ohio as they expand their hydraulic fracturing or “fracking” operations.
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Houston Chronicle
January 31, 2012
HOUSTON FACES PENALTIES OVER 1970S SMOG LIMITS
The EPA concluded Tuesday that Houston has failed to meet 30-year-old limits on smog-forming pollution, a decision that could lead to hefty fines for as many as 300 oil refineries, chemical plants and other large industrial facilities.
The Environmental Protection Agency made the determination six months after a settlement with the Sierra Club, which had accused the federal government of skirting its obligation to enforce the rules set in 1979.
Houston had a 2007 deadline to comply with the smog limits but fell short despite significant improvements in air quality. Federal law requires the state to collect fines from the eight-county region's largest polluters until the standard is met.
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Earthtechling
February 2, 2012
CARBON CAPTURE TAKES CENTER STAGE IN 2012
For two reasons, 2012 will be a milestone for carbon capture and sequestration (CCS) technologies, marking the beginning of its practical utilization.
In December, the next step of the ongoing international climate change talks will be hosted by Qatar, which, with Saudi Arabia, has long pushed to have CCS included among approved technologies for carbon reduction under the European Union cap and trade scheme. (CCS can be used to make electricity cleaner, not only from coal, but also from heavy petroleum residues.) At last year’s talks, they finally succeeded, with more details to be hammered out in December.
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February 2, 2012
Lead Stories
Houston Chronicle
February 1, 2012
CLIMATE SCIENCE EXPERTS PREDICT INTENSIFIED DROUGHT IN TEXAS
The extreme drought gripping Texas and the rest of the Southwest is likely to intensify, according to a panel of climate experts from Columbia University.
Richard Seager, an expert on droughts in North America, told a Washington audience that the Texas drought of the past decade has been the continent’s most serious.
The luckiest three percent of the state’s land is rated as having a “severe drought,” said Lisa Goddard, an expert on climate prediction. Another 88% of the state is considered “exceptional.”
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ABC News
February 1, 2012
SAN ONOFRE NUCLEAR PLANT CLOSED AFTER RADIATION LEAK
A small quantity of radioactive gas leaked inside one of the buildings at San Onofre nuclear power plant north of San Diego, according to a spokesman for the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
The spokesman said the radiation levels were “barely measurable,” but the plant was shut down as a precaution.
“At no point were the public or our workers in any danger,” Southern California Edison spokesman Gil Alexander told ABC News.
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Platts
February 1, 2012
US HOUSE HEARING ON GAS FRACKING HALTED BY DISPUTE OVER FILM MAKER
A dispute over documentary film maker Josh Fox's right to videotape the proceedings of a House of Representatives' subcommittee reviewing the science behind the US Environmental Protection Agency's draft study on the impact of hydraulic fracturing on ground water in Pavillion, Wyoming, brought the subcommittee's proceedings to temporary halt on Wednesday.
After Fox, who produced the controversial 2010 documentary "Gasland" that was critical of fracking, was led away in handcuffs by Capitol police, subcommittee Chairman Andy Harris, Republican-Maryland, read from the Science, Space, and Technology Committee's ground rules that require videographers to be accredited by the House TV and Radio Gallery. Fox, who is making a special for the Home Box Office network, is not a regular member of the Capitol Hill press corps.
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Bloomberg
January 30, 2012
TAINTED-WELL LAWSUITS MOUNT AGAINST GAS FRACKERS LED BY CABOT
For 36 years, Norma Fiorentino drew water from a well near her home in Dimock, Pennsylvania. “It was the best water in town,” she says.
Then on Jan. 1, 2009, she says her well blew up.
State regulators later blamed natural gas drilling by Cabot Oil & Gas Corp. for elevating methane levels in Dimock wells. Fiorentino and her neighbors sued, alleging Cabot’s activities caused contamination and, in Fiorentino’s case, an explosion that cracked a concrete cap into three pieces. Cabot has denied responsibility.
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Oil & Gas Stories
Bloomberg
February 1, 2012
US SILICA FALLS AS INDUSTRY REPORTS FRACKING COSTS: DALLAS MOVER
US Silica Holdings Inc. (SLCA), a provider of sand to energy companies, fell in its first day of trading as other oilfield suppliers struggle to contain costs related to moving from natural-gas to crude basins.
The company, which initially priced 11.8 million shares at $17 each, fell 5.9 percent to $16 at the close in New York.
“The industry is having challenges all around from a logistics standpoint to operationally,” John Keller, an analyst at Stephens Inc. in Houston, who doesn’t rate US Silica, said in an interview today.
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Houston Chronicle
February 1, 2012
CANADIAN DIPLOMAT PROMOTES PIPELINE
The U.S. must decide whether it wants more Canadian oil or wants to continue relying on supplies from the Middle East and Venezuela, Canada's envoy to the United States said Wednesday in San Antonio.
The proposed Keystone XL pipeline would stretch from northeastern Alberta to the Houston-Port Arthur refinery region.
In a speech, Ambassador Gary Doer said that Canada believes the Obama administration should move forward on the pipeline project.
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Bloomberg
February 1, 2012
FRANCE URGED TO PURSUE OIL-FRACKING RESEARCH TO REDUCE IMPORTS
France, which last year banned oil and natural-gas extraction from shale rock, should keep experimenting with the technology if it wants to curb reliance on imports, the nation’s oil industry lobby said.
The country should use “all means” to cut purchases of energy supplies from abroad, the Paris-based Union Francaise des Industries Petrolieres said today in a statement. UFIP also urged France to revise its mining code so that the public and local government are more “closely associated” with projects.
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Fort Worth Star Telegram
February 1, 2012
QUICKSILVER RESOURCES TO CUT CAPITAL SPENDING IN HALF
Fort Worth-based Quicksilver Resources is slashing capital spending nearly in half this year because of the lowest natural gas prices in a decade.
Meanwhile, the company's stock plunged nearly 11 percent in the past two days and is now less than one-third of its 2011 peak.
Quicksilver, predominantly a natural gas producer, plans to spend only $370 million in 2012 for drilling and completing wells and related activities. That's 47 percent less than its 2011 capital budget of $696 million.
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Houston Chronicle
February 1, 2012
BOOMING PRODUCTION PUSHES NATURAL GAS PRICE DOWN
The price of natural gas dropped back to near a 10-year low Wednesday after Exxon Mobil and other energy companies declined to cut production.
Exxon Mobil, America’s biggest natural gas producer, has led a push by major industry players into U.S. gas drilling over the past few years that has boosted production to the highest levels ever. Supplies in storage are well above average, and some experts estimate the nation has enough natural gas to meet its needs for a century.
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Calgary Herald
January 31, 2012
EWART: PUSHING TO SHIFT PUBLIC OPINION ON FRACKING
Like the auto industry previously, public concern over safety — this time it’s the water supply, not traffic accidents — is prompting industry to implement changes to long-standing practices to make production of oil and gas safer but more expensive.
The Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers unveiled six new “operating practices” for its member companies Monday in a two-pronged approach to address widespread concern over fracking: improve operating performance and transparency about that performance.
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Bloomberg
February 1, 2012
EXXON SHALE FAILURE IN POLAND MAY LENGTHEN GAZPROM’S SHADOW
Exxon Mobil Corp. (XOM)’s failed shale-gas wells in Poland may hobble the nation’s effort to become one of the world’s major energy sources and dismantle Russian dominance of Eastern European natural-gas markets.
Exxon, the world’s largest energy company by market value, said two exploratory wells drilled in a Polish shale formation last year weren’t commercially viable. The gas discovered in the wells, Exxon’s first in Poland, failed to flow in sufficient quantities to justify bringing them into production, David Rosenthal, vice president for investor relations, said during a conference call yesterday.
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KXAN
January 31, 2012
EXPLORATORY FRACKING NOW UNDERWAY IN COLLEYVILLE
Seven exploratory gas wells began operating Tuesday, despite homeowner concerns that fracking will release harmful chemicals in the air around it.
