Energy

EPA to rescind methane regulations for oil and gas

The Environmental Protection Agency is preparing to adopt new rules that would rescind regulations for methane-gas emissions, including ending requirements that oil-and-gas producers have systems and procedures to detect methane leaks in their systems, senior administration officials said. The rule changes will apply to wells drilled since 2016 and going forward, and remove the largest pipelines, storage sites and other parts of the transmission system from EPA oversight of smog and greenhouse-gas emissions. The changes also ease reporting requirements for the industry and, for some facilities, how often a plant must check for leaks of other pollutants, the officials said. The new rules, expected to be signed and issued this week, adopt most of the core elements of two proposals from 2018 and 2019. Agency officials are fulfilling a directive by President Trump to ease regulations on U.S. energy producers, and have said the rules being eliminated are duplicative of other federal and state rules. They were adopted in 2016 under former President Obama amid concerns about methane-gas leaks contributing to climate change. Methane accounts for about 10% of U.S. greenhouse-gas emissions and it is about 25 times more potent than carbon dioxide in trapping the earth’s heat, according to estimates used by the EPA. Agency figures show the oil-and-gas industry has long been the nation’s largest emitter of methane, even before the shale boom. As the drilling boom sent natural-gas production surging, the EPA responded in 2016 with requirements for companies to make plans for reducing emissions at new wells and the pipelines they feed. That included regular checks to close leaky valves, pipelines and tanks in the sprawling network covering millions of miles that supplies home furnaces, power plants, industrial sites and other consumers. Rescinding these requirements was a priority for small-and midsize oil-and-gas producers, which say the requirements were so costly to meet that it would be unprofitable to drill in some places. But larger producers, including international giants Exxon Mobil Corp., Royal Dutch Shell PLC and BP PLC, favored retaining the rules, saying a lack of climate regulation undermines their promise that the U.S. natural gas they sell is a cleaner source of energy. In recent days, the EPA and White House officials have agreed, tentatively, on a final rule package after sometimes-contentious negotiations, according to senior administration officials. It is pending a final signoff from the White House Office of Management and Budget, where the EPA sent a final draft of the rule on Friday, one of those officials said. As part of those discussions, the White House agreed to drop plans that would have eased the rules further, reducing inspections to once a year from the current twice a year. The EPA said the environmental benefits of twice-annual inspections are so large that it would be difficult legally to justify fewer inspections, the officials said. White House officials relented after EPA Administrator Andrew Wheeler told them that crafting a rationale for fewer inspections could delay the rest of the methane rollback past the Nov. 3 election and maybe beyond Mr. Trump’s term in office, the senior administration officials said. Their compromise requires twice-annual inspections across nearly all the oil-and-gas industry, the officials said. That maintains the status quo for most operations; it eases what had been a quarterly-inspection mandate at compressor stations, which push natural gas from the wells through the pipelines. Administration officials have largely sided with the smaller producers and pushed to roll back the methane rules as much as possible. The central tenet of their new policy is that the Obama administration erred to begin with when it claimed that the EPA had the authority to regulate methane from oil-and-gas operations. The Obama administration didn’t go through the proper scientific and legal process required to justify the 2016 rules by first determining that the oil and natural-gas industry’s greenhouse-gas emissions, primarily methane, cause or contribute to dangerous air pollution, the EPA says in the new rules, according to the senior administration officials. That determination would make it harder for a new administration to reclaim that authority without a congressional mandate. And, most important, industry and legal experts say, the new policy stops the EPA from requiring companies to add leak-prevention systems to wells drilled years ago, something that isn’t currently required, but which the EPA would eventually have been obligated to do had the Obama-era policy been allowed to stand. Leak monitoring would still be required, just not for methane directly. While the methane mandate is gone, the 2018 proposal being adopted in this package did keep well-monitoring requirements for volatile organic compounds, pollutants that cause smog. Agency leaders have said a benefit of that monitoring is that it will trap most methane emissions, too. The agreement on the frequency of those inspections now sets the stage for the EPA to officially finish the rules this week, the officials said. And agency leaders have been exploring the possibility of an event to mark the moment, with Mr. Wheeler signing them Thursday in the Pittsburgh area, heart of the country’s biggest natural-gas field, the Marcellus Shale, the officials added. Several of the country’s biggest oil-and-gas companies have major offices and operations near Pittsburgh, and the region is a key source of Mr. Trump’s political support. Pennsylvania is one of the country’s biggest swing states and Mr. Trump rode it to victory in 2016. He has boasted a pro-fossil-fuel platform and seized on enthusiasm for Republicans in western Pennsylvania that has grown alongside the oil-and-gas industry.

