Towns Fight States on Drilling

By DANIEL GILBERT and RUSSELL GOLD

States hoping to capitalize on their energy booms are running into resistance from local officials who want to be able to police the noise and industrialization that accompany oil-and-gas drilling.

King Dollar Will Cut Oil Prices

By: Larry Kudlow – CNBC Anchor

No matter how much President Obama protests, the simple fact is that he continues to oppose and mock and disparage oil and gas drilling. He is a prisoner of the environmental left, and he remains on the wrong side of energy history.

Rep. Murphy: US isn’t keeping up with the world on energy

VARNEY: Pennsylvania Republican Congressman Tim Murphy with me now.

Congressman, you heard what the president’s got to say, that we’re producing more oil now than we have in at any time in the last eight years and he wants to expand domestic production even more. Are you buying that?

No link between fracking, contamination: Study

Austin: A University of Texas study says there’s no direct link between groundwater contamination and a controversial process to extract oil and gas known as fracking.

What Are the Santorum, Romney and Gingrich Plans for Energy in the US?

Eric Wesoff

We add Santorum’s energy policy ideas to the mix.

Last month we published an article on the energy policies of Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich, the clear front-runners in the GOP at that time. 

Americans are voting to reenergize America

Americans are voting to reenergize America by increasing access to domestic energy resources, like oil and natural gas. Energy policy that supports developing America’s own resources will increase job creation and energy security.

For more information, visit http://www.vote4energy.org.

Colo. ranch taps hydrothermal water

By JASON BLEVINS – The Denver Post

Owners Chuck and Meredith Ogilby recently tapped hot water at their rustic Avalanche Ranch.

REDSTONE (AP) – A geologist had already told Chuck and Meredith Ogilby that the chance of successfully tapping hydrothermal water beneath their family’s guest ranch above the Crystal River was less than 50 percent.

Then their son, Kayo, a geology teacher at Colorado Rocky Mountain School in Carbondale, brought his students on a field trip to the Ogilbys’ Hell Roaring Ranch on the west side of Colorado Highway 133 south of Carbondale.

The students discovered vents beneath the highway, floating hope that heated water could be found beneath the Ogilbys’ historic ranch.

“They gave us an 80 to 90 percent chance of hitting hot water,” said Chuck Ogilby, a longtime Vail Valley resident who bought the Crystal River property in 1978.

“You gotta believe the 17-year-olds, right?” said Meredith Ogilby as the couple enjoyed their daily soak in the family’s new hot springs, which now anchor their neighboring Avalanche Ranch and mark the first new hot springs resort in Colorado in decades.

The Ogilbys’ newest amenity – three gravel-floored hot springs pools steaming in an aspen grove beneath the shadow of Mount Sopris – has spurred visitation and elevated their Avalanche Ranch, a modest collection of 15 cozy cabins, onto the famous Colorado hot springs circuit. Since opening the springs last spring, the Ogilbys have hosted a deluge of international travelers from as far as Denmark, Sweden and Australia. Add in the locals from the Roaring Fork Valley and all of a sudden, the Ogilbys’ formerly summertime business is year-round.

“We didn’t really expect it to be this busy,” said Chuck Ogilby, a former Vail Town Council member who also co-owns the Shrine Mountain Inn atop Vail Pass.

The hot springs are drawing visitors from nearby families who are relishing their own quiet pools only 30 minutes from bustling Glenwood Springs.

“We always tell everyone, ‘Spread the word,’” Meredith Ogilby said. “And they say, ‘Oh, no, we can’t do that.’”

Finding and tapping healthy flows of 100-degree water was only part of the job. The Ogilbys purchased a water right and a federal discharge permit that allows them to harvest 112 gallons a minute and put the chemical-free water back in the Crystal River. They built a 3,020-foot insulated pipe from the well to the pools.

Using a renewable-energy grant from the Rural Development and Small Business Administration, the family is planning to use the hot water to heat Avalanche Ranch’s cabins. They are courting other sustainable-energy organizations for support in developing the ranch’s geothermal potential.

“We are getting a lot of interest from people who want to see alternative-energy models,” Chuck Ogilby said. “We would like to be on the cutting edge for this kind of energy use.”

Forging a new business model in the Crystal River Valley runs in the Ogilby family. The Ogilbys’ daughter, Molly is married to Tai Jacober, whose family has raised grass-fed cattle and sheep in the valley since 1999. The Jacober brothers – Tai, Rio and Forest – lease five ranches around Carbondale and are raising 475 head of open-pastured cattle and 800 sheep for their family’s Crystal River Meats company. The brothers recently landed a deal for Easter lambs with several Whole Foods stores.

And the Jacober trio also runs a construction company.

“We’ve more than doubled down. We are tripling down in this valley,” said Molly, who manages the Avalanche Ranch operations.

Read More: http://durangoherald.com/article/20120107/NEWS02/701079973/0/s/Colo-ranch-taps-hydrothermal-water

Chamber touts Keystone XL, domestic energy to create jobs

by Puneet Kollipara

Energy topped the U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s annual list of priorities for boosting the economy, as the group’s president urged approval of the Keystone XL pipeline and further exploitation of domestic oil, gas and coal resources.

Chamber President Tom Donohue called energy a “game changer” for the U.S. today in Washington in his annual State of American Business speech, which sets out priorities to boost the economy. For 2012 Donohue also suggested stopping an “avalanche” of energy and business regulations, reforming Social Security and Medicare, boost intellectual property protections and using other policies that can promote growth “without raising taxes or adding to the deficit.”