Tankers containing water and chemicals used in the drilling process rolled out of the site under the watchful eye of independent environmental monitors.
Residents opposed to drilling say they are upset more with the City of Colleyville allowing wells that surrounding communities have rejected. “Its kind of weird they would even do this knowing that Southlake has put a moratorium on all that and there’s no pipeline,” said resident Barbara Lang.
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Houston Chronicle
February 1, 2012
MARATHON OIL 4Q PROFIT DECLINES 22 PCT
Marathon Petroleum Corporation suffered a $75 million dollar loss in the fourth quarter of 2011, largely resulting from the higher crude oil prices, the company announced Wednesday morning.
The independent refining company reported a loss of 21 cents per diluted share for the three month quarter that ended Dec. 31. Marathon Petroleum, which spun off last year from oil and gas production corporation Marathon Oil, had a better showing in the fourth quarter of 2010, when it reported net income of $230 million, or 64 cents per share.
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Houston Chronicle
February 1, 2012
PETROBRAS SELLING $7 BILLION IN BONDS IN RECORD DEBT OFFERING
Petroleo Brasileiro SA (PETR4), Brazil’s state-controlled oil producer, plans to sell $7 billion of dollar bonds as soon as today in the country’s biggest corporate debt offering ever.
Petrobras, the biggest emerging-market issuer of overseas debt in 2011, will issue $1.25 billion of three-year debt and $1.75 billion of five-year debt while issuing more of its existing notes maturing in 2021 and 2041, according to a person familiar with the plan. The three-year debt will yield 275 basis points above similar-maturity U.S. Treasuries while the five- year notes will yield 290 basis points more, said the person, who asked not to be identified because terms aren’t set.
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Houston Chronicle
February 1, 2012
UNION WORKERS WILL GET RAISES UNDER AGREEMENT
Over the next few weeks, thousands of oil and chemical workers will be voting on whether to accept a new three-year labor agreement that will provide a first-year wage increase of 2.5 percent.
The 30,000 workers nationwide — including 4,600 in the Houston area — who are represented by the United Steelworkers Union will also receive a 3 percent raise in both the second and third year of the contract, according to sources familiar with the negotiations.
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Houston Chronicle
February 1, 2012
ENTERPRISE REPORTS 21 PERCENT RISE IN PROFITS FOR 4Q
The Houston-based oil and gas pipeline company Enterprise Products announced record profits for the fourth quarter of 2011, benefiting from the surge in natural gas and liquids drilling in shale plays.
The company announced earnings of $725 net income on $11.6 billion of revenue for the fourth quarter of 2011, a 21 percent increase over $289 million of net income on $9.6 billion of revenue for the same time period in 2010. The strong performance reflected the sharp increase of natural gas production in the Rocky Mountains, Haynesville and Eagle Ford shale plays, said Michael Creel, president and CEO of Enterprise.
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Dallas Observer
February 1, 2012
TRINITY BROADCASTING NETWORK PROPERTY IN COLLEYVILLE IS GETTING FRACKED, BY GOD, PESKY SOUTHLAKE NEIGHBORS BE DAMNED
The denizens of tony Southlake successfully defeated the fracking juggernaut, turning industry leaders like Chesapeake back at the city limit sign. Or maybe it was the low natural gas prices that did it. Tough to say, really.
But what can they do when a derrick goes up a stone's throw across those same city limits ... in Colleyville? And on property owned by none other than Trinity Broadcasting Network, home to Pat Robertson and Jan Crouch's eyelashes? Not much, it turns out, because Titan Operating began fracking the site yesterday, near the intersection of Pleasant Run and John McCain. It'll be the first hydraulically fractured well so far in Colleyville, and it's within earshot of the densely developed Southlake line.
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CNBC
January 31, 2012
US LAWMAKERS TAKE NEXT STEP ON NEW IRAN SANCTIONS
Lawmakers on the U.S. Senate Banking Committee plan to vote on a new round of sanctions targeting Iran's energy sector, aimed at choking off funds they suspect Tehran uses to develop nuclear weapons.
The committee released details of its 61-page bipartisan bill late on Monday and lawmakers will consider the measures and vote on them at a hearing on Thursday.
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San Antonio Express News
February 1, 2012
TESORO HAS RED 4TH QUARTER
San Antonio-based refiner Tesoro Corp. reported a loss in the fourth quarter because of weak refining margins and unfavorable prices for crude oils.
The San Antonio-based refiner reported a loss in the quarter of $124 million, or 89 cents a share, compared with net income of $3 million, or 2 cents a share, for the fourth quarter of 2010.
Tesoro CEO Greg Goff described the quarter as “a challenging period as a result of the dramatic change in crude oil price differentials.”
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CNBC
February 2, 2012
BRENT STRUGGLES TO HOLD GAINS, US STOCKPILES WEIGH
Brent crude oil struggled to sustain gains made earlier on Thursday as a large build-up of oil stocks in top consumer the United States countered upbeat economic data globally.
ICE Brent crude for March was up 9 cents to $111.65 a barrel after earlier rising as high as $112.50. U.S. crude was at $96.92, down 69 cents.
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CNBC
February 1, 2012
SHACTMAN: THE DOWNSIDE OF N. DAKOTA'S OIL BOOM
In the summer of 2011, CNBC traveled to North Dakota to witness the jobs boom created by what can best be characterized as a modern-day oil rush.
In the rock underneath the surface, some say there is upwards of 24 billion barrels of oil. With the advent of horizontal drilling and fracking (also known as hydraulic fracturing), the oil in the Bakken Formation has begun to flow at a tremendous profit.
Everywhere we went, people talked about six-figure jobs, money and opportunity. People drove into places like Williston, North Dakota — widely considered the center and symbol of this oil boom — and before dinner, they found high-paying jobs.
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Utilities Stories
El Paso Times
February 2, 2012
EL PASO ELECTRIC PROPOSAL SEEKS 5.6% RATE INCREASE
El Paso Electric wants to increase electric rates for residential customers by an average $4 per month, but reduce rates for commercial customers under a rate proposal filed Wednesday.
City and county government agencies would also see a hefty increase under the proposal filed with the city of El Paso, as ordered by the City Council. The proposal also was filed by the Texas Public Utility Commission, which will have final say on the rates.
The utility is proposing a total annual increase of $26.3 million, or an overall rate increase of 5.6 percent, for its Texas customers. However, the proposed electric rates vary for various customer classifications.
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New York Times
February 1, 2012
ADVISING CONGRESS TO CEDE CONTROL
The two chairmen of a study group established after the Obama administration killed a plan for a nuclear waste repository in Nevada appeared before a House subcommittee on Wednesday to explain a proposed solution to the enduring waste dilemma. They found their idea tough to sell.
Last week the so-called Blue Ribbon Commission on America’s Nuclear Future released a report calling for a new approach to finding a site, based on local consent rather than Congressional dictate.
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Alternatives & Renewables Stories
New York Times
February 2, 2012
RARE EARTH METAL REFINERY NEARS APPROVAL
The world’s largest refinery for rare earth metals has risen out of the red mud of a coastal swamp here and could soon obtain permission to operate — a step that would help break China’s near monopoly on rare earths but also worsen an emerging glut of some of these strategic minerals.
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Regulatory Stories
New York Times
February 1, 2012
FOR G.O.P., PIPELINE IS CENTRAL TO AGENDA
Just six months ago, Keystone for many Americans was the state nickname for Pennsylvania. But now Keystone, the Canadian pipeline, has become a centerpiece of the Republican economic and political agenda, and the party’s preferred truncheon against President Obama.
On the airwaves, on the campaign trail and in both chambers of Congress, Republicans are relentlessly pushing for an expansion of the pipeline known as Keystone XL and criticizing Mr. Obama’s decision to reject the project for now, forgoing thousands of pipeline jobs. Democrats, increasingly worried that the pounding on the issue will detract from their own message against income inequality, are looking for ways to defuse it.
