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NewEnergyNews

Gleanings from the web and the world, condensed for convenience, illustrated for enlightenment, arranged for impact...

WALL STREET JOURNAL'S Environmental Capital selected NewEnergyNews as one of the "Blogs We Are Reading" in March, April and May of 2007 and quoted NewEnergyNews on June 5, 2007

MOTHER EARTH NEWS' Energy Matters selected NewEnergyNews for its "What We're Reading" list in September 2008

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Anne B. Butterfield of DAILY CAMERA, a biweekly contributor to NewEnergyNews

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  • Selfishly seeking clean energy
  • Anne B. Butterfield
  • July 12, 2009 (Daily Camera)

    It's the cocktail banter of Boulder: We're so selfish in Boulder, because we're seeking to convert or retire the Valmont coal-fired power plant so it will no longer burn coal. Other communities, like the city of Commerce are more deserving of relief from the emissions of their local coal plants, and those other plants are older. So the banter goes.

    On the City Council's hotline Web site, Ken Wilson has written up how other coal plants around Xcel's service territory would have to produce more power if Boulder succeeds at knocking out the coal-fired power from Valmont. He adds, with fine ethics if not complete analysis: "Reducing carbon emissions is not something we in Boulder can feel good about 'winning' if it means pushing our problems to other communities."

    If Xcel's generating capacity weren't overbuilt in the next few years due to the addition of 750 megawatts of new coal starting this fall in Pueblo, Wilson's view would have more merit, mathematically and ethically. But facts are stubborn things -- and a new coal plant changes everything: it means that every coal plant in Xcel's system is now on the chopping block for parents fighting night and day for their children's world.

    Many also lean on the notion that Valmont is one of Xcel's most efficient coal plants. This is a little like referring to thin Sumo wrestlers, or gentle Mafia men. Coal plants just are not efficient enough to warrant the adjective, especially for a plant such as the Valmont coal unit that provides under 5 percent of base load generation for the area.

    The reason Valmont is on the hit-list is that our town has an informed, active populace, which has imposed a carbon tax on itself and whose utility franchise is coming up for renewal. This is a rare moment of leverage that combines with a moment in history when utilities everywhere are committing to coal plant conversions.

    In Ohio, First Energy decided this year to convert 312 MW of coal power to burn fuel crops grown for the purpose. Three years ago, the Public Service Commission of New Hampshire decided to convert 50 MW of coal capacity to burn biomass. DTE Energy of Wisconsin agreed to buy a 50 MW coal unit with plans to convert it to burning wood waste. A 24 MW coal plant in Pepeekeo, Hawaii, is being converted to burn biomass, and Georgia Power has announced a plan to covert a 96 MW coal unit to run on wood fuel.

    Here in the West, we have wood. Lots of beetle-killed timber that can be brought into plants on the trains that typically carry coal from Wyoming, returning there with our hard-earned dollars. In the past few months. Valmont itself is burning lower-grade, dirtier Wyoming coal. Instead, we could make power and carbon-sinking bio-char with beetle-kill trees.

    Also, here in the West we have sun. Matching our solar sensibilities, Xcel Energy itself has committed to a pilot project of augmenting the 39 MW of coal power of the Cameo plant near Grand Junction with the steam of a new concentrating solar assembly. Even more bravely, the Electric Power Research Institute is partnering with Tri State Power and Transmission to integrate concentrating solar power into the 245 MW Escalante coal plant in Prewitt, N.M., and with the legendarily pro-coal Southern Company to do likewise for the 742 MW Mayo plant in Roxboro N.C.

    According to EPRI, these hybrid power plants will demonstrate a near-term, reliable, cost-effective way to use solar energy at commercial scale for power that is greatly cleansed of the emissions that threaten public health and climate.

    In Boulder, ironically, we often have worse air quality than Denver due to the bowl effect of our valley, in which our air is tainted with heavy metals and ozone. The American Lung Association has given Boulder a grade of "F" for ozone, which contributes so much to asthma and other chronic ailments. This Tuesday evening at the Boulder County Courthouse there is a hearing for Valmont's air permit, which is an important chance to speak to regulators about these toxins impacting our community unnecessarily as cleaner options exist.

