Article Archive

Clean Power Plan Formalized

Ken Silverstein's picture
Submitted by Ken Silverstein on Mon, 2015-08-03 17:28
Can the Obama administration successfully guide its newly-formed Clean Power Plan through the legal system? While the regulation is despised by coal-related groups, others are applauding it –– calling it a huge step forward to boost both the economy and the environment.

It’s official: The Obama administration has formalized its Clean Power Plan, which now requires 32 percent carbon emissions reductions by 2030, up by two percentage points from the original plan released last summer. Next phase: outsmarting the opponents’ lawyers to achieve implementation by 2022, a mere two years later than the first draft.

To Reach Our Energy Future

Submitted by meacott on Thu, 2015-07-30 11:53
The new initiative from New York state – Reforming the Energy Vision, or “REV” – will redesign the power grid, making it more secure, efficient, resilient, and economic for electric utility customers.

As anyone knows who works in the energy industry, changes are coming in the way we generate, distribute, and use electricity.

From New York to California to Hawaii, lawmakers are calling for more renewable energy. They're welcoming new technologies into grid systems for energy management. They're encouraging formerly monopolistic and slow-moving utilities to reinvent themselves - as smart and nimble player-coaches in a newly dynamic and pluralistic energy marketplace.

Let's Have Full Disclosure on Harvard's New Health Study

Submitted by meacott on Wed, 2015-07-22 12:31
A recent health study provoked a sharp divide between advocates and contrarians on either side of the EPA’s Clean Power Plan. On one hand, no one in the major media has questioned the study’s claims. On the other hand, contrarians just want full disclosure from all the relevant parties.

As the saying goes, you get what you pay for.

That's the lesson one might well draw from the remarkable but yet not so surprising coincidences that have emerged regarding (A) the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and its "Clean Power Plan" to reduce carbon emissions from existing coal-fired power plants, and (B) an academic study released two months ago by some half-dozen PH.D's from Harvard, Syracuse University, and other schools and NGOs that purports to justify the CPP.

Energy Firms Up-In-Arms Over Congressional Treatment of Ex-Im Bank

Ken Silverstein's picture
Submitted by Ken Silverstein on Mon, 2015-07-13 14:01
If calmer heads prevail, the Ex-Im Bank should get reauthorized. However, if political mindsets rule the day, the bank will go down in flames, and take with it a number of potentially positive energy ventures.

Over the Fourth of July, American’s celebrated the birth of a nation. But in some corners, they mourned the potential death of a federal agency that has meant a lot to energy companies, especially those in the nuclear and renewable fields: the Export-Import Bank.

Actually, on June 30th, the deadlined passed for the U.S. Congress to reauthorize the agency, which makes loans to domestic businesses — both big and small — so that they can sell their wares around the globe. While the bank is now unable to make to any new loans, it still must service the existing ones it has.

Nuclear Fusion is Ideal. But How Real?

Ken Silverstein's picture
Submitted by Ken Silverstein on Mon, 2015-07-06 11:58
If scientists are ultimately able to achieve success with nuclear fusion demonstrations, the result would be the production of 10 million times more power than a typical chemical reaction, such as the burning of fossil fuels. Lockheed Martin and others are hard at work trying to do just that.

Can nuclear fusion become a reality within a decade, at least for small-scale projects? That’s the aim of Lockheed Martin, which says that its truck-sized reactor has the potential to develop safe and abundant power that could solve the issue of climate change.