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The Hill
February 1, 2012
EPA STANDS BY ‘FRACKING’ STUDY BUT CALLS REACH LIMITED
The Environmental Protection Agency is holding firm against critics of its explosive draft report that concluded hydraulic fracturing, the controversial gas-drilling method, probably caused groundwater contamination in Wyoming.
But the agency is warning against use of the finding as a broader indictment of hydraulic fracturing, or “fracking,” noting the fracking in the Pavillion, Wyo., area occurred under conditions “different from those in many other areas of the country.”
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February 1, 2012
Lead Stories
Washington Times
January 29, 2012
WOLFGANG: NATURAL GAS SECTOR SET UP BY OBAMA TO BE SABOTAGED?
President Obama spoke of the role natural gas must play in America’s energy future during his State of the Union address last week, but industry insiders fear it’s merely lip service designed to distract from what they consider the administration’s behind-the-scenes plan to sabotage the sector.
“They’re trying to make it more difficult for the industry to survive while the president is standing in front of the country saying we’re going to create jobs through hydraulic fracturing,” said Ken von Schaumburg, former deputy counsel at the Environmental Protection Agency during the Bush administration.
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Bloomberg
February 1, 2012
SOLAR PANEL SUPPLY GLUT MAY EXPAND IN 2012, BNEF’S CHASE SAYS
The glut of photovoltaic panels that wiped $30 billion from solar stocks last year is likely to expand in 2012, forcing manufacturers out of the industry, said Bloomberg New Energy Finance’s Chief Solar Analyst Jenny Chase.
Photovoltaic plant developers will likely install about 28.4 gigawatts of generators this year while manufacturing capacity may touch 45 gigawatts, Chase said. Installations for 2011 were about 28 gigawatts.
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Houston Chronicle
February 1, 2012
REFINERS, UNION HAVE TENTATIVE DEAL
The United Steelworkers Union reached a three-year deal Tuesday night with the nation's refineries and chemical plants, hours before a midnight deadline that could have put 30,000 workers on strike and reduced U.S. fuel-making capacity.
The tentative agreement is subject to approval by the workers the union represents at 168 production, refining, marketing, transportation, pipeline and petrochemical facilities - including 4,600 workers in the Houston area.
The union did not disclose details of the agreement.
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Oil & Gas Stories
Marketwatch
February 1, 2012
EXXON MOBIL FEELS THE WEIGHT OF ITS REFINERIES
Exxon Mobil Corp.’s fourth-quarter results matched Wall Street earnings expectations. The company had a $9.4 billion profit. Revenue was a staggering $122 billion. So why were its shares off 2%?
Two reasons, closely intertwined: High oil prices and low refining margins.
Oil prices have been hovering around $100 a barrel and that’s been good for Exxon. Earnings from the “upstream” exploration and production side of their business grew 18% last quarter compared with a year ago.
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Guardian
January 30, 2012
FRACKING DOES NOT NEED MORE REGULATION, REPORT SAYS
There is no need for more environmental legislation in the case of shale gas exploration, at least until it reaches commercial scale, says a new study published by the European commission.
The activities relating to exploration of shale gas are already subject to EU and national laws and regulations, says the report, carried out for the European commission by Belgian law firm Philippe & Partners.
Water protection issues, for instance, which have been raised as an issue by shale gas detractors, are already covered by EU legislation under the Water Framework Directive, the Groundwater Directive and the Mining Waste Directive. Meanwhile, the use of chemicals is covered by the REACH regulation, the study says.
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KSAT
January 30, 2012
NEW STATE LAW TARGETS FRACKING INDUSTRY
Many of the townspeople in Floresville said a new state law adopted last year by the Texas Legislature will help educate the public about the fracking process that most don't understand.
"Probably 99 percent don't and I’m among those 99 percent," said Virgil Herndon, who recently opened a used car dealership in Floresville.
The high-pressure process is behind the boom over the Eagle Ford shale formation far underground.
The industry reports water, sand and chemicals are injected, fracturing the rock to release pockets of oil and gas.
Although encouraged by the move toward recycling by some companies, environmentalists have said they are concerned about the effects of fracking, the amount of water being used and how wastewater is disposed.
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Winnipeg Free Press
January 30, 2012
CAPP ANNOUNCES NEW FRACKING GUIDELINES TO BOOST ENVIRONMENTAL PERFORMANCE
An energy industry group has developed a set of rules that it says could improve the environmental performance and transparency of hydraulic fracturing, an extraction method that has attracted a great deal of controversy.
The Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers says the "operating practices" unveiled Mionday apply to all of its members that explore for and produce natural gas in Canada.
"Applying these new operating practices will contribute to improving our environmental performance and transparency over time, both of which contribute to stronger understanding of industry activity and better relationships with the public, stakeholders and government," said CAPP President Dave Collyer in a statement.
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Denton Record-Chronicle
January 31, 2012
PANEL TACKLES WATER ISSUES
Denton’s official gas drilling task force voted Monday to recommend a series of water-related regulations, including a ban on open waste pits at drilling sites and baseline testing of nearby water wells.
The task force also endorsed expanding a city ban on wastewater disposal wells into areas of the city’s extraterritorial jurisdiction, although they were unsure whether the idea would pass a pending legal review.
The task force is meeting through March to help develop changes to the city’s gas drilling and production ordinance. The City Council ultimately must approve any ordinance changes.
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Fort Worth Star Telegram
January 30, 2012
FRACKING BEGINS TODAY ON COLLEYVILLE WELLS
Titan Operating intends to comply with all parts of the city's drilling ordinance as hydraulic fracturing begins today at the Pleasant Run Road well site, city officials say.
Titan has 11 days to finish fracking the seven natural gas wells there.
Residents can expect trucks coming and going as millions of gallons of water and chemicals are injected into the ground to shatter the shale rock to release the gas. Water will then be extracted from the ground and trucked away.
The work will be constantly monitored.
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Environmental Protection Online
January 31, 2012
FRACKING: FINANCIAL FUEL FOR AMERICA'S FUTURE
One of the most robust industries in the U.S. is driven by oil and gas production. A 2011 PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) report for the American Petroleum Institute noted that the oil and natural gas industry currently supplies more than 60 percent of the nation’s total energy demand, more than 99 percent of the fuel used by American vehicles, supports more than 9.2 million jobs, and contributes to 7.5 percent of the U.S. gross domestic product.
So, why is an industry so critical to our future and our economy at odds with environmental groups?
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Seeking Alpha
January 30, 2012
ALSAADI: GASFRAC ENERGY -- UNLOCKING NEW HYDROCARBON LIQUID BASINS
Earlier this year I published an article on waterless fracking company Gasfrac Energy Services (GSFVF.PK). In that article I discussed the various technical, economic and environmental benefits of Gasfrac Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG) fracking technology. Subsequently, I published a follow-up article covering a sample of five companies that achieved superior production results with LPG fracking.
In this article, I have selected an additional five companies that have unlocked new hydrocarbon reservoirs and achieved excellent production results with LPG fracking.
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Bloomberg
February 1, 2012
OHIO TRIES TO ESCAPE FATE AS A DUMPING GROUND FOR FRACKING FLUID
The millions of gallons of chemical- laced wastewater that fracking produces must flow somewhere, and Ohio (STOOH1) is trying not to be that place.
The oil and natural-gas drilling boom spurred more permits for disposal wells there during the past two years than during the previous decade combined. The volume injected into them was on a near-record pace last year, according to the Department of Natural Resources, and more than half was from out of state. That included 92.6 percent of the water sent to a Youngstown well closed last year after 11 nearby earthquakes.
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Houston Chronicle
February 1, 2012
FILLING IT UP JUST MAY EMPTY YOUR WALLET
Drivers, if you didn’t fill up at the start of the week, you may regret it today.
And the crushing news is that the high price you’ll pay now likely will be eclipsed in the spring – when prices at the pump will approach $4 a gallon in Texas, experts say.
