Twenty-two U.S. House Democrats from Texas, Louisiana, Oklahoma, New Mexico, Arkansas, Utah and Idaho delivered a letter to Environmental Protection Agency Director Lisa P. Jackson, cautioning the EPA to do a “reasonable and transparent study” of whether hydraulic fracturing of wells creates risks to drinking water. EPA is required to study whether hydraulic…
The International Energy Agency (IEA) issued a forecast of world energy consumption and use, and for the first time included a scenario projecting the impacts of taking steps to stabilize greenhouse gases in the atmosphere at about 450 parts per million by 2030. This “450 Secnario” would limit overall temperature increases…
The Energy Information Administration has issued rankings of states in production of oil, gas, coal, electricity generation, and energy consumption. Texas ranks prominently in most categories. — Texas is first in total energy production, producing 10,997 trillion Btus of energy in 2006 (the most recent information available). Wyoming is second (mainly from…
America’s Natural Gas Alliance, a recently formed energy lobbying group formed by natural gas producers, has issued a press release praising the Senate’s version of a climate bill. Without actually endorsing the bill, the Alliance commended the bill’s authors for “including provisions in their bill that will enable us to…
Items from this week: Prices: Natural gas prices continue to decline. Below is a comparison of gas NYMEX futures prices with S&P 500 for the last year: On August 14, futures for September delivery settled at $3.24/MMBtu, a 52-week low. Futures prices have declined about 65% from this time…
The NAT Gas Act has been introduced in the U.S. Senate, as S. 1408, sponsored by Senators Robert Menendez, D-NJ, and Orrin Hatch, R-UT. The Act provides incentives for increased use of vehicles powered by natural gas. It was previously introduced in the House as H.R. 1835. The Act increases…
On April 2, Keith O. Rattie, CEO of Questar Corporation, gave a speech to students at Utah Valley University about global warming and U.S. energy policy. The parts of the speech about global warming seek to raise questions about the science behind conclusions of the global warming trend. The most…
Momentum appears to be gaining to increase use of compressed natural gas in vehicles in the U.S., both to decrease the nation’s dependence on foreign oil and as a “bridge fuel” to fight global warming. Last Week, the Potential Gas Committee issued a report estimating that the toal U.S. natural…
Four legislators from Colorado, New York and Pennsylvania have introduced a bill making hydraulic fracturing subject to regulation by the Environmental Protection Agency under the Safe Water Drinking Act. Dubbed the Fracturing Responsibility and Awareness of Chemicals Act, or FRAC Act ( FRAC Act.pdf), the bill would amend the Safe Drinking Water…
Last week I attended an Energy Syposium sponsored by South Texas Money Management, Ltd. in San Antonio. One of the speakers was Amy Myers Jaffe, who is the Wallace S. Wilson Fellow in Energy Studies at the James A. Baker III Institute for Public Policy at Rice University and associate director of…