He said the nation could create more than 1 million jobs by 2018 developing oil, natural gas and coal — a claim promoted by the American Petroleum Institute (but decried by a top Democratic lawmaker). Pointing to the oil boom in North Dakota, where unemployment has fallen below 4 percent, he said the U.S. “is on the cusp of an energy boom that is already creating hundreds of thousands of jobs, revitalizing entire communities and reinvigorating American manufacturing.”

To tap those resources, the U.S. should “speed up permitting and end many of the restrictions that have put key areas off-limits,” he said, though he didn’t give examples. He said the nation should harness both conventional and alternative sources and expand efficiency and nuclear power.

He also urged the Obama administration to approve TransCanada’s Keystone XL pipeline that would carry tar-sands oil from Alberta, Canada to refineries in the Gulf Coast . Like other supporters, Donohue said its construction would create 20,000 jobs and more down the road, and the 1,700-mile pipeline would provide energy from a friendly neighbor.

“The project has passed every environmental test,” Donohue said, adding that some labor unions have been “screaming” in support of it. “There is no legitimate reason, none at all, to subject it to further delays.”.

Donohue’s remarks add to rising pressure from industry and Republican supporters on Obama to approve Keystone XL as a Feb. 21 deadline imposed by Congress for a decision approaches. The pipeline has posed a political dilemma to the administration, whose decision will surely anger some of Obama’s supporters: environmental groups and many Democratic fundraisers who oppose Keystone XL, or some labor groups that support it.

The State Department delayed a decision on the pipeline in November until early 2013, citing the need to study alternative routes taking the pipeline away from an critical aquifer in Nebraska. The decision also deferred the politically challenging decision until after the 2012 election. The State Department, which has authority because the pipeline would cross an international border, warned that the arbitrary deadline wouldn’t provide enough time for the study, required by the law, perhaps dooming the project.

Pipeline opponents contend the pipeline would create at most 6,000 temporary and few permanent jobs, while promoting dirty tar sands oil that poses a high pollution risk and could be exported by Gulf refiners. Opponents also cite a government analysis in saying the pipeline wouldn’t affect U.S. oil imports from Canada.

They sought to upstage Donohue the night before he even gave his speech.

Jeremy Symons with the National Wildlife Federation, a conservation advocacy group, cited those claims in blasting Donohue and the Chamber for supporting the “Keystone XL scam.”

He accused the Chamber of being “taken over by the biggest oil companies with the deepest pockets.”

“It really has nothing to do with jobs and everything to do with our rights to protect our water and our lands,” Symons told reporters in a conference call yesterday.

Donohue told reporters after his speech he wasn’t surprised about what environmentalists were saying.

“It is really a very hard argument to make that the [Keystone] XL pipeline is not a sound thing to do,” Donohue said.

“They’re safe, they’re environmentally friendly, and I’d rather have the oil here than have it go to Asia,” Donohue added, seemingly alluding to a TransCanada executive’s suggestion the company might look to Asian markets if Keystone XL is rejected.

The back-and-forth over the speech adds to separate ongoing debate among stakeholders.

“It will indeed be an election issue, API President Jack Gerard told reporters this year in warning of major consequences for Obama if the administration rejects Keystone XL. API has launched a pro-Keystone XL television ad in six Midwestern states and the District of Columbia.

On Wednesday, House Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Fred Upton, R-Mich., pointed to Iran’s threats to cut off the Strait of Hormuz, a path for transporting one-fifth of the world’s oil, in arguing Keystone XL “will guarantee America has a secure energy source despite attempts to cut off supplies by hostile nations.”

The Natural Resources Defense Council, an environmental group opposing Keystone XL, has rejected that argument as flawed, saying that prices on imported oil are governed by global market forces.

“That’s not really what this debate is about,” Anthony Swift, staff attorney with NRDC, said in a recent interview.

Swift has said additional tar-sands capacity won’t come online quick enough to address any supply shock Iran creates. And pointing to a government study, he said the Keystone XL pipeline won’t affect U.S. imports from Canada through at least 2030.

Read more: http://fuelfix.com/blog/2012/01/12/chamber-touts-keystone-xl-domestic-energy-to-create-jobs/

US bans new mining claims near Grand Canyon

By MATTHEW DALY, Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Obama administration is banning new hard rock mining on more than a million acres near the Grand Canyon, an area known to be rich in high-grade uranium ore reserves.

The decision, announced Monday by Interior Secretary Ken Salazar, hands a victory to environmental groups and some Democratic lawmakers who had worked for years to limit mining near the national park, one of the nation’s most popular tourist destinations.

“When families travel to see the Grand Canyon, they have a right to expect that the only glow they will see will come from the sun setting over the rim of this natural wonder, and not from the radioactive contamination that comes from uranium mining,” said Rep. Edward Markey of Massachusetts, the senior Democrat on the House Natural Resources Committee.

But congressional Republicans and industry groups opposed it, arguing that Salazar was eliminating hundreds of jobs and depriving the country of a critically important energy source. The area near the Grand Canyon contains as much as 40 percent of the nation’s known uranium resources, worth tens of billions of dollars.

Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., called the ban a “devastating blow to job creation in northern Arizona.”

McCain said the ban was “fueled by an emotional public relations campaign pitting the public’s love for the Grand Canyon against a modern form of low-impact mining that occurs many miles from the canyon walls.”