    There is nothing exotic about converting coal plants now. It's a matter of political will and we have a chance with Valmont. The plant is a great candidate, Boulder is the right town, and Xcel is the right utility.

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    Anne's previous NewEnergyNews columns:

  • Selfishly seeking clean energy (July 12, 2009)
  • The big ka-ching in our health care wallet (June 19, 2009)
  • It takes a Governor (May 24, 2009)
  • Want a job? Think Wind. (May 10, 2009)
  • Just Say No to Xcess Energy (April 28, 2009)
  • NREL’s history of fickle funding (April 12, 2009)
  • Wagons firmly circled: Governance at REA’s and Tri-State (March 26, 2009)
  • A new migratory pattern: Colorado youth go to Washington (March 12, 2009)
  • Even coal is in for a revolution (February 22, 2009)
  • High Flyers and the Commons (February 11, 2009)
  • Come on Baby, Sit by Me (January 25, 2009)
  • A return on investment (January 3, 2009)
  • Mr. Secretary, we're watching you (December 28, 2008)
  • Canary in the Coal Mine (December 13, 2008)
  • Crash test dummies (November 16, 2008)
  • Needless markup (November 2, 2008)
  • The flap about 58 (October 19, 2008)
  • Hip towns and a clever measure (October 7, 2008)
  • Are we afraid of change? Still? (September 21, 2008)
  • Cheney in a chignon (September 7, 2008)
  • Don't tick off the blonde (August 10, 2008)
  • Buying us time on global warming (July 27, 2008)
  • Hint from Heloise - It's the pH, Stupid! (July 13, 2008)
  • Nukes: the position ridiculous and the expense damnable (June 29, 2008)

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    NOTEWORTHY IN THE MEDIA:

  • Young, Green Entrepreneurs Flock to Carbon Market, from NPR's Morning Edition: "...climate change and a billion-dollar carbon market that trades in carbon credits — as if they were pork bellies — have created a new career niche."

  • Ethical Markets TV: A remarkable TV series showcasing people who “…illustrate the triple bottom line, respecting people and the environment while earning a profit…” Part of Ethical Markets: “Your gateway to cleaner, greener 21st century economies.”

  • Energy Security and Global Warming, from Warren Olney's TO THE POINT at KCRW in Santa Monica: "US energy demands are rising as the price of oil goes through the roof...Canadian tar sands and domestic coal would provide energy security, but at the risk of increased global warming. Can renewables be developed in time?"

  • Designer Biofuels, from KQED Radio in San Francisco: "...making a gasoline alternative to run our cars has great promise but there are huge problems...The next answer [may come]...from a UC Berkeley lab, a Silicon Valley start up or...the jungles of Costa Rica."

  • HELEN’S WAR: Portrait of a Dissident, showing periodically on the Sundance Channel (click title for listings), profiles the medical doctor turned anti-nuclear activist as she continues her nearly 4-decade-old campaign to educate the public on the serious drawbacks to the development of nuclear energy.

  • A CRUDE AWAKENING: The Oil Crash, showing periodically on the Sundance Channel (click title for listings), studies the implications of world dependence on oil and declining availability of it.

  • Lee Iococa predicts the Plug-In Hybrid will be the next big thing in cars NPR’s Morning Edition: Thursday, April 26, 2007.

  • Robert Redford Presents "the GREEN": A weekly block of New Energy and Environmentally-Friendly programming. Check local listings.

  • John Rabe's OFFRAMP, Saturdays at noon (and podcasts) via NPR-affiliate KPCC-FM. A radio magazine show about Los Angeles, sometimes covering energy issues but frequently featuring John telling anybody he can about his vegetable oil-burning, converted Mercedes.

  • NOW: PBS's David Brancaccio talks with Laurie David, a producer of the Oscar-nominated documentary "An Inconvenient Truth" and a major environmental activist.
    • Stream it at your convenience here.