This is great news for American energy, and more importantly, for struggling Americans trying to pay utility bills. Excellent!! 🙂

Texas fears losing oil-rich lands in Chinese takeover of weakened energy companies

Plunging prices have wreaked havoc on Texas oil companies struggling to avoid a wave of bankruptcies that has ravished the industry during the past five years, leaving them ripe takeover targets for rivals from China and elsewhere. Ninety-eight exploration and production companies in Texas with $75.7 billion of debt filed for bankruptcy from 2015 through 2020, according to the international law firm Haynes and Boone. That number is expected to grow even larger after West Texas Intermediate crude oil prices plunged 52 percent this year as stay-at-home orders designed to slow the spread of COVID-19 wiped out 30 million barrels per day of demand while Saudi Arabia and Russia ramped up production amid a price war. The companies’ vulnerability to foreign buyers raises the risk that the U.S. might lose control over valuable oil-producing lands in the Permian Basin, a swath of land in western Texas and southeastern New Mexico that helped the country become the world’s largest crude producer amid a shale boom. “We have discovered this volume of natural gas and oil that is more than any time in history,” said Wayne Christian, commissioner of the Texas Railroad Commission — the agency that regulates the state’s oil and gas industries. “I believe it’s a national security concern to allow unfriendly foreign countries to come in and buy land and oil in Texas and the United States,” he told FOX Business. A 2018 oil discovery in the Permian uncovered 46.3 billion barrels of crude, 281 trillion cubic feet of gas, and 20 billion barrels of natural gas liquids, according to an assessment by the U.S. Geological Survey. The discovery effectively doubled America’s oil and gas reserves and puts the country on a path for years of energy independence. A separate estimate from RS Energy Group found the discovery could be as large as 230 billion barrels. The oil industry is critical for the Texas economy, accounting for $16.3 billion of revenue in 2019 and about 10 percent of the state’s labor force. An oil worker makes about $132,000 a year, 1.6 times the state’s average wage. Exxon Mobil, Chevron, and BP are the major players in the industry, but there are also hundreds of companies that produce less than 1,000 barrels of oil per day. The scope of the industry reaches far beyond the oil and gas producers, also including midstream companies that operate pipelines, service rigs and more. To help smaller companies navigate the industry’s crisis, Christian said Texas is working on measures that include cutting regulations and permit costs. When the industry is prospering, such firms get bought out at a premium by the big international companies such as Exxon Mobil, leaving money in Texas and giving workers bonuses, Christian said. When markets sour, however, the firms can be snapped up at fire-sale prices. “The federal government should watch very carefully and raise their standards on who can buy,” Christian said. China and other countries are already “starting to look for deals,” said Malcolm McNeil, international practice co-leader at the law firm Arent Fox. He said that while recent volatility in oil prices has left some Chinese companies “cash poor,” those that have money are “going to be seeking bargains.” The uncertainty surrounding the outcome of the 2020 election will cause Chinese firms to “explore deals now, but wait to bargain-hunt until companies are really hurting” and there is more clarity on the political front, he added. Should President Trump win re-election, prospective acquisitions might be less appealing to Chinese buyers, given his administration’s prickly relationship with Beijing and efforts to limit Chinese control of vital U.S. resources. Any oil deal, unless it’s rudimentary, will likely involve the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS), which would require arduous reviews. U.S. law prohibits foreign companies from directly holding many oil, gas and mineral leases, but does allow them to form U.S. corporations to make purchases. Chinese acquisitions of U.S. oil and gas companies have faced increased scrutiny since China National Offshore Oil Corporation in 2005 attempted a takeover of the El Segundo, California-based explorer Unocal, now a subsidiary of Chevron, causing public uproar. While that deal was blocked, the Chinese firm Yantai Xinchao Industry Co. in 2015 received CFIUS approval to forge ahead with a $1.3 billion purchase of oil assets in the Permian Basin owned by Tall City Exploration and Plymouth Petroleum. Stewart Glickman, an energy analyst at New York-based CFRA Research, told FOX Business that barring a “rapid V-shaped recovery in oil prices,” there are going to be a “fair number of new Chapter 11 filings.” While Texas is an attractive investment destination for companies from China and elsewhere, it’s difficult for them to “swoop in” and start acquiring acreage “like a vulture feasting on a carcass,” he said. Though companies from China, Saudi Arabia and elsewhere may have experience in oil and gas, shale is a “U.S. phenomenon,” Glickman noted. A more plausible way for foreign companies to gain access to the rock, according to Glickman, is to enter a joint venture that gives them financial exposure but not operational exposure. He added that such a route would also be the way to go for those seeking to gain access through midstream and downstream businesses. But while the tactic might help eager overseas buyers reach lucrative deals, such developments are precisely what Christian, the Texas railroad commissioner, hopes to avoid. “I don’t want to wind up five years from now with, all of a sudden, some foreign country shutting down production in Texas because they own it, and prefer buying from their own reserves overseas,” Christian said. “I think that would be inefficient use, and I would think it would threaten national security.”