During a speech at the National Geographic Society, Salazar said he was “at peace” with the decision, one of the most high-profile actions of his three-year tenure at Interior. Salazar twice had imposed temporary bans on mining claims.

“A withdrawal is the right approach for this priceless American landscape,” Salazar said. “People from all over the country and around the world come to visit the Grand Canyon. Numerous American Indian tribes regard this magnificent icon as a sacred place, and millions of people in the Colorado River Basin depend on the river for drinking water (and) irrigation.”

The decision imposes a 20-year ban on new mining claims on federal land near the Grand Canyon. About 3,000 mining claims already staked in the area will not be affected, although officials expect fewer than a dozen mines to be developed under existing claims.

While uranium remains an important part of a comprehensive energy strategy, Salazar said, the Grand Canyon is a national treasure that must be protected. Salazar called the ban “a responsible path that makes sense for this and future generations.”

Uranium is used in nuclear power plants, which supplies about 20 percent of the nation’s electricity.

The national park attracts more than 4 million visitors a year and generates an estimated $3.5 billion in economic activity. About 26 million Americans in four states, including the cities of Phoenix and Los Angeles, rely on the Colorado River for clean drinking water.

Conservation groups called the 20-year ban a crucial protection for an American icon. Uranium reserves near the Grand Canyon pose a real and present threat to Grand Canyon National Park and its water supply, said Taylor McKinnon, public lands campaigns director at the Arizona-based Center for Biological Diversity.

McKinnon and other environmentalists disputed claims by the mining industry and some Republican members of Congress that the ban would hurt the state’s economy and the nation’s energy independence.

“The real economic engine in northern Arizona is not uranium mining. It’s tourism,” McKinnon said. “To jeopardize our economic engine with more toxic uranium mining is unacceptable.”

GOP lawmakers lambasted the ban, calling it an overreach that jeopardizes jobs for no proven reason. They cited a study showing that even a severe mining accident would increase uranium levels in the Colorado River by an amount undetectable over levels normally carried by the river from erosion of geologic deposits.

“It is unconscionable that the administration has yet again caved to political pressure from radical special interest groups rather than standing up for the American people,” said Rep. Rob Bishop, R-Utah. “Banning access to the most uranium-rich land in the United States will be overwhelmingly detrimental to both jobs in Utah and Arizona and our nation’s domestic energy security.”

Using modern techniques, mining does not affect drinking water from the Colorado River, McCain said.

The Bureau of Land Management said the 20-year ban on new mining claims would reduce overall uranium production by about 6 percent of current U.S. demand.

State, local and federal governments are expected to lose an estimated $16.6 million in annual tax revenue, and 465 jobs would not materialize.

The Bush administration had opened up land near the canyon to new mining claims. Salazar reversed the Bush policy in 2009 and called for a two-year moratorium on new mining claims around the canyon. He followed up with a six-month extension last year.

Supporters of the ban say any increase in mining jobs is not worth risks to the Colorado River, lands considered sacred by American Indian tribes or wildlife habitat. A mining mishap also could be disastrous for tourism.

___

Associated Press writer Felicia Fonseca in Flagstaff, Ariz., contributed to this report.

Follow Matthew Daly on Twitter: (at)MatthewDalyWDC

Copyright © 2012 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.

Energy Giants Undeterred by Quakes Seek Shale Growth Runway

Joe Carroll, ©2012 Bloomberg News

Asian and European energy producers are spending billions of dollars to amass stakes in oil and natural-gas discoveries from Ohio to British Columbia even as earthquakes and tainted water threaten to stall the biggest drilling boom in at least two decades.

Total SA, Europe’s third-largest oil company, and China Petrochemical Corp., that nation’s second-biggest crude producer, committed $7 billion to U.S. and Canadian shale rock formations during the past two weeks. The investments are aimed at tapping the expertise of smaller explorers including Devon Energy Corp. and Chesapeake Energy Corp. that pioneered techniques employed to crack previously impervious shale.

The potential rewards from shale regions such as the Utica and Marcellus formations in the eastern U.S. are too big for overseas explorers to ignore, said Mark Hanson, an analyst at Morningstar LLC in Chicago. A New Year’s Eve earthquake in Youngstown, Ohio, linked to a well used to store drilling wastewater prompted the state to halt operations at five such wells. Separately, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is studying whether intensive shale-drilling practices pose a danger to drinking water.

“These shale prospects are exploration frontiers and the big international players see them as a runway to growth,” Hanson said yesterday in a telephone interview. “They are acquiring stakes not only to learn how to drill these kind of formations in other parts of the world, but to understand how to get their arms around prospects of this size.

Shale acquisitions helped push overseas offers for U.S. oil and gas fields to $51 billion last year, the most in at least 12 years, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Melbourne-based BHP Billiton Ltd. led purchases in 2011 with the $12.1 billion takeover of Petrohawk Energy Corp.

India’s Reliance Industries Ltd. and Apollo Global Management LLC were today named by people with knowledge of the matter as being among companies in talks to buy El Paso Corp.’s oil and gas exploration and production unit. The unit, whose assets include more than half a million acres of shale fields, may be worth about $8.1 billion, analysts at BNP Paribas SA estimated in November.

El Paso owned drilling rights to 46,000 acres in Louisiana’s Haynesville Shale at the end of 2010, according to a regulatory filing, and 500,000 acres in the Eagle Ford Shale, Permian Basin and other fields in Texas. It also has 605,000 acres in the Raton Basin coal-bed methane field in New Mexico and Colorado.