  • Living with Ed, an HGTV tons-of-fun reality/comedy show about the trials, tribulations, hilarity and rewards in the marriage of environmentalist Ed Begley, Jr., and his appearance-oriented actress-wife Rachelle Carson. Click here for listings

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  • My Novels: OIL IN THEIR BLOOD, The American Decades & OIL IN THEIR BLOOD, The Story of Our Addiction
  • Review of OIL IN THEIR BLOOD, The American Decades by Mark S. Friedman
  • OIL IN THEIR BLOOD, The American Decades, the second volume of Herman K. Trabish’s retelling of oil’s history in fiction, picks up where the first book in the series, OIL IN THEIR BLOOD, The Story of Our Addiction, left off. The new book is an engrossing, informative and entertaining tale of the Roaring 20s, World War II and the Cold War. You don’t have to know anything about the first historical fiction’s adventures set between the Civil War, when oil became a major commodity, and World War I, when it became a vital commodity, to enjoy this new chronicle of the U.S. emergence as a world superpower and a world oil power.
  • As the new book opens, Lefash, a minor character in the first book, witnesses the role Big Oil played in designing the post-Great War world at the Paris Peace Conference of 1919. Unjustly implicated in a murder perpetrated by Big Oil agents, LeFash takes the name Livingstone and flees to the U.S. to clear himself. Livingstone’s quest leads him through Babe Ruth’s New York City and Al Capone’s Chicago into oil boom Oklahoma. Stymied by oil and circumstance, Livingstone marries, has a son and eventually, surprisingly, resolves his grievances with the murderer and with oil.
  • In the new novel’s second episode the oil-and-auto-industry dynasty from the first book re-emerges in the charismatic person of Victoria Wade Bridger, “the woman everybody loved.” Victoria meets Saudi dynasty founder Ibn Saud, spies for the State Department in the Vichy embassy in Washington, D.C., and – for profound and moving personal reasons – accepts a mission into the heart of Nazi-occupied Eastern Europe. Underlying all Victoria’s travels is the struggle between the allies and axis for control of the crucial oil resources that drove World War II.
  • As the Cold War begins, the novel’s third episode recounts the historic 1951 moment when Britain’s MI-6 handed off its operations in Iran to the CIA, marking the end to Britain’s dark manipulations and the beginning of the same work by the CIA. But in Trabish’s telling, the covert overthrow of Mossadeq in favor of the ill-fated Shah becomes a compelling romance and a melodramatic homage to the iconic “Casablanca” of Bogart and Bergman.
  • Monty Livingstone, veteran of an oil field youth, European WWII combat and a star-crossed post-war Berlin affair with a Russian female soldier, comes to 1951 Iran working for a U.S. oil company. He re-encounters his lost Russian love, now a Soviet agent helping prop up Mossadeq and extend Mother Russia’s Iranian oil ambitions. The reunited lovers are caught in a web of political, religious and Cold War forces until oil and power merge to restore the Shah to his future fate. The romance ends satisfyingly, America and the Soviet Union are the only forces left on the world stage and ambiguity is resolved with the answer so many of Trabish’s characters ultimately turn to: Oil.
  • Commenting on a recent National Petroleum Council report calling for government subsidies of the fossil fuels industries, a distinguished scholar said, “It appears that the whole report buys these dubious arguments that the consumer of energy is somehow stupid about energy…” Trabish’s great and important accomplishment is that you cannot read his emotionally engaging and informative tall tales and remain that stupid energy consumer. With our world rushing headlong toward Peak Oil and epic climate change, the OIL IN THEIR BLOOD series is a timely service as well as a consummate literary performance.
  • Oil history journal articles by Dr. Trabish: Oil Stories and Histories
  • Review of OIL IN THEIR BLOOD, The Story of Our Addiction by Mark S. Friedman
  • "...ours is a culture of energy illiterates." (Paul Roberts, THE END OF OIL)
  • OIL IN THEIR BLOOD, a superb new historical fiction by Herman K. Trabish, addresses our energy illiteracy by putting the development of our addiction into a story about real people, giving readers a chance to think about how our addiction happened. Trabish's style is fine, straightforward storytelling and he tells his stories through his characters.
  • The book is the answer an oil family's matriarch gives to an interviewer who asks her to pass judgment on the industry. Like history itself, it is easier to tell stories about the oil industry than to judge it. She and Trabish let readers come to their own conclusions.
  • She begins by telling the story of her parents in post-Civil War western Pennsylvania, when oil became big business. This part of the story is like a John Ford western and its characters are classic American melodramatic heroes, heroines and villains.
  • In Part II, the matriarch tells the tragic story of the second generation and reveals how she came to be part of the tales. We see oil become an international commodity, traded on Wall Street and sought from London to Baku to Mesopotamia to Borneo. A baseball subplot compares the growth of the oil business to the growth of baseball, a fascinating reflection of our current president's personal career.
  • There is an unforgettable image near the center of the story: International oil entrepreneurs talk on a Baku street. This is Trabish at his best, portraying good men doing bad and bad men doing good, all laying plans for wealth and power in the muddy, oily alley of a tiny ancient town in the middle of everywhere. Because Part I was about triumphant American heroes, the tragedy here is entirely unexpected, despite Trabish's repeated allusions to other stories (Casey At The Bat, Hamlet) that do not end well.
  • In the final section, World War I looms. Baseball takes a back seat to early auto racing and oil-fueled modernity explodes. Love struggles with lust. A cavalry troop collides with an army truck. Here, Trabish has more than tragedy in mind. His lonely, confused young protagonist moves through the horrible destruction of the Romanian oilfields only to suffer worse and worse horrors, until--unexpectedly--he finds something, something a reviewer cannot reveal. Finally, the question of oil must be settled, so the oil industry comes back into the story in a way that is beyond good and bad, beyond melodrama and tragedy.
  • Along the way, Trabish gives readers a greater awareness of oil and how we became addicted to it. Awareness, Paul Roberts said in THE END OF OIL, "...may be the first tentative step toward building a more sustainable energy economy. Or it may simply mean that when our energy system does begin to fail, and we begin to lose everything that energy once supplied, we won't be so surprised."
  • Oil history journal articles by Dr. Trabish: Oil Stories and Histories