Trump emerges as oil’s white knight after worst week since 2008

The battered U.S. oil market may have just received a lifeline from President Trump after crude prices posted the worst week since 2008 hugging the $31 per barrel level, down 48 percent so far this year. Trump, as part of his national emergency declaration to combat the fallout from the coronavirus, greenlighted the Department of Energy to step into the market as a buyer. “Based on the price of oil I have also instructed the Secretary of Energy to purchase, at a very good price, for large quantities of crude oil for storage in the U.S. Strategic Reserve, we are going to fill it right up to the top, saving the American taxpayer billions and billions of dollars and helping our oil industry,” Trump stated on Friday. The move, according to Phil Flynn of The PRICE Futures Group, should boost oil prices from historic lows. “This could send prices back into the $40s if the buyers are there,” said Flynn, when reached for his reaction. “They [the U.S.] can buy oil at the lowest price in years,” he added. The Strategic Petroleum Reserve is the world’s largest supply of emergency crude oil, as described by the DOE, and was established as a backup facility to protect the U.S. in the event of market disruptions or potential shortages. The oil market hit a sharp downward spiral on Monday, with prices falling over 30 percent, as Saudi Arabia and Russia engaged in a price war, flooding the market with product. The action, which choked U.S. energy producers, prompted oil tycoon Harold Hamm, CEO of Continental Resources, to pursue justice after he deemed the international move “illegal.” “They’re taking advantage of this coronavirus pandemic that’s sweeping the world to focus in on this industry and devastate it,” Hamm, founder, and executive chairman at Oklahoma City-based Continental Resources Inc., said during an interview on FOX Business’ “Cavuto Coast to Coast” on Wednesday. “That’s not gonna happen. We’re gonna take action on them. We’re gonna investigate that.” He said the Domestic Energy Producers Alliance has taken action to pass a resolution and start an anti-dumping investigation into Saudi Arabia, Russia and possibly other countries. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin also put Russia on notice, speaking to Ambassador of the Russian Federation to the United States Anatoly Antonov in which he “emphasized the importance of orderly energy markets,” according to a statement following the heavy selling.