The average gas price in Houston jumped 12 cents over the last week to $3.38 a gallon Wednesday for regular unleaded. Motorists locally now are paying 46 cents a gallon more for gasoline than they were a year ago, according to AAA.
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Houston Chronicle
February 1, 2012
ORSZAG: FRACKING BOOM COULD FINALLY CAP MYTH OF PEAK OIL
The U.S. oil market could be on the verge of its own fracking revolution, similar to what the natural-gas market is already experiencing. As a result, domestic production is now projected to rise significantly over the coming decades, reducing the relative share of imports in U.S. oil consumption.
Advances in horizontal drilling and hydrofracking, in which highly pressurized liquids are injected into underground rock, have been used increasingly over the past few years to extract natural gas. The result has been a substantial increase in recoverable reserves — accompanied by a lot of controversy over fracking’s environmental effects — and an associated decline in the cost of natural gas.
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Fort Worth Star Telegram
January 31, 2012
DRILLERS MUST NOW DISCLOSE FRACKING CHEMICALS
A new Texas Railroad Commission rule requiring oil and natural gas operators to publicly disclose the chemicals used in hydraulic fracturing of natural gas and oil wells takes effect today.
The rule also requires that operators disclose how much water is used in fracking, a process that may require 1 million to 5 million gallons for a well drilled in North Texas' Barnett Shale.
Ed Ireland, executive director of the Barnett Shale Energy Education Council, an industry group, said he believes that the information, to be disclosed at www.fracfocus.org, will be most sought by "those who have a keen interest in the environmental questions being raised regarding hydraulic fracturing."
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Utilities Stories
Houston Chronicle
January 31, 2012
2 MEN HURT IN EAST TEXAS BIOMASS PLANT ACCIDENT
SACUL, Texas — Emergency personnel say two workers have been critically hurt in an apparent electrical explosion and brief fire at a biomass power plant in East Texas.
A dispatcher with the Nacogdoches County Sheriff’s Department says the accident was reported around 8 a.m. Tuesday at a facility in Sacul, about 165 miles northeast of Houston.
A spokesman for Fagen Inc. of Granite Falls, Minn., which operates the unit, declined comment.
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Alternatives & Renewables Stories
Bloomberg
February 1, 2012
U.K. SAID TO PLAN CUTS TO SOLAR SUBSIDY AT PREDICTABLE INTERVALS
The U.K. government will announce as early as next week plans to reduce subsidies for solar energy at routine intervals as part of an effort to curb a boom in installations, a person familiar with the plan said.
The plan will include a deployment trigger mechanism that automatically cuts above-market rates paid for power from solar cells once installations reach a predetermined level, said the person, who declined to be identified before the official announcement. A spokeswoman for the Department of Energy and Climate Change confirmed by phone the government will propose a cost-control mechanism for solar power by Feb. 9.
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Bloomberg
February 1, 2012
U.S. CLEAN TECHNOLOGY VENTURE FUNDING DECLINES 4.5% IN 2011
U.S. venture capital investment in renewable power and energy-efficiency technology declined 4.5 percent to $4.9 billion last year from 2010, according to an Ernst & Young LLP study.
A total of $940.5 million in 70 funding rounds was provided in the fourth quarter to companies developing renewable sources of electricity, storage and energy-efficiency technologies, New York-based Ernst & Young said today in a statement.
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Bloomberg
February 1, 2012
COMPANIES MAY OUST SUPPLIERS OVER ENVIRONMENT GOALS, GROUP SAYS
Companies looking to save money by going green may be willing to fire suppliers who don’t act quickly to help, a nonprofit group called the Carbon Disclosure Project reported after surveying Coca-Cola Co. (KO) and others.
The number of multinationals planning to dump vendors within five years for missing environmental targets more than doubled to 39 percent in 2011, according to a report today. The study, released in London by Accenture Plc and the nonprofit, involved 50 respondents, also including Kraft Foods Inc. and Wal-Mart (WMT) Stores Inc. The report didn’t name any of the companies planning to dismiss suppliers.
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Regulatory Stories
Bloomberg
January 25, 2012
SAFE GAS FRACKING TOUTED BY OBAMA DISPUTED BY ENVIRONMENTALISTS
President Barack Obama’s promotion of fracking as a safe way to boost natural gas production is disputed by environmentalists who say the government lacks tough rules to safeguard air and water.
Groups such as Protecting Our Waters say hydraulic fracturing -- in which a mix of water, sand and chemicals are shot underground to break apart rock and free gas -- is tainting drinking water and causing more pollution than is cut by the cheap gas. The broad new federal legislation and regulation the groups advocate would tangle up fracking in miles of red tape, industry leaders counter.
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Motley Fool
January 30, 2012
SIMON: WHY OBAMA'S LATEST ENERGY POLICY MAKES SENSE
Last April, I put forth my perspective on President Obama's ambitious energy plan, which called for a one-third reduction in oil imports by 2025. I tried to put together the supply-side issues on the domestic front and see whether that plan was carved in stone. Now, in his latest State of the Union address last week, the President emphasized regulations for the safe development of those resources. This means that all companies drilling for gas on public land are required to disclose the chemicals used for fracking.
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Washington Times
January 30, 2012
WT: OBAMA’S FRACK ATTACK
President Obama taking credit for higher oil and natural gas production is like the rooster taking credit for the sunrise. Contrary to the words on the teleprompter at last week’s State of the Union address, any success for these fossil fuels has come in spite of administration policies. Unless the president sticks to his promise of an “all-out, all-of-the-above” energy strategy and keeps the carbon haters at bay, America's energy future will be at risk.
Just as Mr. Obama made no mention in his speech that he had just shut down the Keystone XL oil pipeline, he also skipped over “fracking,” the process of natural gas extraction that has become a dirty word among his radical, self-proclaimed environmental allies.
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San Antonio Express News
January 31, 2012
SENATE CANDIDATE JONES DEFENDS RESIDENCY IN TWO PLACES
Texas Railroad Commissioner Elizabeth Ames Jones appears to have uncovered a mystery in the state's Constitution: Nowhere does it define “the Capital of the State.”
The Constitution requires certain state officers to reside there while in office, but since the capital city isn't named, how can that requirement be enforced?
Jones sent that question as part of a larger request to the Texas attorney general's office Monday, seeking an opinion on whether she may continue to serve on the commission while she campaigns for a state Senate seat from her home in San Antonio.
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The Hill
February 1, 2012
HOUSE GOP: NO DECISION YET ON SOLYNDRA CONTEMPT CHARGES
House Republicans insisted Tuesday that they haven’t yet decided whether to set up an explosive confrontation with the White House by seeking contempt charges over the response to a subpoena for internal communication about Solyndra.
Discussions this week will add more clarity, said Rep. Cliff Stearns (R-Fla.), a top member of the House Energy and Commerce Committee and the GOP point man in the probe of federal aid to the failed California solar panel manufacturer.
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Washington Post
January 31, 2012
SENATORS PUSH FOR BILL TO APPROVE KEYSTONE PIPELINE
A group of 44 U.S. senators, all Republican but one, have signed on to proposed legislation that would authorize the Canada-to-Texas Keystone XL oil pipeline despite the refusal of President Obama to advance the project.
Sen. John Hoeven (R-N.D.) introduced a bill Monday that, if passed into law, would allow work to begin immediately on all but the sensitive Nebraska portion of TransCanada’s $7 billion project.
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Other Stories
Lufkin Daily News
January 31, 2012
ANRA GM SAYS LUFKIN AREA IS WELL-SUITED FOR WATER COMPARED TO REST OF STATE
"In serious drought conditions, Texas does not and will not have enough water to meet the needs of its people, businesses and agricultural enterprises.”
That sobering message came from the Texas Water Development Board recently, as the agency charged with collecting and disseminating water-related data and assisting with regional water supply planning released its 2012 State Water Plan.
The plan, updated every five years, was approved by the board at its Dec. 15 meeting and was delivered to the governor and the legislature Jan. 5.