    • About Me

    Name: Herman K. Trabish
    Location: La Crescenta, CA

    *Doctor with my hands *Author of the "OIL IN THEIR BLOOD" series with my head *Student of New Energy with my heart

    View my complete profile

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    CONTACT: herman@newenergynews.net

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      A tip of the NewEnergyNews cap to Phillip Garcia for crucial assistance in the design implementation of this site. Thanks, Phillip.

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    Pay a visit to the HARRY BOYKOFF page at Basketball Reference, sponsored by NewEnergyNews and Oil In Their Blood.

  • -------------------

    • Monday, September 15, 2008

    ENERGY DEAL OR GOVERNMENT SHUTDOWN?

    All indications are that there is a deal in Congress on legislation to fund New Energy.

    Celebrations would be premature.

    Not only is the deal to bring legislation to the floor tentative, but if the deal falls apart or the legislation fails to pass this week, Republicans could shut the government down in the last week before the election season recess by refusing to pass a     continuing resolution (CR) to keep the government going if itdoes not include what they want.

    What they want is drilling.

    Rumors indicate the House of Representatives and Senate will debate and vote on the New Energy Reform Act of 2008, a measure that will allow extensive drilling for oil and gas in previously protected U.S. coastal waters. It will also extend the federal tax credits for New Energy and Energy Efficiency. And it will contain the proverbial "variety of other provisions," some of which could prove to be highly controversial.

    Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev) made statements at the end of last week’s Hurricane Ike-truncated session to the effect that “increasing consensus” on the measure is emerging.

    As reported by NewEnergyNews September 12     (See ENERGY GAMES… ), the former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich-led American Solutions “drill here, drill now” lobbying movement has been transmuted into the “drill,baby,drill” movement on behalf of the McCain Republican presidential bid and necessitated a position shift toward drilling from the Obama-led Democrats.

    The rise and impact of Gingrich’s lobbying group, as fully chronicled by Marianne Lavelle’s     Mixing Oil and Politics Is Formula for Newt’s “Solutions”, has moved the Democrats into a deal that will trade formerly-protected-area drilling privileges for a shift of budget monies from oil and gas industry subsidies to New Energy subsidies.