Pentagon awards contracts to design mobile nuclear reactor

The Pentagon on Monday issued three contracts to start design work on mobile, small nuclear reactors, as part of a two-step plan towards achieving nuclear power for American forces at home and abroad. The department awarded contracts to BWX Technologies, Inc. of Virginia, for $13.5 million; Westinghouse Government Services of Washington, D.C. for $11.9 million; and X-energy, LLC of Maryland, for $14.3 million, to begin a two-year engineering design competition for a small nuclear microreactor designed to potentially be forward deployed with forces outside the continental United States. The combined $39.7 million in contracts are from “Project Pele,” a project run through the Strategic Capabilities Office (SCO), located within the department’s research and engineering side. The prototype is looking at a 1-5 megawatt (MWe) power range. The Department of Energy has been supporting the project at its Idaho National Laboratory. Pele “involves the development of a safe, mobile and advanced nuclear microreactor to support a variety of Department of Defense missions such as generating power for remote operating bases,” said Lt. Col. Robert Carver, a department spokesman. “After a two-year design-maturation period, one of the companies funded to begin design work may be selected to build and demonstrate a prototype.” “The Pele Program’s uniqueness lies in the reactor’s mobility and safety,” said Jeff Waksman, Project Pele program manager, in a department statement. “We will leverage our industry partners to develop a system that can be safely and rapidly moved by road, rail, sea or air and for quick set up and shut down, with a design which is inherently safe.” However, Pele is not the only attempt at introducing small nuclear reactors to the Pentagon’s inventory. A second effort is being run through the office of the undersecretary of acquisition and sustainment. That effort, ordered in the 2019 National Defense Authorization Act, involves a pilot program aiming to demonstrate the efficacy of a small nuclear reactor, in the 2-10 MWe range, with initial testing at a Department of Energy site in roughly the 2023 time-frame. If the testing goes well, a commercially developed, Nuclear Regulatory Commission licensed reactor will be demonstrated on a “permanent domestic military installation by 2027,” according to DoD spokesman Lt. Col. Mike Andrews. “If the full demonstration proves to be a cost effective energy resilience alternative, NRC-licensed [reactors] will provide an additional option for generating power provided to DoD through power purchase agreements.” The best way to differentiate between the programs may be to think of the A&S effort as the domestic program, built off commercial technology, as part of an effort to get off of local power grids that are seen as weak targets, either via physical or cyber espionage. Pele is focused on the prototyping a new design, with forward operations in mind — and may never actually produce a reactor, if the prototype work proves too difficult. According to an Oct. 2018 technical report by the Nuclear Energy Institute, 90 percent of military installations have “an average annual energy use that can be met by an installed capacity of nuclear power of 40 MWe or less.” Replacing all local power with a nuclear reactor isn’t necessary for the department’s goals, but one or more reactors in the 2 to 10 MWe range, located on base, would ensure that if the local power grid goes down, critical functions will still be able to operate. “The concern here is that, obviously, installations need energy, they need power,” Ellen Lord, the department’s acquisition head, explained last week at the annual McAleese conference. “Typically they are tied to the grid; what if the grid goes down, what if your generators don’t have fuel to work on for awhile? So, what we’re doing is looking at small nuclear modular reactors.” This isn’t the first time the DoD has looked into small nuclear reactors. The 2010 NDAA directed the department to study the feasibility of nuclear power for military installations, but a study concluded that the reactors available at the time were simply too big. However, new developments in the commercial sector are opening up more options. According to Dr. Jonathan Cobb, a spokesman for the World Nuclear Association, small nuclear reactors come in three flavors. The first, small modular reactors, sit in the 20-300 MWe range and are approaching the point they will appear on market. The second category sits from 10-100 megawatts, and have been used in transports such as icebreakers. According to Cobb, a pair of 32 MWe reactors, based on icebreaker technology, are being used aboard the Akademik Lomonosov, a Russian “floating power plant.” The third category, covering what the Pentagon appears most interested in, is a category known as microreactors. The challenge, Cobb said, is that this group is the furthest behind technologically, with demonstrations of commercial systems targeted for “the second half of the 2020s,” putting them in the “ballpark” of what DoD is looking for with its A&S effort. According to the NEI study, the reduced size and increased simplicity of microreactors mean a procurement and manufacturing cycle could take “between 3 and 5 years from the order of long lead materials to the delivery of the largest component, with a nominal target of 4 years. Most of the components will need to arrive on-site at least 6 months prior to startup in order to support the achievement of construction milestones.”

For more, click on the text above.

