Blog

Someoneas poetic as Oettinger deserves a round of applause or at least some freecarbon creditsGuardian (2/10/11) reports: He said the tougher target would force industries to move toAsia. "If we go alone to 30%, you will only have a faster process ofde-industrialisation in Europe," he said, citing the steel industry as oneof the likely casualties. "I think we need industry in Europe, we needindustry in the UK, and industry means CO2 emissions." Moving to thehigher target would cost about...

Case study on RangeFuels: Americantaxpayers invested $162 million in a biofuel company and all they have to showfor it is 4 million gallons of bio fuel, a closed plant and 4 employees WallStreet Journal (2/9/11) reports: Vinod Khosla stepped in with his hand out.The political venture capitalist founded Range Fuels and in March 2007 itreceived a $76 million grant from the Department of Energy—one of sixcellulosic projects the Bush Administration selected for $385 million ingrants. Range said...

AsCape Wind searches for buyers of its expensive energy, the Obama Administrationfast tracks more wind projects USAToday (2/7/11) reports: The Obama administration announced plans Monday tospend $50 million to speed the development of offshore wind farms, aiming tolease wind farms off four Mid-Atlantic states by the end of this year…TheInterior Department said it will expedite environmental reviews for four windprojects off the coasts of Virginia, Maryland, Delaware and New Jersey....

You can’tsqueeze blood out of a turnip or energy from woodchips, but you can squeezemoney out of a taxpayer WashingtonExaminer (2/6/11) reports: To turn wood chipsinto ethanol fuel, George W. Bush's Department of Energy in February 2007announced a $76 million grant to Range Fuels for a cutting-edge refinery. A fewmonths later, the refinery opened in the piney woods of Treutlen County, Ga.,as the taxpayers of Georgia piled on another $6 million. In 2008, the ethanolplant was the first...

Permitorium: Shell is the latest casualty fromthe war on affordable and reliable energy; EPA and DOE carry out Obama'smyopic  energy views while the consumer suffers high energy prices New York Times (2/3/11) reports: Shell CEO Peter Voser in anearnings call with reporters said the company would need to spend as much as$150 million without knowing whether it would receive needed permits from U.S.EPA and the Interior Department..."Despite our investment in acreage andtechnology and our work...

Themarket has spoken: wind installations were down 50% in 2010. The reason? AWEAsays uncertainty about long-term federal support of wind industry. AWEA(1/24/11) reports: New wind powered generating capacity installed in 2010 inthe US was roughly half that installed in 2009, but there is a fairly robustpipeline of new capacity currently under construction, the American Wind EnergyAssociation said Monday… AWEA attributed the falloffto uncertainty about long term federal policies in support...