2013

NY Assembly Votes to Extend Fracking Moratorium Until 2015

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The NY State Assembly voted to enact legislation that would extend the moratorium on high volume hydraulic fracturing until 2015, aiming to facilitate additional health and environmental impact assessments.

On March 6, 2013, the New York State Assembly passed a bill to further suspend issuance of permits for high volume hydraulic fracturing until May 15, 2015. The bill passed with a vote of 95-40 and marks the Assembly’s third moratorium, following similar measures in 2010 and 2011. The industry currently awaits the release of DEC’s Supplemental Generic Environmental Impact Statement (SGEIS) and a subsequent ruling for permit issuance. Keep reading →

 /  Published March 14, 2013 at 2:00 PM

House Democrats Release Draft Carbon Pricing Legislation

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House Democrats have released draft carbon-pricing legislation, soliciting feedback on a potential per-ton fee for emissions, annual rate of fee increase, and revenue spending.

On March 12, 2013, House Democrats released a draft plan for carbon-pricing legislation that would impose a fee on greenhouse gas emissions from the nation’s largest polluters, such as power plants, oil refineries, and factories. The measure, which has the potential to address both climate change and budget deficit, aims to establish a system that would minimize compliance burden for polluting entities and reduce administrative costs. It would build on EPA’s existing program that requires major sources to report emissions. The Treasury Department would have the responsibility to collect carbon fees based on EPA emissions data. Keep reading →

 /  Published March 14, 2013 at 11:30 AM

Canadian Government and Business Leaders ‘Frustrated’ with Keystone XL Debate

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The controversial Keystone XL Pipeline was very much on the agenda at today’s FT Global Investment Series: Focus on Canada event held in New York City, with government officials and business leaders using strong language to underline the importance of US – Canadian trade relations with regard to the pipeline.

“For the record, I would note that is no small irritant to some in Canada that our American friends focus on the current and future emissions from the oil sands while, here in the United States, a far greater environmental impact is caused by hundreds of coal-fired plants that remain in operation,” said Jim Prentice, Senior Executive Vice President and Vice Chairman at CIBC. Keep reading →

 /  Published March 14, 2013 at 8:45 AM

Commodity Trade Flouts Broader Exchange Trade Decline

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Trade in derivatives has been one of the most controversial activities in finance since the opacity around those markets was held by observers to blame for the scale and depth of the financial crisis of 2008. One of the key solutions recommended by regulators was to move trade in contracts onto exchanges, where they could be monitored more closely.

That effort showed early signs of success as the more-liquid contracts moved online but efforts to make exchange trading the default have faltered and – for many types of derivatives – actually reversed. Keep reading →

 /  Published March 13, 2013 at 1:28 PM

New Lightbulb Technology Designed to End Consumer Resistance

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What if the future of lighting looked surprisingly like the past? Cree, a lighting company with its roots in selling LEDs to the 80% of the lighting market that is commercial, has hit the consumer market with a new bulb it says could eventually save more than $40 billion in energy costs if adoption of the new technology hits 100%

The logic in appealing to the consumer market is similar to the IT strategies proliferating across the industrial sector, and more specifically energy: technology decisions are made by consumers based on their comfort with it, even when the applications aren’t for their personal lives. “This is a very important step to accelerate the adoption [of LED lighting]; getting the consumer on board will change the inflection point,” Cree Vice President, Corporate Marketing Mike Watson told Breaking Energy in a recent interview. Keep reading →

 /  Published March 13, 2013 at 9:00 AM

Chevron Highlights Aggressive Upstream Plans, Downstream Restructuring to Wall Street

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At its annual securities analyst day held today in New York City, Chevron touted its upstream growth strategy, which includes some of the world’s largest energy projects, and the success of its downstream reorganization.

The company reported $26 billion in total 2012 earnings and detailed its $36.7 billion 2013 capital spending program, 42% of which will be deployed in the Asia Pacific region. A majority of Chevron’s 2013 capital expenditure – 69% – will be focused on 3 major business segments: Upstream base projects, LNG and deepwater. Keep Reading →

 /  Published March 12, 2013 at 3:00 PM

IBM and CenterPoint Energy: Customers, Utilities Get Closer on New Platform

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The promise of smart grid has long been a closer and two-directional link between energy customers and providers. It has been the promise of an end to the decades of opaque or confusing bills arriving in the mail, an end to the lights and heat coming on or not in a kind of perceived magic only dimly related to real world assets like power plants, energy market regulations or natural gas wells.

The first generation of smart meters, now nearing a decade in age, seemed predicated on the idea that the next step in the evolution of the power consumer was a fascination about energy supply and consumption. Customers would become as obsessed with saving money and tracking usage as their suppliers were, or as they’d been proved to be in other market situations like grocery shopping. That didn’t transpire to be the case, and the high-touch, human-led information processing of the first generation of smart grid failed to have the desired impacts on usage or market transparency. Keep reading →

 /  Published March 12, 2013 at 8:30 AM

Iraqi Budget Snubs Kurds – What’s Next for Oil Business?

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The long-running dispute between Iraq’s central government in Baghdad and Kurdistan Regional Government leaders in Erbil entered a new phase when the Iraqi Parliament last week passed a 2013 budget that allocated a fraction of the money requested by the KRG. A bulk of this funding is used to pay oil companies operating in the semi-autonomous region.

“In a blatant stiff-arm to the Kurds, the budget allocates just $646 million to cost recovery for Kurdistan Regional Government oil contractors — a figure that covers only around two months’ worth of the crude that Erbil was slated to provide this year,” Michael Knights said in a Policy Alert from the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, a think tank. The KRG reportedly requested $3.5 billion. Keep Reading →

 /  Published March 11, 2013 at 6:30 PM

Breathing New Life into Mining Operations: Cloud Peak and Sandvik

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As consumers, we may not stop to consider how the global mining industry plays a role in our daily lives.

Consider that the average American uses approximately 3.4 tons of coal and nearly 40,000 pounds of newly mined materials each year, according to the National Mining Association. With a rising global demand for energy and other commodities – especially in emerging markets such as China, India and Brazil – mining has never been a more vital industry. Keep reading →

 /  Published March 11, 2013 at 2:00 PM

Energy Data Jam Goes on Tour

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The Department of Energy has led sector technology changes in part by helping create a series of “data jams,” and today announced several new related events on its blog, including one set for the upcoming New York Energy Week.

From Energy.gov: Keep reading →

 /  Published March 11, 2013 at 11:00 AM
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