Trump’s DOI Moves to Open Federal Land in Utah for Energy Production, Recreation

President Donald Trump directed the Department of Interior to open up more federal lands for energy production and recreation, including in Utah where he downsized massive amounts of land put off limits by the Obama administration. The Department of Interior announced the finalized plan last week even as environmentalists challenge Trump’s 2017 proclamations to return the boundaries Bears Ears and Grand Staircase Escalante monuments to be consistent with the Antiquities Act of 1906. The plan allows for leasing land in Utah for the mining of coal and drilling for oil and gas and for recreation and tourism. “The approved plans keep the commitment of this Administration to the families and communities of Utah that know and love this land the best and will care for these resources for many generations to come,” Casey Hammond, acting assistant secretary, land and minerals management, said in the DOI announcement. “These cooperatively developed and locally driven plans restore a prosperous future to communities too often dismissed and punished by unilateral decisions of those that would not listen to the voices of Utahns.” “I appreciate the President’s and Secretary [David] Bernhardt’s collaborative approach to both the Grand Staircase-Escalante and the Bears Ears national monuments,” Utah Governor Gary Herbert said in the announcement. “As the Antiquities Act itself states, and as I have reiterated for years, monuments should be as small as possible to protect artifacts and cultural resources.” “And they should not be created over the objections of local communities,” Herbert said. “I’m happy to see the administration develop management plans that protect areas with sensitive artifacts and yet still provide a way to use these lands for recreation, grazing, and management practices that will keep the lands healthy.” “The outcomes are always better when the federal government works with local communities rather than presumes to know what is best for them,” Hebert said. “These management plans are the result of meaningful collaboration that was clearly lacking in the politically-motivated monument designations by past administrations,” Rep. Robert Bishop (R-UT) said in the announcement. “Well-funded special interest groups that aren’t from our state will spread outrageous misinformation, but the fact remains that this administration has continued to take actions that reflect the will of Utahns who call these places home.” “When President Trump reduced the size of both Bear’s Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monuments, he did it with the full support of Utah’s federal delegation and the elected officials who represent those areas,” Rep. Chris Stewart (R-UT) said in the announcement. “By contrast, the Obama and Clinton administrations snubbed and ignored Utah’s local, state, and federal elected officials who objected to the creation of both monuments.”

Kudos to President Trump and his DOI for this way over-due common sense decision. Both the Clinton and Obama administrations grossly abused the Antiquities Act to wall off huge swaths of public land; in effect exercising land grabs by the big brother federal government. This restores much of that land back to the great state of Utah, and allows for energy exploration for our energy independence, and for recreation. And, despite what the extreme enviro-wackos would have you believe, such activities CAN be done in an environmentally responsible manner. Again, excellent decision! For more, click on the text above. 🙂

Opinion/Analysis: Clean-energy supporters should support nuclear power

No matter your view on climate change, corporations and markets are planning for a lower-carbon future. In fact, some of the largest utility companies in the U.S. are making big bets that they can reach net-zero carbon dioxide emissions by 2050. But without nuclear power in the mix to produce needed energy, these bets are much less likely and will certainly be more expensive. The question is not whether the world’s economy will shift to a low-carbon one. The question is how and when. Here’s where things get very tricky and incredibly complicated, and a dose of humility is called for. When you hear Democrats in Congress and the party’s 2020 presidential candidates talk about their solutions to climate change, they generally focus on electricity and a “renewable” grid comprised of wind and solar power. Much of the case for 100 percent renewable energy comes from one professor at Stanford University – Mark Jacobsen. His theory includes the assumption that we can increase the amount of power from hydroelectric dams tenfold. But according to the U.S. Department of Energy and all major studies, the real potential increase is just a tiny fraction of that. Even if this were possible, it’s not smart or humble to put all of our eggs in one basket. I’m for renewables as part of the energy mix, but I’m not sure why the word “renewables” even matters. Aren’t we going for “clean” – meaning reducing greenhouse gas emissions? If so, why would Democratic presidential candidates Sens. Elizabeth Warren, Bernie Sanders and other Democrats want to take down 55 percent of our clean energy by decommissioning all nuclear power plants by 2030? That means replacing $60 billion of always-on power with intermittent renewables that have to be backed up by a power source when the sun isn’t shining or the wind isn’t blowing. And to replace a 2-gigawatt nuclear plant with solar you would need the equivalent solar panel coverage of a two-lane highway from Washington, D.C., to Los Angeles and back. Democrats say that wind and solar power are cheaper than other forms of energy, but they aren’t counting the cost of backup power. This is like saying that I saved a ton of money by selling my car and riding my new bike to work – but not counting the cost of Uber when I didn’t want to get wet on rainy days or sweaty on hot ones, or when I had to make a long trip. It’s easy to say nuclear power is too expensive or unsafe. It’s simple, and the Democratic base likes this claim. However, this point generally confuses the distinction between keeping existing plants open and building new ones. Virtually no one is advocating building more “Gen 3” nuclear reactors, which were first designed in the 1950s. But utility executives and pragmatic clean energy thinkers are advocating to keep existing nuclear power plants operating. As far as safety goes, there has never been a fatality or even a major injury at a nuclear plant in the U.S. due to radiation. Importantly, there are exciting prospects ahead thanks to nuclear innovation. New companies have figured out how to make nuclear power plants “walk-away safe.” This means that no human intervention is needed to shut down the plant if something goes wrong. The nuclear fission reaction stops when, under a rare occurrence, things get overheated. Many of these new reactor concepts work on used fuel. Not only do these engineering breakthroughs eliminate safety concerns – they drastically reduce costs. These new technologies aren’t pipedreams. NuScale’s small modular reactor is almost through the Nuclear Regulatory Commission licensing process and has a power agreement with a Utah utility. Additional cutting-edge designs are expected to undergo formal reviews beginning in the next 18 months. Even our Defense Department is working on prototyping a new micro nuclear reactor by 2022. These reactors will not only provide always-on affordable power, but they can “load follow” renewables to provide 100 percent clean energy when needed. They should be viewed as an exciting complement rather than a competitor to renewables. For decades, Democrats in Congress and previous administrations have built roadblocks for nuclear power, making it the most heavily regulated industry in the country. We’ve seen modest improvements, but we need a bolder, more rapid modernization of federal nuclear policy. The Nuclear Energy Leadership Act is one example of legislation that could make a big difference. It has dozens of bipartisan co-sponsors in the House and Senate and broad industry and environmental stakeholder support. Among other things, the legislation would establish specific goals for public-private partnerships; require the development of a 10-year strategic plan that supports advanced nuclear research and development goals, and provide for initial domestic supplies of advanced nuclear fuel (currently available only in Russia) needed by new nuclear reactors. Nuclear power is critical to meeting environmental goals, but it is also a massive economic opportunity. The world’s middle-class is projected to grow by almost 50 percent by 2030, which means a lot of new air conditioners and appliances that need reliable and affordable power. It’s time to acknowledge nuclear power’s important place in the clean energy family.

