Ohio-based FirstEnergy is trying an audacious regulatory double play in the state legislature, with two bills aimed at subsidizing the company’s two unprofitable Ohio nuclear power plants – Davis Besse and Perry – while at the same time vastly increasing the profits the parent company can earn while scaling back renewable energy and energy efficiency … More FirstEnergy’s controversial political double play
A court case challenging the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission’s grant of eminent domain to a natural gas pipeline, originally brought over the long-running, contentious issue of how to treat greenhouse gas emissions, has turned into a case of whether the commission can approve condemnation of private property for pipelines that serve foreign, as well as … More FERC’s eminent pipeline domain authority legally challenged
The overly-ambitious, $9 billion V.C. Summer nuclear project in South Carolina – a joint venture of then SCANA Corp. and state-owned generation and transmission utility Santee Cooper – failed miserably in July 2017, when the two essentially equal partners walked away and left an uncompleted hulk on the site of two operating nuclear power plants. … More Is the failed VC Summer project South Carolina’s Brexit?
On March 12, Nathan Myhrvold, idea man for Bill Gates and a principal in Gates’s Terra Power breeder reactor project, spoke to an audience of thousands at the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s annual regulatory information conference. Basing his talk on a November Scientific American article, Myhrvold pushed for a new generation of advanced, innovative nuclear … More Commentary: The fallacy of industry self-regulation
State renewable energy mandates are an inefficient way to reduce carbon dioxide emissions from electric generation, according to a new working paper from the Energy Policy Institute at the University of Chicago (EPIC). The paper – “Do Renewable Portfolio Standards Deliver?” – argues that state-level renewable electricity mandates in 29 states and the District of … More Are state renewable targets too expensive?
While U.S. natural gas prices rose slightly in 2018, according to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission’s latest State of the Markets Report, lack of pipeline capacity in the Permian Basin in west Texas and eastern New Mexico led to substantially lower prices. During a presentation at the FERC’s April 18 public meeting, Staff noted that … More FERC scopes out 2018 energy market forces
A busy Federal Energy Regulatory Commission today approved two new liquefied natural gas export projects: Driftwood LNG in Louisiana and Port Arthur LNG in Texas. The approval also continued the squabble at FERC over assessing the environmental impacts of greenhouse gas emissions from LNG projects. Commissioner Cheryl LaFleur concurred with Chairman Neil Chatterjee and Commissioner … More FERC approves two new LNG export terminals
Energy economist Severin Borenstein in a new post at his Energy Institute Blog argues that the favorite of most economists, pricing greenhouse gases, won’t be enough to harness global warming. Borenstein, faculty director at the Energy Institute at the Haas School of Business, writes, “I’m as big an advocate of pricing GHGs as other economists … More Borenstein: Carbon pricing not a panacea
President Trump’s two executive orders yesterday, aimed at streamlining permitting of oil and gas pipelines, are winning industry support. But they will likely face legal pushback from affected states and environmental groups. The New York Times wrote, “The actions are unlikely to have much of an immediate impact, but they will probably attract legal challenges … More Trump’s pipeline orders: Less than meets the eye?
While Pacific Gas & Electric is drawing most of the attention – and fire – for its role in devastating wildfires in 2017 and 2018, it’s clear that this is a statewide problem, not just sloppy practices by an uncaring monopoly utility. The state’s other two investor-owned utilities – Southern California Edison and San Diego … More All Calif. utilities face fire liabilities