China Petrochemical, known as Sinopec Group, yesterday agreed to buy a one-third stake in five Devon exploratory oil projects in the U.S. for $900 million. The Beijing-based company also will provide as much as $1.6 billion to cover Devon’s future drilling costs, Oklahoma City-based Devon said in a statement.

The deal followed Sinopec Group’s C$2.2 billion ($2.16 billion) acquisition of Daylight Energy Ltd. on Dec. 23 to get access to the Calgary-based company’s gas and oil projects in western Canada.

Sinopec Group and domestic rivals China National Petroleum Corp. and Cnooc Ltd. are seeking to learn how to tap shale formations at home that the U.S. Energy Information Agency estimates may hold 1,275 trillion cubic feet of gas, or 12 times China’s so-called conventional deposits.

Total agreed to pay $2.32 billion yesterday for a 25 percent stake in 619,000 acres in a section of the Utica shale rich in butane and propane that sell at a premium to gas. Chesapeake will receive $2.03 billion and EnerVest Ltd. will get $290 million.

Total has been a partner with Chesapeake in another shale formation, the Barnett, near Fort Worth, Texas, since 2010. The company plans to transfer what it learns about cracking dense shale from Chesapeake’s experts to shale prospects in Africa, Latin America, Australia and Europe.

Drilling into shale rock to extract gas and crude has come under fire from federal regulators, state lawmakers and environmental groups concerned that the practice may contaminate drinking water. Shale rock was considered too hard to drill until the 1990s, when new methods for boring horizontal wells were combined with hydraulic fracturing, which involves pumping millions of gallons of high-pressure water laced with chemicals and sand underground.

The number of rigs drilling horizontal wells in the U.S. surged 23 percent in 2011, reaching 1,184 on Dec. 16, the highest since at least January 1991, according to Baker Hughes Inc., an oilfield-services provider that tracks rig activity.

Last month, the EPA said for the first time that it found chemicals used in hydraulic fracturing in drinking water in Wyoming. Encana Corp., which operates 150 wells in the region of Wyoming where the EPA made its findings, said on Dec. 20 that the EPA failed to take into account naturally occurring chemicals and the possibility that the agency contaminated its own tests.

Total pursued shale opportunities outside France because of a ban on hydraulic fracturing in the company’s home country. Scott Hanold, a Minneapolis-based analyst for RBC Capital Markets, said the Dec. 31 quake in Ohio — the tenth in that region in a year — is unlikely to spur restrictions that may disrupt U.S. shale exploration.

“No one has made a concrete connection between earthquakes and drilling,” Hanold said in a telephone interview. “There’s not a lot of fear of regulation right now.”

–With assistance from Jim Polson, Benjamin Haas and Jim Efstathiou Jr. in New York, Mike Lee in Dallas, Mark Niquette in Columbus and Andrew Hobbs in Sydney. Editors: Charles Siler, Ryan Woo

To contact the reporter on this story: Joe Carroll in Chicago at jcarroll8@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Susan Warren at susanwarren@bloomberg.net

Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/g/a/2012/01/03/bloomberg_articlesLX9GVL6KLVR5.DTL#ixzz1ioUZkB4M

Obama, Congress Begin 2012 In Oil Pipeline Dispute

by The Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Barack Obama and Congress are starting the election year locked in a tussle over a proposed 1,700-mile oil pipeline from Canada to Texas that will force the White House to make a politically risky choice between two key Democratic constituencies.

Some unions say the Keystone XL pipeline would create thousands of jobs. Environmentalists fear it could lead to an oil spill disaster.

A law Obama signed just before Christmas that temporarily extended the payroll tax cut included a Republican-written provision compelling him to make a speedy decision on whether to build the pipeline. The administration is warning it would rather say no than rush a decision in an election year.

It’s a dicey proposition for Obama, who enjoyed strong support from both organized labor and environmentalists in his winning 2008 campaign for the White House.

Environmental advocates, already disappointed with his failure to achieve climate change legislation and the administration’s decision to delay new smog standards, have made it clear that approval of the pipeline would dampen their enthusiasm for Obama in the upcoming November election.

Some liberal donors even threatened to cut off funds to Obama’s re-election campaign to protest the project, which opponents say would transport “dirty oil” that requires huge amounts of energy to extract.

If he rejects the pipeline, Obama risks losing support from organized labor, a key part of the Democratic base, for thwarting thousands of jobs.

Obama appeared to have skirted what some dubbed the “Keystone conundrum” in November when the State Department announced it was postponing a decision on the pipeline until after this year’s election. Officials said they needed extra time to study routes that avoid an environmentally sensitive area of Nebraska that supplies water to eight states.

The affected area stretches just 65 miles through the Sandhills region of northern Nebraska, but the concerns were serious enough that the state’s governor and senators opposed the project until the pipeline was moved.

Republican Gov. Dave Heineman, who opposed the initial route, says he supports efforts to accelerate the project, noting that provisions in the payroll tax bill allow the project developer to find a new route avoiding the Sandhills.

The new route would have to be approved by Nebraska environmental officials and the State Department, which has authority because the pipeline would cross an international border.

The pipeline would carry oil from tar sands in western Canada to refineries in Texas, passing through Montana, South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas and Oklahoma. The project’s developer, Calgary-based TransCanada, says the pipeline could create as many as 20,000 jobs, a figure opponents say is inflated. A State Department report last summer said the pipeline would create up to 6,000 jobs during construction.