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January 31, 2012
Lead Stories
Houston Chronicle
January 30, 2012
HIGHWAY BILL AN UNLIKELY VEHICLE FOR PARTISAN ENERGY FIGHTS
A bill that might otherwise have served only to build the nation’s roads and bridges may end up burning bridges — albeit figuratively — between the two parties later this year.
Last fall Congress showed a rare moment of bipartisanship on major legislation when a Senate committee unanimously passed a bill extending highway and mass-transit programs at current spending levels by two years. Senate Environment and Public Works Committee Chairwoman Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., has said the bill passed with such strong support because Democrats and Republicans set aside controversial policy riders in the interest of getting the bill done.
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San Antonio Express News
January 30, 2012
CONTROVERSIAL BORDER COAL MINE BACK IN PLAY
Two decades after the first salvos were fired, a bitter battle over a plan to mine millions of tons of low-quality coal in Maverick County to be burned in smog-producing Mexican power plants will resume next week.
On Monday, an examiner for the Texas Railroad Commission will begin hearing evidence on an application by Dos Republicas Coal Partnership, a company owned by Mexican industrialists, to operate a large strip mine just north of Eagle Pass.
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North County Times
January 30, 2012
THWARTED ON US OIL PIPELINE, CANADA LOOKS TO CHINA
The latest chapter in Canada's quest to become a full-blown oil superpower unfolded this month in a village gym on the British Columbia coast.
Here, several hundred people gathered for hearings on whether a pipeline should be laid from the Alberta oil sands to the Pacific in order to deliver oil to Asia, chiefly energy-hungry China. The stakes are particularly high for the village of Kitamaat and its neighbors, because the pipeline would terminate here and a port would be built to handle 220 tankers a year and 525,000 barrels of oil a day.
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Associated Press
January 27, 2012
NO ENERGY INDUSTRY BACKING FOR THE WORD 'FRACKING'
A different kind of F-word is stirring a linguistic and political debate as controversial as what it defines.
The word is "fracking" — as in hydraulic fracturing, a technique long used by the oil and gas industry to free oil and gas from rock.
It's not in the dictionary, the industry hates it, and President Barack Obama didn't use it in his State of the Union speech — even as he praised federal subsidies for it.
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Oil & Gas Stories
San Antonio Express News
January 30, 2012
REFINERS, UNIONS PREPARE FOR STRIKE AS CONTRACT DEADLINE LOOMS
Union officials are drawing up strike rosters while refineries prepare for possible shutdowns as a deadline looms on nationwide contract talks covering 30,000 refinery and chemical workers.
Negotiators with United Steelworkers International and Shell Oil Co. were meeting Monday to hammer out a contract to replace one that expires at 12:01 a.m. Wednesday.
One analyst warned Monday that a strike that closes refineries could boost gasoline prices.
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Reuters
January 27, 2012
EXXON MOBIL PRESSING ON WITH GERMAN SHALE-GAS EXPLORATION DESPITE "FRACKING" CONCERNS
U.S. ExxonMobil will continue to push for unconventional gas exploration in Germany alongside conventional gas production, despite scepticism over new drilling methods, its Europe chief said on Friday.
"(Germany) is most definitely an interesting market. We cannot achieve the energy strategy shift without gas," Gernot Kalkoffen, Exxon Mobil Central Europe head, said in an interview with the Handelsblatt business daily.
"The gas infrastructure is good and gas is in demand in Germany," he added.
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TheStar.com
January 30, 2012
WHY NATURAL GAS IS NOT AN ENVIRONMENTALLY FRIENDLY FUEL
The Green Car Journal was wrong to honour any car powered by natural gas, and I hope the things don’t proliferate, although that’s the unhappy trend. After years as a prototype, the GX (which is what Honda has branded the Civic Natural Gas car) went on limited sale to American consumers in 2006 and the new model will be available in most states, although not yet in Canada.
The technology does offer benefits. According to the EPA, at the tailpipe it cuts carbon-dioxide emissions — they contribute to climate change — by 25 per cent compared with gasoline, and reduces various toxic pollutants and dangerous particles by between 50 and 95 per cent.
The problem is that you can’t count only what spews from the tailpipe. Fuel sources, and their impacts, must be part of the equation, and on that score natural gas is rapidly moving from green to black.
That’s because, increasingly, it’s found as shale gas.
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Seeking Alpha
January 27, 2012
INVESTING IN FRACKING WATER SOLUTION PROVIDERS
According to Chesapeake Energy Corporation (CHK) it takes on average 4.5 million gallons of water to drill a single horizontal deep shale oil or natural gas well using the traditional fracking process. All of that water must be hauled to the drill site and then the flowback, which is generally 20%, but can be as high as 50%, must be either treated on site or hauled away to be treated elsewhere. In addition to the usage of water, concerns regarding the chemicals mixed with the water and whether or not that is tainting drinking water have also become a heated topic of conversation.
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The Street
January 28, 2012
IN FRACKING BOOM, OIL AND GAS COMPANIES BOXED IN BY SAND
For companies involved in the hydraulic fracturing boom, from the miners of the sand like Carbo Ceramics to the oil service companies like RPC dependent on increased supply, and finally, to exploration and production companies like Whiting Petroleum that are paying increasing costs, sand is a critical raw material.
Sand is mixed with water and chemicals in the fracking process to extract oil and gas trapped in shale rock, and most of that sand comes from mines in the Wisconsin/Minnesota area.
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Houston Chronicle
January 31, 2012
CONOCO PHILLIPS APPEALS WORKER’S $15.2M VERDICT
A Jones County man waited too long to file a lawsuit over exposure his exposure to workplace asbestos, attorneys told the Mississippi Supreme Court.
The Mississippi Supreme Court heard arguments from Conoco Phillips Corp., which has appealed a $15.2 million jury award to an oil well drilling worker who alleged he got lung disease from exposure to asbestos.
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Houston Chronicle
January 30, 2012
CAMERON SUES INSURER FOR REFUSING TO PAY BP SETTLEMENT
Cameron International Corp., facing thousands of claims from the 2010 Gulf of Mexico oil spill, sued one of its insurers for allegedly refusing to pay $50 million in coverage, a move the manufacturer says threatened a $250 million settlement with BP Plc. (BP/)
Cameron, in a complaint filed yesterday in federal court in New Orleans, accused a Liberty Mutual Holding Co. unit of breach of contract and of acting in bad faith by holding up the settlement with BP “hostage” so the insurer could negotiate a “steep discount” on the amount it owed.
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Utilities Stories
San Antonio Express News
January 30, 2012
CPS SETS $1.38 BILLION BUDGET FOR '13
CPS Energy's board of trustees approved a budget of $1.38 billion for fiscal 2013 and $825.8 million for fiscal 2014 — both budgets significantly below that of fiscal 2012, which ends today.
The CPS board didn't discuss a planned rate increase, but the utility's managers have said they plan to ask City Council for a rate increase in the spring.
“We do anticipate going to council for a rate increase,” CPS spokeswoman Lisa Lewis said after the meeting, “and we are making every effort to hold to the commitment of a modest rate increase. We think it will be less than 5 percent for the next two-year period.”
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New York Times
January 31, 2012
U.N. WATCHDOG TENTATIVELY BACKS JAPAN’S NUCLEAR STRESS TESTS
A United Nations fact-finding mission on Tuesday tentatively supported new stress tests designed to determine whether Japan’s nuclear plants can withstand another emergency, throwing its weight behind a government push to restart reactors idled in the wake of the disaster at Fukushima.
Experts from the Vienna-based International Atomic Energy Agency were in Japan at the request of the government to review stress tests ordered by the country’s nuclear regulator on reactors across Japan.
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Charlotte Observer
January 29, 2012
A NEW GENERATION OF NUCLEAR PLANTS
The long and winding road of America's nuclear renaissance runs down South Tryon Street on its way to the first U.S. power plants to be built in a generation.
Headquartered one block off the Square, Shaw's Power Group shares contracts with Westinghouse to build two additional reactors at both the Summer nuclear plant northwest of Columbia and at the Vogtle plant in eastern Georgia.
