WASHINGTON – Today the American Energy Alliance released a new video highlighting the consequences of the Obama administration’s Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) standards. This mandate requires that America's fleet of new cars and trucks get on average 54 miles per gallon by 2025—if EPA's assumptions are correct. AEA’s video, which also features an interview with Congressman Mike Kelly, tells the story of Nelcy Grande, whose ability to buy a car allowed her to start and...
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Last week, the House Science Committee Environment Subcommittee held a hearing regarding the Environmental Protection Agency’s new methane regulations. The hearing highlighted the dangers of these regulations and the Administration’s continuing attacks on domestic natural gas and oil production. The EPA finalized new source performance standards for methane emissions earlier this spring. Unsurprisingly, the rule has a hefty price tag. EPA pegged the cost at $530 million in 2025 (using...
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The Dakota Access Pipeline is a 1,170 mile pipeline project currently under construction in the northern plains. The pipeline, spanning four states, would transport oil from North Dakota, through South Dakota and Iowa, onto its terminus in Patoka, Illinois. However, what should be a standard, albeit significant, infrastructure project, has come into the national limelight as a hot button debate over energy transportation. Announced in 2014, the DAP was intended to be a safe alternative to...
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In 2008, President Obama famously said “...if somebody wants to build a coal-powered plant, they can; it’s just that it will bankrupt them…” With Labor Day earlier this week, it’s a reminder of how President Obama’s anti-energy policies have affected employment. The Daily Caller reports that since President Obama came into office, America has 83,000 fewer coal jobs with the coal mining sector having lost nearly 11,000 jobs in 2015 alone. In addition, The Daily Caller also...
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President Obama will likely "join" the Paris Climate Agreement during his upcoming trip to China. What does this mean? In reality, not much. That’s because the administration knew that a binding climate treaty would need to be voted on in the Senate. Instead, they worked hard to create a non-binding agreement, which they argue would not need to be ratified by the Senate (despite President Obama's recent attempt  to portray the agreement as a treaty). However, non-binding agreements by...
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Last week, activist groups WildEarth Guardians and Physicians for Social Responsibility (PSR) filed a lawsuit seeking to force the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) to review nearly 400 oil and gas leases on federal lands. If successful, the lawsuit would advance the radical “keep it in the ground” movement via shady legal tactics and further impair the nation’s fiscal health and energy security. The lawsuit, filed in the D.C. District Court, challenges 397 oil and gas leases in...
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This week, the White House announced that it was designating 87,000 acres of land in northern Maine to as a national monument, once again demonstrating the Obama administration’s anti-democratic tendencies and their disdain for the wants and wishes of state and local leaders. The new Katahdin Woods and Waters monument surrounds Baxter State Park and Mt. Katahdin in rural northern Maine, bordering the Penobscot River. These lands were gifted to the federal government by a private donor....
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This summer, both chambers of Congress have been working towards a conference agreement between two energy bills, H.R. 8 (the base package) and S. 2012 . The House passed its bill in late 2015, while the Senate agreed on its version this past April. The House then passed an amended version of the Senate bill, setting up the conference process that began in July. The conference committee is now tasked with passing a package addressing a broad range of energy issues, including infrastructure...
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Next week, Advanced Energy Economy (AEE)—a group co-founded by billionaire environmental activist Tom Steyer—will host its annual event titled “Pathway to 2050.” The name of this conference is in reference to California’s renewable energy mandate that requires the state generate 50 percent of its electricity from renewable sources by the year 2050. California already has high electricity rates and rates are only going to increase. California already has high electricity rates...
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Rep. Jenkins, along with Reps. Culberson, Womack, LaHood, and Mullin, recently introduced H.R. 5668, the Transparency and Honesty in Energy Regulation Act of 2016 (THERA). This bill would stop the use of the Social Cost of Carbon (SCC) and the Social Cost of Methane (SCM) in regulatory rulemaking. As explained many times before, the SCC and SCM are too flawed to be used in the rulemaking process . The SCC is estimated using Integrated Assessment Models (IAMs). These models try to assess...
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