The payroll tax cut law gives the Obama administration 60 days to decide whether to allow construction of the pipeline.

An “arbitrary deadline” for the permit decision would compromise the process, short-circuiting time needed to conduct required environmental reviews and preventing the issuance of a permit, the State Department warned in a written statement on Dec. 12. Obama administration officials confirmed that view after the payroll tax bill was approved.

Republicans call the threat little more than an excuse that allows Obama to placate environmental groups while not rejecting the pipeline outright.

“The only thing arbitrary about this decision is the decision by the president to say, ‘Well, let’s wait until after the next election,’ ” said House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio.

Boehner and other Republicans say the pipeline would help Obama achieve his top priority — creating jobs — without costing a dime of taxpayer money. They hope to portray Obama’s reluctance to approve the pipeline as a sign he favors environmentalists over jobs.

Russ Girling, TransCanada’s president and chief executive, said his company would do whatever is necessary to make sure the project is approved.

“We’ve had more than enough surprises on this,” said TransCanada spokesman Shawn Howard.

In Nebraska, where the pipeline faces strong resistance, state officials are awaiting an environmental study that will determine a new route. Officials have said the review will take six to nine months.

Some landowners in the Sandhills celebrated the decision to reroute the project, but the pipeline’s strongest opponents say they still have concerns about the prospect of the government using its power of eminent domain to seize land, as well as liability issues in case of a spill.

“Republicans have bullied their way to get a reckless rider attached to a bill that was supposed to be about helping middle-class families,” said Jane Kleeb, executive director of the group Bold Nebraska, which opposes the pipeline.

With the bill signed into law, Obama “must do the right thing for our land, water and families’ health by denying the pipeline permit,” Kleeb said.

Project supporters say U.S. rejection of the pipeline would not stop it from being built. Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper has said TransCanada could pursue an alternative route through Canada to the West Coast, where oil could be shipped to China and other Asian markets.

“Canada is going to develop this no matter what, and that oil is either going to come to the United States or it’s going to go to a place like China. We want it here,” said Rep. Fred Upton, R-Mich., chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee.

Opponents call the West Coast option farfetched, noting that Canadian regulators have announced a one-year delay for a similar project that would carry tar sands oil to British Columbia, on Canada’s western coast.

Native groups strongly oppose both the Keystone XL and the Northern Gateway pipeline proposed by TransCanada rival Enbridge. Canada’s First Nations have constitutionally protected treaty rights and unsettled land claims that could allow them to block or significantly delay both pipelines.

Unions are watching closely. Unemployment in construction is far higher than other industries, with more than 1.1 million construction workers jobless, said Brent Bookers, director of construction at the Laborers’ International Union of North America.

“For many members of the Laborers, this project is not just a pipeline, it is a lifeline,” Bookers said, adding, “Too many hard-working Americans are out of work, and the Keystone XL pipeline will change that dire situation for thousands of them.”

Roger Toussaint, international vice president of the Transport Workers Union, opposes the pipeline.

“The dangers of the pipeline are compelling, and no one should believe the claims of either the Republican leadership or the energy companies, with respect to the project being shovel ready or with respect to the number of jobs it’s going to produce,” he said.

___

Associated Press writer Grant Schulte in Lincoln, Neb., contributed to this report.

___

Follow Matthew Daly on Twitter: (at)MatthewDalyWDC

Read more: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=144604241

EPA announces new clean air standards – ignores devastating impact on jobs and our economy

By Pam Kasey – email

New limits on power plant emissions of mercury and other air toxics and a three-year compliance timeline remain essentially as proposed in March in a long-expected U.S. Environmental Protection Agency rule issued Dec. 21.

“With these standards that were two decades in the making, EPA is rounding out a year of incredible progress on clean air in America with another action that will benefit the American people for years to come,” said EPA Administrator Lisa P. Jackson. “The Mercury and Air Toxics Standards will protect millions of families and children from harmful and costly air pollution and provide the American people with health benefits that far outweigh the costs of compliance.”

The MATS rule — also known as the Hazardous Air Pollutants rule for utilities and the Utility Maximum Available Control Technology rule — establishes the first national standards to limit toxic air emissions from power plants.

The rule is expected to cut mercury emissions by 90 percent and also to cut emissions of arsenic, chromium, nickel, and acid gases including hydrochloric and hydrofluoric acid. The technology that controls those emissions also will reduce fine particulate matter.

Mercury is a neurotoxin to which fetuses and children are particularly susceptible, while other targeted emissions cause cancer, chronic and acute respiratory disorders, and other illnesses.

The compliance deadline is Jan. 1, 2015.

Changes in the Final Rule

The rule was issued several days after it was expected on Friday, Dec. 16, leading to speculation that it was being weakened in the final hours.

Changes, however, were minor and kept the emissions limits and the three-year timeline essentially as proposed.

Most notably, estimated costs and benefits dropped — from costs of about $11 billion per year in the proposed rule and benefits of up to $140 billion, to $9.7 and up to $90 billion in the final rule — but that’s not the result of weakening, according to Jackson.

Costs dropped due to efficiencies suggested by some of the 900,000 commenters on the proposal, she said. Benefits were reduced because analysis showed that some of the benefits will be realized through the Cross-State Air Pollution Rule issued earlier this year.