The projects are billion-dollar prizes loaded with risk for their owners and builders.
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ChicagoBusiness.com
January 30, 2012
EXELON SHUTS BYRON NUCLEAR PLANT UNIT AFTER POWER LOSS
A nuclear reactor at a northern Illinois plant shut down Monday after losing power, and steam was being vented to reduce pressure, according to officials from Exelon Nuclear and federal regulators.
Unit 2 at Byron Generating Station shut down around 10:18 a.m., after losing power from an off-site source, Exelon officials said. Diesel generators began supplying power to the plant equipment and operators began releasing steam from the non-nuclear side of the plant to help cool the reactor, officials said.
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Alternatives & Renewables Stories
Des Moines Register
January 27, 2012
BIODIESEL PLANT REOPENS AFTER FOUR IDLE YEARS
ALGONA, IA. — Folks in Kossuth County are feeling good now that the biodiesel plant east of Algona has emerged from bankruptcy, has reopened and is employing 30 workers putting out 60 million gallons of biodiesel per year.
The old East Fork plant sat idle for four years, a poster boy for the difficulties of biodiesel. Unlike its cousin ethanol, biodiesel has known mostly struggle as it tries to establish itself as the renewable biofuels alternative to diesel in the truck/heavy equipment market.
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GlobalWarming.org
January 29, 2012
DRIP, DRIP, DRIP: YET ANOTHER GREEN ENERGY STIMULUS RECIPIENT HITS THE SKIDS (THE THIRD THIS WEEK!)
Earlier this week, Stimulus beneficiary Evergreen Energy bit the dust. Then, Ener1, a manufacturer of batteries for electric vehicles and recipient of Stimulus largesse, filed for bankruptcy. And today, the Las Vegas Sun reports that Amonix, Inc., a manufacturer of solar panels that received $5.9 million from the Porkulus, will cut two-thirds of its workforce, about 200 employees, only seven months after opening a factory in Nevada.
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Chicago Sun Times
January 27, 2012
ILLINOIS TOPS NATION IN WIND ENERGY
Despite skepticism about the viability of solar-component and electric-car battery companies that have gone bankrupt recently, Illinois is proving that firms can create jobs and help the environment with wind turbines and wind farms, alternative-power advocates said Thursday.
In 2011, Illinois topped the nation in the number of new wind turbines installed here — 404 — and ranked No. 2 behind California in the total amount of the turbines’ power capacity , according to a report by the American Wind Energy Association.
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Southwest Farm Press
January 29, 2012
AUSTRALIAN TREE OFFERS TEXAS GROWERS BIOFUEL ALTERNATIVE
As global petroleum resources decline and the cost of imported oil escalates, agriculture producers around the world have been researching and testing food and non-food biofuels as an alternative to meet the growing demand for energy.
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.Biodiesel is experiencing a historic surge worldwide and a rapid expansion in production capacity is being observed not only in developed countries such as Germany, Italy, France, and the United States but also in developing countries such as Brazil, Argentina, and Indonesia. Interest in and expansion of renewable fuel production has been fostered by mandates and financial incentives offered by governments, like the Obama Administration’s Renewable Fuels Standard requiring the production of 36 billion gallons of biofuels by 2022.
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New York Times
January 30, 2012
WEIGHING TARIFFS ON CHINESE SOLAR PANELS
The Commerce Department is scheduled to decide in a month whether Chinese solar panels should be subject to an import tariff, after fielding a complaint from domestic manufacturers that the Chinese are illegally subsidizing their solar export market. The department has not said how it will rule.
But on Monday it issued a finding stating that the domestic manufacturers were facing “critical circumstances,” which means that if it does decide to favor imposing duties, they could, in theory, be retroactive to 90 days before its decision.
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Regulatory Stories
KSAT
January 27, 2012
STUDY: SOUTH TEXAS HAS ENOUGH WATER FOR OIL BOOM
The oil boom in South Texas has drawn a few concerns for the way the oil is extracted through fracking -- which uses a lot of water.
Railroad Commissioner David Porter appointed a task force to look at the water supply along the Eagle Ford shale field above the Carrizo Wilcox Aquifer.
The 26-member panel studied the situation and declared that there is enough water to sustain man, beast and fracking.
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Houston Chronicle
January 31, 2012
WITH TRIAL PENDING, BP ASKS JUDGE TO CULL EXPERTS
With a trial over the Gulf of Mexico oil spill looming, BP PLC is asking a federal judge to block two plaintiffs’ experts from testifying about an alleged disregard for safety throughout the energy company that those experts say led to the nation’s largest offshore oil spill.
BP’s legal maneuver to limit the two California experts from testifying about the alleged lack of a safety culture at BP was made public Monday after U.S. Magistrate Sally Shushan unsealed 30 court motions to limit and block expert testimony. BP filed 17 of the motions, seeking to block expert testimony on a number of issues behind what happened to cause BP’s well to blow out.
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New York Times
January 26, 2012
ENERGY TAX BREAKS PROPOSED, DESPITE WANING SUPPORT FOR SUBSIDIES
Assisted by technological innovation and years of subsidies, the cost of wind and solar power has fallen sharply — so much so that the two industries say that they can sometimes deliver cleaner electricity at prices competitive with power made from fossil fuels.
At the same time, wind and solar companies are telling Congress that they cannot be truly competitive and keep creating jobs without a few more years of government support.
Their efforts received a boost on Thursday from President Obama, who called for a package of tax credits for renewable power as part of a broader energy plan that he outlined while on a campaign swing through Nevada and Colorado.
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Huffington Post
January 30, 2012
KEYSTONE XL APPROVAL BILL GETS 44 U.S. SENATORS ON BOARD
A group of 44 U.S. senators, all but one Republican, have signed on to proposed legislation that would authorize the Canada-to-Texas Keystone XL oil pipeline despite the refusal of President Barack Obama to advance the project.
Republican Senator John Hoeven is set to introduce the bill on Monday that, if passed into law, would allow work to begin immediately on all but the sensitive Nebraska portion of TransCanada's $7 billion controversial project.
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New York Times
January 26, 2012
RULING FAVORS OWNER OF RIG IN GULF SPILL
Transocean, the owner of the Deepwater Horizon rig, which blew out in the Gulf of Mexico nearly two years ago, is not liable for some of the pollution claims arising from the fatal accident, a federal judge in Louisiana ruled on Thursday.
Transocean had argued that BP, as the owner of the well, was responsible for all the costs of the blowout, which killed 11 workers and spilled nearly five million barrels of oil into the gulf. Judge Carl Barbier, the federal judge hearing the lawsuits relating to the disaster, agreed in part, saying that Transocean’s contract with BP shielded it from compensatory claims.
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KXAN
January 30, 2012
CORNYN JOINS EFFORT TO REVIVE PIPELINE
U.S. Sen. John Cornyn on Monday signed on as a co-sponsor of legislation to ensure that a Canada-to-Texas oil pipeline gets built.
President Barack Obama this month put the so-called Keystone XL Pipeline project on hold so that additional proposed routes could be considered to minimize any environmental threats. Keystone supporters say the project will reduce the United States' dependence on oil from the Middle East.
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January 30, 2012
Lead Stories
The Hill
January 28, 2012
GOP WANTS SEN. BAUCUS TO GO ROGUE ON KEYSTONE XL OIL SANDS PIPELINE
Republicans are pressing Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus (D-Mont.) to buck his leadership and use his authority in the payroll tax conference to green-light the Keystone XL oil sands pipeline.
Baucus has told business leaders in Montana that winning authorization for the transnational pipeline is one of his highest priorities for 2012.
Republicans say Baucus, as co-chairman of the payroll tax conference, has the power to include Keystone language in must-pass legislation and will pressure him to act.
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Fort Worth Star Telegram
January 28, 2012
OIL SPILL BRINGS ATTENTION, AND DOLLARS, TO DELICATE GULF COAST
For decades, farmers and fishermen along the Gulf of Mexico watched as the waters in the sensitive ecosystem slowly got dirtier and islands eroded, all while the country largely ignored the destruction.
