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Heating Oil Users: Beware of Misleading Rebate System for Energy-Efficient Heating Systems
By Josh Garrett, Editor of The HEAT Zone
To his credit, President Obama has made energy-efficiency a major priority in his agenda. Between appointing Nobel Laureate Steven Chu as Energy Secretary and repeatedly voicing support for energy efficiency and green energy advancements, he has helped lay the foundation for a US “energy revolution” in the coming [...]
US and China to Collaborate on Green Energy Research and Develoment
This morning, the world’s two biggest greenhouse gas emitters, the United States and China, announced plans for a joint Clean Energy Research Center, according to the AP. Operations are set to begin by the end of 2009.
The US Department of Energy says the Center “would facilitate joint research and development on clean energy by teams [...]
Climate Change Coalition Waffles on Support for Emissions Bill
The Wall Street Journal reported on Monday that climate change legislation now working its way through Congress in the form of the American Clean Energy and Security Act (ACES) is encountering increased resistance from industry as changes are made to the bill. Some of the objections are coming from prominent members of The U.S. Climate [...]
Read More »Inadequate Electrical Grid Forces Pickens to Indefinitely Delay Massive Wind Project
Forbes reported last Wednesday that Texas oilman, T. Boone Pickens, has announced that he will delay, or perhaps cancel, plans for a giant wind energy project in the Texas panhandle.
Pickens’ project was supposed to be the largest wind power field in the world at a rated generating capacity of 1,000 megawatts per hour — about [...]
Nuclear Power Part of Dr. Chu’s Green Energy Prescription
Energy Secretary Dr. Steven Chu was one of four ranking Obama Administration officials who recently told the Senate that the United States needs more nuclear power. Together with the secretaries of Agriculture and the Interior, plus the head of the Environmental Protection Agency, Dr. Chu told the Senate’s Committee on Environment and Public Works that [...]
Read More »Under Pending Climate Bill, Handful of States Could be Biggest Winners
As the debate over the pending climate and energy bill heats up, one criticism of the legislation that has been levied extensively by Republicans and politicians from Southern and Western states is that the bill will transfer wealth from rural areas to more urban areas, or from the heartland to the coasts. For example, Michele [...]
Read More »Echoing Yesterday’s CFTC Announcement, Heads of France and Britain Call for Curbing Oil Speculation
In an opinion piece in today’s Wall Street Journal Gordon Brown, prime minister of the UK and Nicolas Sarkozy, president of France, called upon other world leaders, the oil industry and the international business community to take steps toward stabilizing oil prices worldwide for the common good.
Their article points out that for the past two [...]
Oil Prices Continue to Fall on OPEC Report, Regulation Talk
As of 9:46 am EDT, the price of crude oil had fallen by 1.3 percent to $62.11 a barrel and the price of heating oil had lost 1.3 percent.
HEAT USA Price Report
Today’s average retail heating oil price per gallon: DOWN $0.02
Morning projection (for Thursday’s average retail price per gallon): DOWN $0.01
The belief that the economic [...]
Industries Feel the Sting of Oil Price Volatility
The crude oil market has put on quite a show in the last year. Last summer, it reached record highs, topping over $145 per barrel. But just a few short months later, the price had completely bottomed out, dropping to $33 a barrel. This summer, has rebounded once again, recently reaching the $72 mark. This [...]
Read More »Heating Oil Users Would Pay Heavily Under Cap-and-Trade Law; Biofuels Could be the Solution
The Hartford Courant reported today that Connecticut, where more than half of all households use heating oil to keep warm, could bear the brunt of a broad climate change bill just approved by the U.S. House of Representatives.
The Waxman Markey bill, otherwise known as the American Clean Energy and Security Act, was approved by the [...]
Pending Energy Bill Does Little to Reduce US Foreign Oil Dependence
The Obama administration has announced, broadly speaking, two main goals for their energy policy:
• Fighting climate change
• Reducing our dependence on often-unfriendly states for oil
There are other worthy goals also behind the Administration’s policy, such as creating new jobs in the green energy sector, but the two main thrusts are fighting global warming and improving [...]
Rep. DeFazio Calls for Tax on Crude Oil Futures and Options
The Associated Press reported this month that the Obama administration is warning lawmakers that the trust fund that pays for highway construction will go broke in August unless Congress approves an infusion of as much as $7 billion to keep current projects going. Another $8 billion to $10 billion will be needed to keep the [...]
Read More »Renewable Energy Industries Face Halt in Growth When Stimulus Funds Run Out
The massive government stimulus package, a.k.a. the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA), contains billions for renewable energy development. Among the hoped-for results are reduced dependence on fossil fuels, cleaner air, and millions of jobs in new, green industries. The money is already flowing, but much remains to be distributed to companies developing solar and [...]
Read More »FutureGen “Clean Coal” Plant Loses Two Investors
Will the FutureGen clean coal project ever get off the ground?
Last month, as reported here on The HEAT Zone, the federal government has allocated $1 billion in stimulus package funds towards the creation of FutureGen, a proposed coal-fired power plant with carbon sequestration technology in Illinois. A conglomeration of energy and coal companies have also [...]
Fuel of the Future: Smaller, Safer Nuclear Power
All life on Earth depends on nuclear power. The Sun is a giant fusion furnace, and what energy on Earth doesn’t come in one way or another from the Sun comes from radioactive decay at Earth’s core. If it wasn’t for nuclear reactions, Earth would be a cold, lifeless rock. Long decried as unsafe or [...]
Read More »Algae Will Eat CO2, Produce Ethanol at Pilot Plant in Texas
The New York Times Green, Inc. blog reported on Monday that Algenol Biofuels and Dow Chemical Company are planning to build a pilot plant to produce low-cost, non-feedstock ethanol from algae on the site of a Dow plant in Freeport, Texas.
The plant already produces carbon dioxide (CO2), a key ingredient in the photosynthesis-based production [...]
Study: Health Costs Outweigh Economic Benefits of Coal in Appalachia
In asking the true price of energy, are we actually asking the price of human life? That’s what West Virginia University researcher Michael Hendryx believes, the Charleston Gazette reported on June 20th. Hendryx has published studies claiming that coal costs Appalachia five times more in early deaths than it gains from jobs, taxes, and all [...]
Read More »Fuel of the Future: Bio-Butanol from Wood as Renewable Gasoline
We have known for centuries how valuable trees are: they help us breathe, provide us with wood for shelter and can even be turned into a variety of products, like paper. But now, some investors are developing ways to turn trees into bio-butanol to help wean America off its usage of petroleum.
According to a Reuters [...]
New Tools Boost Energy Conservation, But Will Growing Demand Wipe Out Savings?
We recently looked at the nation’s aging electrical grid and the challenges involved in upgrading it to meet America’s surging power needs, now and into the future.
That post was based on a series presented on National Public Radio in April. The 10-part series also considered these questions: If we used electricity more prudently, could we [...]
Cap-and-Trade Bill Passes House by Thin Margin
A sharply divided House of Representatives narrowly passed the controversial Waxman-Markey climate change bill Friday. An early vote on the bill had been pushed by Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi who had first vowed to get it passed before the Fourth of July recess, then moved the vote to Friday.
The bill passed by the [...]