    Lavelle: “…if Congress voted tomorrow to lift the protections now in place on the Atlantic and Pacific coasts and the Gulf of Mexico close to Florida, it would all but certainly be a long wait for the crude to reach the gas pumps. Drilling rig shortages assure that development would be slow. The U.S. Energy Information Administration, the federal agency that compiles official government energy statistics, says there would be no impact on prices until 2030. Even then, because the amount of oil gained would be a drop in the bucket of the global market, the impact could be “insignificant,” EIA said. But Gingrich and American Solutions have pressed their case for vastly expanding the areas open to drilling…”

    click to enlarge

    The deal was reportedly brokered by the Senate’s bipartisan “Gang of 10 (subsequently 20),” a coalition of moderate Republicans and conservative Democrats that has won conciliation with its “states-rights” compromise: A protective restriction will still keep drilling outside a 100-miles-from-shore limit UNLESS a state’s legislature passes a law permitting it to come in.

    The legislatures can allow drilling even inside the once sacrosanct 50-mile limit. It is not yet clear if there remains a sacrosanct limit. Republicans want to drill inside a 12-mile limit, though they are reportedly agreeable to respecting designated marine sanctuaries.

    In addition to crucial funding for vital New Energy tax credits and other subsidies and incentives, Democrats retain all rights to revenues from the drilling (no matter what the states do or don’t allow).

    Aside from Senator Reid’s widely reported hint there is a deal afoot, there were 2 other indications the Gang of 10 is prevailing: (1) At its much ballyhooed “Senate Energy Summit” on September 12, both sides of the compromise were well represented by experts and academics, and (2) the “Gang” became 20-strong with the addition of more influential members such as Senators Elizabeth Dole (R-NC), Susan Collins (R-Me), Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn) and Evan Bayh (D-Ind).

    It is yet to be reported which party got drilling in the Alaska National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) as part of the compromise.

    Why is it too soon to join hands and sing?

    Senator Ken Salazar (D- Colo) used the Democrats’ weekly national radio address not to talk about the war in Iraq, as President Bush did in his radio talk, but to echo the party line about the pointlessness to drilling: “We consume 25 percent of the world’s oil, but we have less than 3 percent of the world’s oil reserves…We simply can’t drill our way to energy independence…Yet that was the only idea that John McCain and his friends at the Republican national convention offered…”

    This is not the conciliatory attitude of a party ready to wholeheartedly submit. It is more the guarded attitude of Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky), who expressed serious doubt about the validity of the compromise, calling it “half measures.”

    Senate Minority Whip Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.):“Is this just an opportunity for members to have a cover vote — to vote for something knowing it never becomes law?”

    Many Republicans are unwilling to sign on to the agreement as long as the revenues from drilling monies ($2.6 trillion) and from oil and gas industry subsidies ($16 billion) are used to fund New Energy. Speaker of the House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif) last week expressed a strong commitment to this part of the deal.

    Money is what the fight for New Energy and drilling will be over in the next 2 weeks and, because it is a lot of money, the fight could get bitter. No measure is likely to get out of Pelosi’s House without funding and any measure with funding from money the oil and gas industry considers its own may not beat a filibuster by the Senate’s recalcitrant minority of fossil fools.

    Finally, if all efforts at energy legislation fail, Republicans could refuse to allow a CR to pass unless it includes the expanded drilling. Depending on how the fight goes this week over energy, Democrats may be strongly opposed to including drilling in a CR.

    Without the CR, government functions could not go forward. Shutting down the government would dramatically call attention to the Republicans’ stand for more domestic drilling. Will the Democrats dare them to do it?

    Republicans refused to pass a CR in 1995, in order to call attention to their fight for a balanced budget. The move backfired, making them more unpopular. Some leaders now are disinclined to risk Senator McCain’s narrow lead with such a risky move.

    Senator Mel Martinez (R-Fla.): “Those politics are pretty well-known…No one in our caucus that I know of is seriously even uttering the word ‘shutdown.’ ”

    Other Republicans believe it would make the very point necessary for them to make to win over voters. They are talking about compromise in very strong, hostile terms.