It took BP's oil well blowout in the Gulf -- and the resulting environmental catastrophe when millions of gallons of crude spewed into the ocean and washed ashore -- for the nation to turn its attention to the slow, methodical ruin of a region vital to the U.S. economy.
Last month, more than 11/2 years after the spill began, the U.S. Agriculture Department announced a three-year, $50 million initiative designed to improve water quality along the coast.
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Houston Chronicle
January 30, 2012
NABORS $7.2 BILLION TAKEOVER SEEN WITH SURGING OPTIONS
Nabors Industries Ltd. (NBR) has gotten so cheap that traders in the options market are betting the world’s largest land-drilling contractor may be a takeover candidate after the departure of its 81-year-old chief executive officer.
Nabors, which lost $2.4 billion in value in the past six months as delays in equipment deliveries and upgrades of rigs in Saudi Arabia cut profitability, is now cheaper than 97 percent of oil and gas services companies versus sales, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. In the past two weeks, calls priced 10 percent above Nabors’ stock rose the most in 18 months versus puts on one-month contracts, signaling traders are anticipating an acquisition, said JonesTrading Institutional Services LLC.
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Oil & Gas Stories
CNBC
January 30, 2012
OIL DIPS BELOW $111, EU AND IRAN EYED
Oil prices retreated on Monday, dipping below $111 a barrel after an expected Iranian vote to suspend crude exports to Europe was postponed and markets continued to wait for a deal on Greek debt.
Brent crude futures were down 55 cents to $110.91 a barrel and U.S. crude was down 75 cents at $98.81 a barrel.
Both contracts gained more than 1 percent last week.
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CNBC
January 27, 2012
CHEVRON PROFIT FALLS AS REFINERIES, OUTPUT SUFFER
Chevron said Friday that its profit slipped by 3.2 percent in the fourth quarter as its refineries struggled to pass on the higher cost of crude oil.
The San Ramon, Calif., oil giant on Friday reported net income of $5.12 billion, or $2.58 per share, in the final three months of 2011. That compares with $5.3 billion, or $2.64 per share, in the same part of 2010. Revenue increased 11.9 percent to $60 billion.
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Fort Worth Star Telegram
January 29, 2012
ARLINGTON COUNCIL REJECTS CHESAPEAKE DRILLING SITE IN RUSH CREEK AREA
After city leaders twice rejected their proposed Rush Creek drill site in southwest Arlington, Chesapeake Energy officials said it is unlikely that they will find an acceptable site where all 2,600 lease-holders can earn royalties.
After a lengthy public hearing Tuesday, the Arlington City Council voted 7-1 to deny Chesapeake's request for a special-use permit to drill at the southwest corner of South Bowen and West Bardin roads. The council also rejected the company's second request since 2010 to rezone the 55-acre site to office use from planned development, which doesn't allow drilling.
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San Antonio Express News
January 29, 2012
RETREAT FROM NATURAL GAS GROWS AS PRICE SHRINKS
A precipitous plunge in natural gas prices has turned the national shale gas rush into a retreat.
Oil and gas companies released a stream of announcements last week of plans to close off natural gas wells, pull out gas rigs and curtail spending in gas fields from Texas to Pennsylvania.
Oklahoma City-based Chesapeake Energy, the nation's second-largest natural gas producer, launched the barrage with an announcement Monday that it would slash natural gas drilling in half over the next few months.
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Houston Chronicle
January 30, 2012
STEFFY: BP’S NUMBER-FUDGING TACTICS REVEALED
An email conversation released as part of federal court proceedings last week shows BP officials worried that the Macondo well could release far more oil than the official estimates of the 2010 spill. A memo, sent on the day of the Deepwater Horizon accident, warned that well could flow as much as 3.4 million gallons a day, based on BP’s internal modeling. Federal estimates have put the daily flow rate at about two-thirds of that rate.
The blowout preventer, of course, didn’t work, and BP low-balled the initial estimates of the oil flow. That, as I pointed out before, was a tactic designed to reduce it’s legal liability in the case.
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Houston Chronicle
January 29, 2012
DEAL OF THE WEEK: LYONDELLBASELL TO PUT NAME ON TOWER
1 Houston Center is getting a new name as part of a lease deal with global chemical maker and longtime tenant LyondellBasell.
The downtown building at 1221 McKinney will be known as LyondellBasell Tower after a lease extension of 358,138 square feet, Crescent Real Estate Holdings announced. The company will occupy floors 3 through 17 of the 46-story building and will put its name on the monument at McKinney and San Jacinto. Assorted signs on the sky bridges and other areas of the Houston Center complex will be changed to reflect the new name.
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Fort Worth Star Telegram
January 28, 2012
WATER POLLUTION SUIT AGAINST RANGE RESOURCES IS REJECTED
A state district judge has ruled that a Parker County couple lack legal jurisdiction to sue Fort Worth-based Range Resources in a high-profile case involving methane contamination of their water well.
Judge Trey Loftin of the 43rd District Court in Weatherford made his ruling late Friday.
He said Steve and Shyla Lipsky, who live in the upscale Silverado subdivision in far south Parker County, do not have legal standing for their $6.5 million lawsuit against Range in his court because the Texas Railroad Commission determined last year that two of the company's natural gas wells were not responsible for contaminating the private water well.
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Fort Worth Star Telegram
January 27, 2012
U.S. RIG COUNT SAME; TEXAS DOWN; BARNETT UP
The number of active drilling rigs in the U.S. was unchanged this week at 2,008, according to Houston-based oil field services firm Baker Hughes. There were 1,225 rigs exploring for oil, 777 for natural gas and six miscellaneous. Texas dropped six rigs to 917. In North Texas' Barnett Shale, 60 rigs were drilling Friday, up two from a week earlier, according to RigData. The leading counties were Tarrant, 17; Montague, nine; Johnson, eight; Wise and Jack, six each, and Denton, five.
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Houston Chronicle
January 30, 2012
KAN. SEEKS TO BEEF UP BUDGET TO DEAL WITH FRACKING
The Kansas Corporation Commission, the agency that regulates the oil and gas industry in the state, says it doesn’t have the necessary staff to inspect the growing number of oil and gas drilling sites involving horizontal fracturing, or fracking.
“Current staffing resources cannot adequately and timely perform necessary field inspections with this increase level of activity,” the KCC said in its budget request for 2013.
The KCC said that since 2009 when the first horizontal wells were drilled in Kansas, the state has seen a 300 percent increase in permits for such wells. The number of permits the state has issued for horizontally fracked wells has gone from eight in 2010, to 250 estimated for fiscal year 2012 and 500 estimated for fiscal year 2013, according to the KCC.
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Houston Chronicle
January 29, 2012
U.S. REFINERY UNION SAYS STRIKE POSSIBLE AS CONTRACT DEADLINE NEARS
The union representing more than 30,000 workers at refineries, terminals and pipelines throughout the U.S. warned members that a strike may be imminent as negotiations with the industry near a Feb. 1 deadline.
“Your policy committee is concerned that the lack of more substantive response from the industry will necessitate strike action at one or more locations,” United Steelworkers said in an update to workers.
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CNBC
January 30, 2012
TONEN BUYS 99% OF EXXONMOBIL'S STAKE FOR $4 BILLION
Japan's second largest refiner TonenGeneral Sekiyu said on Sunday it will buy 99 percent of the shares in ExxonMobil's Japanese unit, ExxonMobil Yugen Kaisha, for 302 billion yen ($3.94 billion) to improve efficiency.
ExxonMobil will give up its controlling stake in TonenGeneral, but retain a 22 percent voting share in the Japanese oil giant, completing the transaction by June 1, 2012, a statement said.
ExxonMobil currently holds about 50 percent of the Japanese refiner.
