3-11-15 For the archives: gasline problems for Alaska’s new governor

  TODAY'S CONSUMER ENERGY ALLIANCE ENERGY NEWS LINKS

KTVA by Rhonda McBride.

When Gov. Bill Walker (NGP Photo) announced he wanted to put a backup gas line project in competition with the Alaska Liquefied Natural Gas project, he opened a Pandora’s box of questions for lawmakers focused on AKLNG as the main vehicle for getting North Slope gas to market.

House majority leaders responded by introducing legislation to prevent a competing line for AKLNG, unless producers back out from the project.

The bill had its first hearing on Friday, despite the governor’s threats to veto it.  (Read full story and see vido) 

TODAY'S CONSUMER ENERGY ALLIANCE ENERGY NEWS LINKS

Albuquerque Business First: Viewpoint: Why New Mexico doesn't need fracking bans*David Holt Op-Ed 

Energy production has always been an important part of New Mexico's economy. Indeed, the state ranks sixth in the country in crude oil production, and its production of natural gas accounted a crucial 4.8 percent of U.S. marketed natural gas production in 2012, according to the Energy Information Administration (EIA).
 
CEA’s The Energy Voice: Winter Storms Evoke Polar Vortex Price Spikes
It’s not just record-low temperatures giving consumers chills during this week’s winter storms and wild weather. The cold weather brings with it reminders of last year’s regional power outages and spikes in electricity and heating costs for many New England, New York, Mid-Atlantic and Midwest residents. Part of the price spikes were attributable to a lack of adequate pipeline infrastructure to move natural gas to areas of demand.
 
The Hill: Obama embraces Keystone skepticism
President Obama has increasingly sided with the most negative assessments of the proposed Keystone XL oil pipeline, leading both opponents and supporters to believe that he’ll reject the contentious project’s permit. As anger among Republicans in Congress has grown stronger when it comes to Obama’s years-long delay on judging Keystone, the president has gradually abandoned attempts to avoid weighing in on the project’s merits, gravitating instead toward arguments against it.
 
KTIV: Nebraska congressman says Keystone XL pipeline won't be built during Obama presidency
Nebraska's First District Congressman doesn't think the Keystone XL Pipeline will get built while President Barack Obama is in office. U.S. Rep. Jeff Fortenberry made that statement during a visit to Norfolk on Tuesday. Fortenberry said that President Obama's recent veto shows that there is now no way the pipeline will get built without an administrative change.
 
The Intelligencer: Sen. Capito Calls for Keeping Keystone Pipeline Out of New Legislation
West Virginia's two U.S. senators are united in their belief the proposed Keystone XL pipeline project should move forward, but they appear to disagree about how to make it happen. Following the Senate's failed attempt to override President Barack Obama's veto of legislation approving construction of the long-delayed pipeline, the bill's original co-sponsors, Sens. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., and John Hoeven, R-N.D., said they would try to tack pipeline approval onto a long-term highway funding bill that will be up for consideration in the coming weeks.
 
U.S Chamber of Commerce: EPA War on Coal Will Shut Down More Power Plants in 2015
EPA’s “War on Coal” is succeeding in driving coal-fired power plants into retirement. The Energy Information Administration (EIA) reports, “Nearly 16 GW of generating capacity is expected to retire in 2015, 81% of which (12.9 gigawatts) is coal-fired generation.” At the same time, new electricity-generating capacity will come mostly from wind (9.8 GW), natural gas (6.3 GW), and solar (2.2 GW).
 
The Washington Times: Now this is getting serious: Climate change puts coffee at risk, EPA chief warns
Americans’ morning caffeine rush ultimately could be a casualty of climate change, Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Gina McCarthy said Wednesday. In a speech at the Council on Foreign Relations, Ms. McCarthy said the changing climate — which she believes is largely caused by human activity — puts economies, global security and food supplies at risk. Coffee lovers also will eventually feel the effects, the EPA chief said.
 