MATS benefits occur primarily through as many as 11,000 premature deaths avoided per year but also through the avoidance of 4,700 non-fatal heart attacks, 130,000 cases of respiratory illness including aggravated asthma and acute and chronic bronchitis, and 540,000 days of missed work, according to the EPA.

In addition, the EPA’s jobs analysis finds a net gain of 46,000 short-term jobs as pollution control technologies are installed and 8,000 long-term jobs to operate and maintain those technologies.

Plant Closures Expected

Based on the draft rule and other environmental rules expected or already out, utilities have said they would close some plants that are too small and old to merit expensive retrofits. More than 30 plants in a dozen states likely will be retired and another 34 may retire, according to an Associated Press survey based on the draft rule and reported on Dec. 19.

In West Virginia, AEP has said it expects this rule, with other EPA regulations, to lead to the closure of its Philip Sporn plant in Mason County, Kanawha River plant in Kanawha County and Kammer plant in Marshall County. Those three plants amount to 2,200 megawatts of older coal-fired generating capacity — 12 percent of the state’s generating capacity but only about one-tenth of 1 percent of generation in 2010.

FirstEnergy has not yet announced its plans.

“We would need some time to evaluate what the final rules are and how they might impact our operations,” said FirstEnergy spokesman Mark Durbin.  “At this time, no final decisions have been made on the future of our fossil generating plants.”

A state regulator has suggested that FirstEnergy’s small, old Albright, Rivesville and Willow Island plants may be retired. Those total about 600 megawatts of capacity and represented much less than one-tenth of one percent of generation in 2010.

Utilities, regulators and electric trade organizations raised concerns that the combined capacity of plant retirements expected from the proposed rule and the tight timeline could lead to reliability problems.

The AP concluded after its survey that the concern likely was overblown; however, the EPA provided in its final rule for a fourth compliance year for technology installations and further flexibility for localized reliability problems.

Reactions

The National Mining Association belittled the flexibility as inadequate.

“The modest adjustment to the compliance timeline in the MACT standard merely papers over a deeply flawed rule,” said NMA President and CEO Hal Quinn in a media release.

But PJM Interconnection, which manages the grid in a 13-state region that includes West Virginia, supported the flexibility measures.

“We at PJM are pleased that the EPA administrator has included the key elements of our proposed process to preserve reliability into documents accompanying the final rule,” the organization wrote in a media release.

The Sierra Club applauded the rule as a “milestone.”

And the sustainability advocacy group CERES said the rule would “unleash investment” in infrastructure and create jobs up and down the supply chain.

Soon after the EPA made its announcement, Rep. Nick Rahall, D-W.Va., issued a statement in which he said he had “serious concerns” about the new rules.

“In fact, I have voted in Congress to prevent their implementation in the near term. The rules are likely to drive up energy prices for American consumers and result in the loss of jobs for coal miners while doing nothing to address the growth in global emissions,” he said. “It certainly makes more sense to me to be investing in American-made technologies to help American utilities upgrade to more efficient, cleaner ways of using domestic coal, rather than putting the rulemaking hammer to American plants and forcing our coal to be shipped overseas where emissions will be even greater. From the standpoint sufficiency of our energy supply and protection of our global atmosphere, we ought to be looking creatively at coal power, rather than instituting policies that force coal out of our energy sector.”

Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., also was critical of the rules.

“Today’s announcement of yet another onerous rule by the EPA completely ignores the devastating impact these regulations will have on jobs and our economy, not only in West Virginia but across this nation,” he said. “The Utility MACT Rule, combined with the Cross-State Air Pollution Rule that was finalized earlier this year, are two of the most expensive regulations ever to be imposed, and every American should be concerned about their effect on energy prices, the reliability of our power supply, our coal mining industry and most importantly our families,” Senator Manchin said. “I believe we can find a responsible and reasonable balance when it comes to the environment and our energy needs as a nation. My desire to achieve this balance is why my Republican colleague Dan Coats of Indiana and I introduced the Fair Compliance Act – a commonsense, bipartisan piece of legislation that would create a fair timeframe to comply with new rules. I hope that Congress will address these regulations, and take up the Fair Compliance Act as soon as possible, to prevent the potential loss of a million jobs, increased utility rates, and more damage to our economy.”

Read more: http://www.wowktv.com/story/16370235/epa-to-make-clean-air-act-announcement-wednesday

Gov. Pataki in NY Daily News: Natural gas is absolutely crucial to America’s energy strategy

BY George Pataki

Few issues have elicited a greater reaction from New Yorkers recently than the development of natural gas in the Marcellus Shale. As the state Department of Environmental Conservation seeks public comment this month, it is important to cut through the political rhetoric and understand exactly what is at stake — and why extracting this resource, with strong oversight by the state, is the right thing to do.

This past summer, the Department of Environmental Conservation issued draft rules, along with an environmental impact statement, analyzing possible ramifications of high-volume horizontal drilling extraction of natural gas, called hydraulic fracturing.

On Energy Production, U.S. Isn’t Keeping up with the Joneses

by Marita Noon

America has an abundance of natural resources, yet our policies keep them locked up. We can’t drill in the Gulf. ANWAR is off limits. Mining is nearly impossible due to regulations. “Endangered species” threaten existing supplies.

Meanwhile resource discoveries are being made and developed the world over.

Last week, Repsol announced a new discovery in Argentina—estimated to be more than 900 million barrels of oil. The oil shale find is reported to be Repsol’s largest ever. Argentina’s potential has attracted investment from both majors and independents. Argentina’s rising energy consumption and higher prices make Repsol’s success especially welcome, representing a potential windfall for the country. Argentina is not crying.