Indeed…and well said, Jay. Jay Faison is the founder of ClearPath, whose mission is to accelerate conservative clean energy solutions. Learn more at http://www.clearpath.org. Follow Jay on Twitter: @JayFaison1 France runs almost 80% of its national energy grid on nuclear. There is no excuse for being so far behind in our use and development of nuclear energy. It’s a national security issue.

Mnuchin says Greta Thunberg should study economics before calling for fossil fuel divestment

U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin took a shot at Greta Thunberg — the famed teen climate activist — on Thursday over her push at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, for companies to immediately cease all investments in fossil fuels. Mnuchin was at a news conference in the Alpine town when he was asked about Thunberg’s earlier appeal to abandon older sources of energy, according to Reuters. “Is she the chief economist? … After she goes to college and studies economics in college, she can come back and explain that to us,” he was quoted saying. Thunberg, 17, from Sweden, has been embraced by celebrities and is seen by supporters as a fierce, young voice capable of rallying support for her cause: to clean up the environmental mess left by previous generations. Her detractors view her as a media-generated star who admitted that she was surprised when she was named Time magazine’s “Person of the Year.” There appears to be no love lost between Thunberg and President Trump, who called Time magazine’s decision “ridiculous.” Thunberg said in September that talking to Trump at the U.N. General Assembly in New York City would have been a waste of time. In Davos, Thunberg took part in a panel discussion hosted by The New York Times, where she told the audience there is a real need for immediate action on climate change. “Your inaction is fueling the flames by the hour,” she said, according to the Times. “Let’s be clear. We don’t need a ‘low carbon economy.’ We don’t need to ‘lower emissions.’ Our emissions have to stop.” Trump and Thunberg were both in Davos at the same time and “sparred indirectly,” the Reuters report said, though Trump appeared to “extend an olive branch” when he told reporters he wished that he was able to hear her speak before he left.

Good on Sec. Mnuchin calling out this kid with NO life experience, and who knows absolutelynothing about economics. She’s propped up by the media left because she’s young and spouting their talking points. Someone needs to ask her how she got to Davos. Did she take a plane? A car? Typical liberal hypocrisy…..