E&E Publishing: Consumers trapped in the middle of Big Coal's fight for survival
Chris Woolery seemed impatient when he cornered a lawmaker inside an elevator at the Kentucky Capitol. It was his first shot at bending an ear as legislators hustled to their morning meetings. "I've helped folks with $1,400 electric bills, and we've cut their bills in half," Woolery said, twisting his tall frame inside the packed shoebox to get closer to the state representative from Lexington.
 
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Walker, Obama administration representatives differ on emissions cuts
Representatives of the Obama and Walker administrations gave polar opposite views in Milwaukee on Tuesday about federal regulators' plan to reduce emissions tied to global warming. Defending the plan, Susan Hedman of the Environmental Protection Agency described it as flexible and workable, saying it would lead to health benefits through reduced hospitalizations linked to less polluted air.
 
UPI: Oil price rally waning, though WTI holding strong
Crude oil prices continued their slow fade Tuesday even as U.S. data show evidence the bear market had an impact on the production behind recent market trends. The price for Brent, the global benchmark, slid about 1.3 percent from Monday's close to trade near $57.70 per barrel for the April contract early in Tuesday trading. Brent hit a low mark of around $45.13 per barrel mid-January and climbed 37 percent by late February. The rally, however, ran out of steam in March, with Brent crude oil prices down about 5.3 percent since the start of the month.
 
Bloomberg: Get Ready for Oil Deals: Shale Is Going on Sale
A decision by Whiting Petroleum Corp., the largest producer in North Dakota’s Bakken shale basin, to put itself up for sale looks to be the first tremor in a potential wave of consolidation as $50-a-barrel prices undercut companies with heavy debt and high costs. For the first time since wildcatters such as Harold Hamm of Continental Resources Inc. began extracting significant amounts of oil from shale formations, acquisition prospects from Texas to the Great Plains are looking less expensive.
 
CBS News: U.S. oil regions are bracing for more bankruptcies
There are more signs that the North American oil boom, and the lower gas prices it brought with it, is running out of…well, gas. On Monday, Houston-based BPZ Energy, an independent oil and gas exploration and production company, announced it was voluntarily filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.
 
Platts: US crude production to rise to 9.3 million b/d in 2015: EIA
The US Energy Information Administration on Tuesday nearly tripled its forecast for the 2015 Brent-WTI spread to $7.35/b, largely due to a glut of US crude production. The 2015 spread, which EIA in February forecast would be $2.54/b, was widened due to "continuing large builds in US crude oil inventories, including at the Cushing, Oklahoma storage hub," the agency said in its latest Short-Term Energy Outlook.
 
The State: BP oil spill film used to fight SC drilling as business leaders counterpunch
Boosters of drilling for gas and oil along the South Carolina coast are punching back at a sustained effort by environmental groups to influence public opinion against a proposal that could allow offshore drilling. As a public comment deadline nears, U.S. Rep. Jeff Duncan, R-S.C., and business leaders will hold a forum Wednesday near Charleston to explain why oil and gas would be the right industry for coastal South Carolina.
 
WSAV: Feds holding SC meeting on offshore oil, gas exploration
Folly Beach has become the fifth coastal community in South Carolina to pass a resolution opposing offshore drilling for oil and natural gas. The town passed the resolution Tuesday evening, the night before the federal government holds a meeting on the prospect of opening wide swaths of the Atlantic off the Carolinas to drilling later in the decade. That meeting in Mount Pleasant is sponsored by the federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management.
 
McClatchy: Some in Georgia are skeptical of offshore drilling plans
News that President Barack Obama is proposing to open Georgia’s coastal waters to oil and gas drilling has taken many people in the state off guard, and opponents are scrambling to resist the plan. “It’s definitely clear that they woke up,” said Claire Douglass, campaign director for the environmental group Oceana.
 
The Wall Street Journal: Wrecks Hit Tougher Oil Railcars
In a string of recent oil train derailments in the U.S. and Canada, new and sturdier railroad tanker cars being built to carry a rising tide of crude oil across the continent have failed to prevent ruptures.
 