On October 20, a “giant” gas discovery was announced off the coast of Mozambique. It is reported that the results of the exploration well “exceed pre-drill expectations and confirm the Rovuma Basin as a world-class natural gas province.” Then, one week later, word came out that the find was 50% greater than originally estimated with up to 22.5 trillion cubic feet of gas. Estimates are expected to increase. Infrastructure, including LNG facilities, will have to be built to support the recent exploration successes with the natural gas expected to be brought to the market in 2018.

The day before the original Mozambique “giant” discovery announcement, it was reported that companies such as ExxonMobil would invest $100 billion to develop and upgrade oil fields in Iraq. The investment is expected to up Iraq’s oil production to at least 6.8 million barrels of oil a day by 2017—making Iraq one of the world’s largest producers of crude oil.

Also, on October 19, reports came out saying that the North Sea Statoil discovery is bigger than originally estimated with a potential of 2.6 billion barrels of oil equivalent—which would make it the third-largest find ever made on the Norwegian shelf. Production is expected to begin by 2018.

One day earlier, October 18, service provider Odebrecht announced plans to triple its revenues over the next three years. In support of Brazil’s vast deepwater oilfields, the company is spending $5 billion in equipment, from drilling ships and floating oil platforms to pipeline-laying vessels. Odebrecht says: “This year we should [have] revenues of about $500 million and we are going to double that next year, and be at $1.5 billion by 2013.”

This, all in the past couple of weeks.

In late-December 2010, 16 trillion cubic feet of gas was found off the cost of Israel in what is being called the Leviathan Field. The Julia Field was discovered in 2008 in the Gulf of Mexico and is called one of the greatest discoveries of the Gulf with an estimated 1 billion barrels of oil—but the Interior Department is now fighting ExxonMobil over its control.

Clearly there is no energy shortage.

While Europe is not rich in energy resources, they do understand their importance. They know they need energy.

Last week, on November 8, the Nord Stream Pipeline opened and began delivering Russian gas to Germany. With proposed plans to close their nuclear power plants by 2022, Germany needs the resource from Russia—though it does raise the specter of dependence on Russia/Russian energy control. Work is underway to build pipelines from other sources, which will minimize Russian domination.

Two days later, on November 10, President Obama announced a delay of more than a year to the true-shovel-ready XL Pipeline that would have created thousands of industry-funded jobs and reduced America’s dependence on Middle Eastern oil. The pipeline would have brought both Canadian and northern US oil to refineries in the southern United States. Instead of diversifying our energy supplies and suppliers, we remain reliant on unfriendly countries.

Some might point to the November 8 announcement of a “modest expansion” in offshore leasing to indicate a change in the Obama administration’s attitude—though, in light of his ideological opposition to oil, gas, and coal, the proposed plan is more likely the result of public and industry pressure and the upcoming presidential election. Much like the apparent reverse on the ozone regulations left plenty of onerous, price-elevating regulations in place, this modest expansion still keeps many of America’s most promising energy resources—some the most promising in the world—off limits.

Worldwide, more and more energy resources are being discovered, developed, and delivered. In the United States, not so much. Like public and industry pressure pushed for an increase in offshore leasing and a decrease in the EPA’s economically destructive regulations, we need to keep the pressure on and engage friends, family, and neighbors to do the same. Congress needs to hear from you. We need to be exploring and discovering here.

Marita Noon is the executive director for Energy Makes America Great Inc. and the companion educational organization, the Citizens’ Alliance for Responsible Energy (CARE). Together they work to educate the public and influence policy makers regarding energy, its role in freedom, and the American way of life. Combining energy, news, politics, and, the environment through public events, speaking engagements, and media, the organizations’ combined efforts serve as America’s voice for energy. Marita’s twentieth book, Energy Freedom, has just been released.

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Evan Bayh: Another regulation means fewer jobs, less reliability

Coal contributes nearly $2 billion annually to Indiana‘s economy, supporting thousands of Hoosier jobs and keeping energy costs modest.

It provides low-cost power to keep our state’s electric bills affordable and our industries competitive. In this time of economic uncertainty and strained middle-class family budgets, it would be unwise to institute regulations that cost jobs and raise household expenses. Unfortunately, some have not thoroughly examined the broader impact on our economy new federal regulations could have.

The Environmental Protection Agency’s proposed Utility Maximum Achievable Control Technology Rule will put tens of thousands of jobs in our state directly at risk by affecting Hoosiers‘ utilities that rely on coal-fired power to keep our lights on and manufacturing facilities working. Even though the electric utility industry has invested billions of dollars over the past two decades to reduce emissions, the Utility MACT Rule orders coal-fired utilities to spend additional billions on retrofitting technologies to decrease the amount of emissions released as a production byproduct. Power plants that cannot reasonably afford these compliance costs will have to shut down and be replaced in a short timeframe by new generation and transmission at substantial cost to consumers.

Rick Perry Slashed Environmental Protection Funds As Texas Governor

AUSTIN, Texas — Gov. Rick Perry likes to say the best way to promote economic growth is to reduce regulation. When it comes to the environment, Perry has made Texas one of the most industry-friendly states in the nation.

By CHRIS TOMLINSON

Perry has cut funding for clean air programs and sued the Environmental Protection Agency to avoid enforcing laws to make the air cleaner. As part of his Republican presidential campaign, he routinely blasts the White House for tightening environmental standards.