Trump administration seeks to juice dishwashers by scrubbing energy regulations

For years, consumers have complained about slower, noisier dishwashers that produce dirtier dishes, the result of tighter federal efficiency regulations that the Trump administration is now seeking to unload. The Energy Department last month proposed a rule to create a new dishwasher product class that would finish a normal cycle in an hour or less by using less stringent energy standards than permitted under the current rules. Sam Kazman, general counsel of the free-market Competitive Enterprise Institute, which led the charge for the regulatory clean-up, said the ever-tighter restrictions on energy and water have produced machines that take twice as long without getting dishes as scrubbed as earlier models. “Basically, these dishwashers have turned into crap, and it is solely the result of the Department of Energy’s so-called efficiency regulations,” said Mr. Kazman. He cited data from Consumer Reports showing that average wash times have increased from about 70 minutes in 1983 to 140 minutes in 2018 as manufacturers slow down the cycles to “compensate for the negative impact on cleaning performance,” as the department acknowledged in 2016. “The result has been ever longer and longer cycle times,” said Mr. Kazman. “Back in the late ‘70s, they were reporting one-hour times, not just for cleaning but for drying as well. Now it typically takes over two hours, in some cases two-and-a-half hours, and the dishes come out neither very clean nor very dry.”

Agreed… For more on this, click on the text above.

With Hickenlooper out, Colorado’s empowered environmentalists target oil and gas industry

For eight years, Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper shielded the oil and gas industry from the salvos of the environmental left, but now there’s a new political regime in town with no love for fossil fuels. Without the pro-fracking Mr. Hickenlooper to run interference, Colorado Democrats are poised to deliver a body blow to the state’s $31 billion oil and gas industry with Senate Bill 181, legislation aimed at prioritizing environmental and safety concerns that critics have described as a de facto prohibition on drilling. “That bill, SB 181, make no mistake, it has nothing to do with public health and safety and everything to do with banning energy development in the state of Colorado,” Amy Oliver Cooke, executive vice president of the free-market Independence Institute, said at a Friday protest rally in Greeley. Still, nobody doubts that the measure will pass. The state Senate advanced the bill during Wednesday’s blizzard on a 19-15 party-line vote with one abstention, sending the measure to the House and one step closer to the desk of Gov. Jared Polis, a Democrat and longtime fracking foe who campaigned last year on 100 percent renewable energy by 2040. Environmental groups cheered the vote. “The state Senate is showing real national leadership, showing other states how to protect communities from the public health and safety impacts of oil and gas extraction,” said Sam Gilchrist, western campaigns director at the National Resources Defense Council. New York, Maryland and Vermont have gone further by prohibiting fracking, but unlike those states, Colorado has a major oil and gas industry presence. The nation’s fifth-largest producer of natural gas, Colorado fossil-fuel development supported nearly 233,000 jobs in 2015, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration. Colorado “is going to do something that hasn’t been done, and that is: a state with a very significant pool of gas and oil is going to make it a lot more difficult to mine it,” said Denver political analyst Floyd Ciruli. “There is really now ample warning that the way this legislation is drafted, it’s essentially going to allow some level of a ban,” he said. “The public is clearly divided on this.” Republicans, rural Coloradans and industry officials have warned of brutal economic consequences. A REMI Partnership study released Tuesday by industry groups estimated that a 50 percent reduction in production by 2030 would wipe out 120,000 jobs and $8 billion in state and local tax revenue. “Let’s not forget that there will be pain if this bill passes,” state Sen. Rob Woodward, a Republican, said before Wednesday’s vote. “People will lose their jobs, people will lose their homes, people will lose their businesses. And as we all know when this happens, marriages will crumble, suicides will increase. It’s not a pretty picture.”

Indeed.. For more on this story, click on the text above. This will be truly devastating to Colorado, if this crap becomes law. Awful…

Energy Department Says U.S. Is Now World’s Top Oil Producer

The United States is pumping record amounts of oil, vaulting over Russia to become the world’s biggest producer of crude. The Energy Information Administration said Thursday that the U.S. produced more than 11.3 million barrels a day in August, a 4 percent increase over the old record set in July. Russia’s energy ministry estimates that country pumped 11.2 million barrels a day in August. OPEC reports Saudi Arabia pumped 10.4 million barrels a day. It’s the first time since 1973 that the U.S. leads the world in oil production. Several states hit record production in August including Texas, which accounts for about 40 percent of U.S. crude. The energy agency says pipeline bottlenecks in Texas and New Mexico are causing more use of trucks and rail cars to haul oil.

Excellent!! 🙂