Associated Press: Recent derailments deepens fear of train disaster
Many factors can cause an accident, from too great a speed to operator fatigue. We won't know the cause of the most recent ones until investigations are complete, but weather may be a factor. When it is very cold, as it has been across much of North America, steel rails and train car wheels can contract and become brittle. If the steel has a manufacturing flaw, no matter how small, it can spread rapidly in the cold weather.
 
Fuel Fix: Wisconsin Democrats want oil train rules on fast track
The Obama administration should take “immediate action” to boost the safety of moving crude by rail following a string of oil train explosions, argue a pair of Wisconsin lawmakers. Wisconsin Democratic Sen. Tammy Baldwin and Rep. Ron Kind insist that the accidents — including two in Ontario, one in Illinois and another in West Virginia in the past four weeks — illustrate the need for a rapid phase out of “antiquated” tank cars that are prone to rupture as well as stepped-up standards for new models.
 
Midwest Energy News: Under Rauner, Illinois’ energy direction remains unclear
Two months after his inauguration, Illinois Gov. Bruce Rauner has made national headlines for his aggressive efforts to get the state’s budget crisis under control. Energy and related environment issues have so far taken a back seat, but experts and advocates are watching closely for signs of what the new Republican gubernatorial administration will mean on that front.
 
Associated Press: NC House members want air emission rules for HF
Three North Carolina Republican lawmakers want to make clear a state environmental panel must draw up rules designed to minimize toxic emissions related to any upcoming natural gas exploration through fracking. The Wake County House members filed the billMonday, a week after a flap over a provision inserted into another bill by the House majority leader.
 
Pittsburgh Business Times: Slowdown costs at least $1.5B in capital spending
Five natural-gas producers with significant operations in southwestern Pennsylvania have reduced their capital budgets collectively by 23 percent — or $1.5 billion — according to numbers reported in operational guidance.
 
Associated Press: Governor advances tougher drilling rules
Pennsylvania state environmental regulators say they want to get tougher on how the Marcellus Shale natural gas drilling industry stores waste, dampens noise and affects water resources, schools and playgrounds. Department of Environmental Protection officials gave a Monday briefing in which they described key elements of a forthcoming plan to update drilling industry regulations.
 
Columbus Dispatch: Businesses pick apart Kasich’s tax proposals
Gov. John Kasich’s tax proposals continued to take on water yesterday — and some of his front-line supporters in the business community are the ones shooting holes in the boat. Ohio’s nine metro chambers of commerce, including Columbus’, said Kasich’s tax package — which includes $5.7 billion in income-tax cuts and $5.2 billion in sales, business, tobacco and fracking tax increases — could “stall Ohio’s recent economic rebound.”
 
Columbus Dispatch: Panel accepts some safeguards for state parks, rejects others
An Ohio House panel modified a fracking proposal yesterday to explicitly mandate “zero surface impact” on state parks and forests. But by mostly party-line votes, the House Energy and Natural Resources Committee denied a pair of additional amendments that would have provided extra protection to public lands.
 
Times-Recorder: Ohio senator seeks stricter waste penalties
A state senator wants increased penalties and stiffer permit rules for improperly disposing of gas-drilling waste and toxic brine in Ohio. Senate Minority Leader Joe Schiavoni's legislation would raise the state's penalties for knowingly disposing of oil and gas waste illegally to levels found in the federal Clean Water Act. The Boardman Democrat says violators could face a felony.
 
Denton Record-Chronicle: Filed legislation could affect city's HF ban
The chairman of the Texas House Energy Resources Committee filed legislation in Austinon Tuesday that would prevent cities from not only regulating oil and gas production with new rules but also from enforcing any such rules they have on the books now.
 
Fuel Fix: EIA: Eagle Ford production will slow in April
The U.S. shale boom may finally be slowing down, according to projections from the U.S. Energy Information Administration. Oil production from the six largest shale plays in the U.S. will hit 5.6 million barrels per day in April, an increase of less than 300 barrels per day over March, the EIA said in its monthly drilling productivity report on Monday. The increase would be the smallest since February 2011.