“As president, I would roll back the radical agenda of President Obama’s job-killing Environmental Protection Agency,” Perry wrote recently in an op-ed for the New Hampshire Union-Leader. “Our nation does not need costly new federal restrictions, especially during our present economic crisis.”

Those positions get big applause at Republican debates and fundraisers, and also provide insight into how he would govern if elected, particularly when it comes to the EPA.

Critics battle EPA on water

BY GEORGE DUNCAN – Central Florida’s Agri-Leader

New Environmental Protection Agency water quality standards in Florida would cost agricultural industries hundreds of million of dollars and cause sharp increases in food prices, according to state and local agricultural officials.

EPA officials say the new “Numeric Nutrients” standards — which are scheduled to become law in March — are needed to maintain water quality in the state and that the costs have been exaggerated by critics.

Those critics include local farming and citrus officials, and the state of Florida. The state has filed a lawsuit against the EPA asking for a temporary injunction against the new standards. The suit is backed by citrus groups and other agricultural organizations. The critics say the EPA standards are not scientifically based and will not substantially improve water quality.

The proposed EPA standards are different for each body of water — streams, rivers, lakes, etc. — in the state but, in almost all cases, the proposed mandate is higher than the federal standards currently in use.

EPA Attacks The GOP

A Commentary by J. D. Longstreet  The Environmental Protection Agency has begun to feel our breath on their necks and they are lashing out.

An article by Lisa P. Jackson entitled “Too Dirty too Fail — House Republicans’ assault on our environmental laws must be stopped.” appeared in the L. A. Times October 21^st, 2011.  In the article, the author says the following:  “Since the beginning of this year, Republicans in the House have averaged roughly a vote every day the chamber has been in session to undermine the Environmental Protection Agency and our nation’s environmental laws. They have picked up the pace recently — just last week they voted to stop the EPA’s efforts to limit mercury and other hazardous pollutants from cement plants, boilers and incinerators — and it appears their campaign will continue for the foreseeable future.” (Ms. Jackson is the administrator of the U. S. Environmental Protection Agency.)

To this I say: “Hallelujah!” If America is fortunate enough to actually have a Congress and White House controlled by Republicans, after next year’s election, one of its priorities should be the abolishment of the EPA.

The EPA is the “Vatican” of the pagan religion “Environmentalism.” In this century, and the last, so many have turned from the worship of a supreme being, we call God, to what we used to call “paganism”… the worship of nature, or the environment, or… more specifically… Environmentalism.

Yes, Environmentalism HAS become a religion.  Well, actually, it always was, it has just come back into favor in the past 100 years, or so.

Rick Perry: Energy – Put American’s to Work Now.

Rick Perry has the only plan to get us back to work.  Let’s get America going.  Now.

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Alabama joins suit against EPA

State Attorney General Luther Strange said today that Alabama has joined 24 other states and Guam in filing a brief in U.S. District Court in Washington to require the Environmental Protection Agency to delay air emissions regulations, claiming the new rule could damage Alabama jobs and electricity rates.

The EPA’s proposed Utility Maximum Achievable Control Technology rule would create a new federal regulation to address emissions of hazardous air pollutants from coal and oil-fired power plants.

The proposed rule may require installation of new expensive control technologies to meet the new limits mandated by the EPA.

Power plants that are unable to meet these new EPA limits may be forced to shut down, Strange contends.

The brief filed in the case American Nurses Association, et al. v. Lisa P, Jackson, and Administrator of The United States Environmental Protection Agency requests the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia postpone the implementation of the Utility MACT rule to Nov. 16, 2012.

The extension would allow the EPA more time to respond to states’ concerns, fix serious technical flaws and undergo a more careful review of the economic ramifications of the regulation.

The 25 states filing the amicus brief include: Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, Colorado, Georgia, Florida, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Michigan, Mississippi, Nebraska, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Virginia, West Virginia and Wyoming, in addition to the Territory of Guam.

Read more: http://www.decaturdaily.com/stories/Alabama-joins-suit-against-EPA,86208

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The EPA puts the screws to power plants

I’m sure most of you are well aware of the activist stance the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has taken, especially under the direction of Lisa Jackson.

Submitted by Lynn Westmoreland

Over the last two years, they have proposed some of the most controversial rules and regulations that, even by their own accounting, have the potential of costing American companies tens of billions of dollars.

Unfortunately, too often, the overwhelming number and scope of these regulations results in each individual one being forgotten. I hope to use at least some of these Regulatory Roundups to highlight some of the most harmful EPA regulations.

GOP freshmen return, resume effort to roll back regulations

WASHINGTON – After the summer’s red-hot battles over the nation’s debt ceiling, Republican freshmen return to the nation’s capital Wednesday emboldened for one of the fights that could dominate the fall: repealing environmental and labor rules Republican leaders say have stymied hiring.

By Alan Gomez and Fredreka Schouten, USA TODAY

• By Pat Sullivan, AP

Smokestacks and storage tanks line the Houston ship channel. Freshmen GOP legislators have vowed to reverse rules advanced by the Environmental Protection Agency.

GOP freshmen sponsored four of the six bills House Republican leaders plan to bring to the full chamber this fall, starting this week with an effort by South Carolina Rep. Tim Scott to bar the National Labor Relations Board from restricting where a company can locate jobs. It would nullify the board’s recent decision restricting Boeing’s effort to build its 787 Dreamliner airplane at a nonunion assembly plant in South Carolina.