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Houston Chronicle
January 30, 2012
HC: FRACKING STANDARDS ALREADY IN PLACE
It is refreshing to read reasoned explanations of just what is involved in hydraulic fracturing, particularly about the materials used in hydraulic-fracturing operations ("The fracking facts," Page B6, Jan. 11.) Too often, writers resort to a shortcut and describe the fluids as consisting "of a mixture of water and chemicals." They omit the fact that 90 percent of the fluids are water while sand makes up 9.5 percent, meaning that chemicals make up 0.5 percent - and that most of those chemicals, as the Chronicle's editorial point out, are found in household and food products.
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Utilities Stories
Austin American Statesman
January 29, 2012
PARTS OF DOWNTOWN GO DARK FOR NEARLY 12 HOURS
An unusual, back-to-back failure of electric transformers late Saturday led to power lines overloading, smoldering and, in one instance, catching fire, causing a nearly 12-hour electricity outage across a wide area of downtown Austin.
Power remained out Sunday night at one building, Capitol Center, a 15-story office tower at 919 Congress Ave., and crews planned to work through the night to restore it.
On Saturday night, bars and clubs on much of East Sixth Street were forced to close early, losing out on more than two hours of business on the busiest night of the week.
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San Antonio Express News
January 30, 2012
SAEN: RAILROAD COMMISSION SHOULD HEED STRIP MINE WORRIES
Economic development is a key goal of most local government officials. And when a majority of a community's public leaders are against a project touted as a job-generator, that opposition is noteworthy.
In Maverick County, despite a high level of unemployment, most community leaders are lined up against a plan to strip mine coal and sell it for use in loosely-regulated Mexican power plants.
The Express-News reported that the city of Eagle Pass, Maverick County Judge David Saucedo, the school district, the hospital district and the local water authority oppose the strip-mining plan.
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Austin American Statesman
January 29, 2012
BROWN: A CAPTIVE RATE PAYER SPEAKS
I am one of Austin Energy's 56,000 captive customers who live outside the city. Many of us are opposed to the utility's proposed $136 million rate increase, which will likely be appealed to the Texas Public Utility Commission.
The rate plan is replete with harsh fees, exorbitant energy charges and untested assumptions. It will create a "weird" utility business model unlike any other in the state. And it will make Austin Energy an oddity — like a two-headed calf — in the Texas utility world.
If the plan is approved, Austin Energy will attract unwanted attention from the PUC and members of the Texas Legislature. Those groups will quickly see that Austin Energy's practices are far outside industry norms.
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Austin American Statesman
January 29, 2012
GARCIA: PROPOSED ELECTRIC RATE INCREASE RAISES QUESTIONS ON PUBLIC DEBT
Austin's electric rates bumped up against the growing national discontent with public debt.
Ever-elusive consensus has apparently been reached in Washington that public debt is not a good thing. I say apparently because, public debt — like Mark Twain's weather — is more conversation piece than action item. Members of Congress denounce debt but can't quite reach agreement on how to do it.
Long before the economic free fall of 2008 there were warnings about the rising level of national debt. After 2008, the voices that had been sounding the warnings grew in both number and volume.
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Austin American Statesman
January 28, 2012
AUSTIN ENERGY TRANSFERRING MORE EVERY YEAR INTO CITY'S GENERAL FUND
Even as Austin Energy's budget has eroded, the city government has shifted increasingly large chunks of the utility's earnings to fund other parts of the city budget.
It is a trend that threatens the utility's long-term finances and that is helping drive Austin Energy's need for a 12 percent rate increase, according to a variety of observers.
Complaints about Austin Energy's general fund transfer and spending on things outside its core business are not new. But allegations of a stealth tax have traditionally been countered with arguments that Austin Energy is helping the entire city with proceeds that a private utility would turn over to shareholders.
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Alternatives & Renewables Stories
CNBC
January 29, 2012
BOYLE: WITH $100 A BARREL OIL, WHY ISN’T GREEN TECH BETTER?
The demand for energy is expected to double in the next 40 years globally, as populations grow and access to electricity increases, yet a large-scale, safe alternative to fossil fuels has yet to be built.
Peter Voser, chief executive of Royal Dutch Shell, the world’s biggest energy company, told the audience at a CNBC debate on the concluding day of the World Economic Forum in Davos that more innovation was needed in “all energy forms.”
“We can’t go on subsidizing new forms of energy forever,” he said. “Innovation in scientific education is key.”
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Bloomberg
January 30, 2012
RENEWABLE ENERGY DEALS BUCK UNCERTAINTY TO RISE 40%, PWC SAYS
Renewable energy mergers and acquisitions rose 40 percent in value last year, bucking the uncertainty caused by the European Union debt crisis, the global consultant PwC said today.
About $53.5 billion of wind, solar, biofuels, energy efficiency, geothermal, biomass and hydro deals were completed, up from $38.2 billion in 2010, PwC said in an e-mailed report. It’s the highest in the four years that PwC has conducted the survey. The overall number of deals dropped to 570 from 606.
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Bloomberg
January 29, 2012
INDIA’S LARGEST SOLAR PROGRAM CUTS POWER RATES BY AS MUCH AS 33%
India’s largest solar program cut the preferential rate it pays utilities for sun power as much as 33 percent as global prices of panels declined by more than half.
Photovoltaic plants commissioned after the Jan. 28 deadline will be paid a rate of 9.98 rupees (20 cents) per kilowatt-hour for the first 12 years, compared with 15 rupees for those finished on time, the Gujarat Electricity Regulatory Commission said in a tariff order on its website. The rate will be reduced to 7 rupees per kilowatt-hour for the next 13 years.
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Regulatory Stories
The Hill
January 30, 2012
GOP SEN. MURKOWSKI SAYS NO WHITE HOUSE MUSCLE BEHIND ‘CLEAN’ POWER STANDARD
In his State of the Union, Obama called for a "clean energy standrad" for utilities, but the top GOP senator on the Energy committee says the plan isn't going anywhere.
The top Republican on the Senate’s Energy committee says President Obama’s proposed national green electricity mandate remains moribund in Congress – and that the White House hasn’t really pushed it.
Obama’s 2012 State of the Union speech reiterated his call for a “clean energy standard” for utilities, a pitch that first surfaced in last year’s address. But Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) told Platts Energy Week TV that the idea isn’t going anywhere.
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The Hill
January 29, 2012
BOEHNER SAYS GOP WILL ADD KEYSTONE PROVISION TO INFRASTRUCTURE BILL
Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) said Sunday that legislation advancing the Keystone pipeline would be part of a major House Republican infrastructure and energy bill if it is not enacted before that bill comes to a vote.
The Obama administration has rejected approval of the oil sands pipeline over GOP objections, and Republican leaders have identified it as a top job-creating priority.
House GOP leaders are preparing to release a top Boehner priority: Legislation that would generate revenue for improving the nation’s aging infrastructure through expanding domestic energy production.
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Houston Chronicle
January 30, 2012
ND SENATE LEADER: LOOK AGAIN AT OIL TAX SPLITS
The North Dakota Senate’s Republican majority leader says the Legislature needs to provide a greater share of state oil tax collections to local governments.
Rich Wardner of Dickinson is chairman of a committee that’s looking into how oil tax revenues are split up.
North Dakota’s oil production tax is now divided among the state and local governments.
But a number of county, city and school officials say the formula needs to be reworked to give local governments more money.
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The Hill
January 28, 2012
HOUSE REPUBLICANS EXTEND SOLYNDRA PROBE TO DEFENSE DEPARTMENT
House Republicans are investigating whether the Defense Department considered giving Solyndra government contracts in 2010 as the solar company faced major financial problems.
Republicans on the House Energy and Commerce Committee wrote Thursday to Defense Secretary Leon Panetta requesting all internal Solyndra-related documents.
It’s the latest development in the House GOP’s months-long probe of the solar panel maker, which declared bankruptcy in September about two year after receiving a $535 million loan guarantee.
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 Copyright February 05, 2012, Harvey Kronberg, www.texasenergyreport.com, All rights are reserved
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