    Sen. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.): “Any Republican would be foolish to vote for a ban on energy after this issue has been so front and center…”

    Mr. Gingrich, whose lobbying efforts on behalf of “drill, baby, drill” brought the party the current confrontation, led the 1995 shutdown. He will likely be instrumental in which way the party goes.

    It is not yet clear what Democrats will do about a fight over the CR. They are reported to be entirely focused on the coming energy legislation votes.

    What a footnote: By all reports, the national Renewable Electricity Standard (RES, aka Renewable Portfolio Standard, RPS) is still in the legislation. That’s good. On the other hand, so are multiple provisions in service to the nuclear energy industry.     (See Billions of Dollars of Nuclear Subsidies Hidden in “New Energy Reform Act of 2008” ) Not so good.

    Finally: What comes out to play on Monday morning is unlikely to bear much resemblance to what is left, if anything is, at the end of the week. Watch this space.

    click to enlarge

    Senate leader says consensus building on energy
    H. Josef Hebert, September 12, 2008 (AP via Yahoo News)
    and
    Dems fend off energy attacks
    Alexander Bolton, September 13, 2008 (The Hill)
    and
    Renewable efficient energy touted to U.S. lawmakers
    Ayesha Rascoe (w/Jim Marshall), September 12, 2008 (Reuters)
    and
    Senate Energy “gang” Grows To 20
    Martin Kady II, September 11, 2008 (Politico via CBS News)
    and
    Senate GOP wary of shutdown
    Manu Raju, September 11, 2008 (The Hill)

    WHO
    Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev); Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky); Senate Minority Whip Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.); The Gang of formerly 10, presently 20 and gathering momentum (Senators Kent Conrad, D-ND, Saxby Chambliss, R-GA, Sens. Elizabeth Dole, R-NC, Susan Collins, R-Me, Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn, Evan Bayh, D-Ind); Former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich; Academics and executives from oil, auto and other industries (Daniel Yergin, chairman, Cambridge Energy Research Associates; Frank Verrastro, director (energy and national security), Center for Strategic and International Studies)

    WHAT
    Against the background of the fight over extended drilling rights on federally protected lands and extension of the New Energy incentives and tax credits, a bipartisan Senate energy summit helped move Republicans and Democrats closer to agreement on legislation and especially on the controversial expansion of offshore oil drilling.

    WHEN
    - The Senate Summit was September 12.
    - Votes on the elements of the energy bill are expected between September 15 and 20 in both the Senate and House.
    - The continuing resolution (CR) to keep the government going in the absence of a settled appropriations bill would be passed the following week, expected to be the last week before the election season recess.
    - 1995: Republicans refused to pass a CR and shut down the government, resulting in hostility toward the party and losses in the 1996 election.

    WHERE
    Drilling for oil and gas in all federally protected lands and offshore areas of the outer continental shelf is in play. Regions of the Rocky Mountains, Alaska (the Alaska National Wildlife Refuge) and offshore areas of 4 Southeastern states (especially the Eastern Gulf of Mexico off Florida’s west coast) are of concern.

    Tom Friedman explains the gravity of the situation. From CharlieRose via YouTube.

    WHY
    - Senators discussed ideas for dealing with the energy issue in the one-day summit: New Energy, energy efficiency, increased domestic oil and gas production, volatile fuel and power prices, pending energy legislation.
    - Panelists at the summit said increasing offshore drilling would not solve all of America's energy problems and they agreed more drilling will be necessary as the nation transitions to alternative fuels.
    - Panelists at the summit encouraged Senators to invest in research and technology and make tax credits for renewable energy consistent.

    QUOTES
    - Daniel Yergin, chairman, Cambridge Energy Research Associates: "An on-again, off-again production tax credit is not a way to promote stable development of renewable energy…Uncertainty is the enemy of investment, whether for renewables and alternatives or for conventional energy."
    - Frank Verrastro, director (energy and national security), Center for Strategic and International Studies: "Eliminating fossil fuels any time soon, I would argue, is impossible because we have nothing to replace them with,"
    - Sen. Judd Gregg (R-N.H.): “Obviously, there will be an interest for getting a vote on drilling in the CR, but it’s not going to lead to any dramatic event…”

    posted by Herman K. Trabish @ 6:35 AM

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