Budget & Policy

John Tombari stepped down from his role as president of Schlumberger Carbon Services this week after serving in a leadership capacity since the group’s inception seven years ago. 

Despite what appeared to be growing momentum in some policy circles in support of a carbon tax, both the White House and Congress backed away from the issue this week. 

Tamar Hallerman and Lindsay Kalter GHG Monitor 11/30/12 IN CONGRESS The House Energy and Commerce Committee this week announced its leadership for the next Congress, and most of the key posts related to the Department of Energy in the Committee will continue to be filled by the same lawmakers. Fred Upton (R-Mich.) will remain the […]

Tamar Hallerman GHG Monitor 11/30/12 AT KEMPER: TWO REPORTS CONTEST STATE OF PROJECT’S PROGRESS Two reports released in as many weeks have contested the level of progress Mississippi Power has reported in recent months on its Kemper County Integrated Gasification Combined Cycle project. Both analyses—one commissioned by project opponent the Sierra Club and the other […]

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s Institute for 21st Century Energy emphasized the potential economic and energy security benefits associated with further utilizing enhanced oil recovery in a report released this week. 

The Environmental Protection Agency recently proposed easing some compliance requirements for mercury and other emissions from new coal- and oil-fired power plants under a partial reconsideration of its Mercury and Air Toxics Standards. 

The Department of Energy’s Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy is shelling out more than $10 million for a new round of carbon capture technology development projects, the Department announced this week, including $3 million to formulate a material that can convert captured CO2, sunlight and water into fuel. 

The National Energy Technology Laboratory last week approved the testing of a post-combustion membrane capture technology on the world’s largest scale to date. 

Tamar Hallerman GHG Monitor 12/7/12 IN CONGRESS Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.), one of the Senate’s most prominent climate change skeptics, said he will continue to use the Congressional Review Act (CRA) in the new Congress to kill Environmental Protection Agency regulations primarily aimed at cutting emissions the nation’s coal fleet. In remarks on the Dec. […]

Even as low natural gas prices continue to drive out coal-fired generation, coal will remain the dominant fuel for electricity production through 2040, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration’s Annual Energy Outlook 2013. 

The Natural Resources Defense Council released a proposal this week aimed at compelling the Obama Administration to reel in carbon emissions from existing power plants under Clean Air Act authority. 

A California state senator reintroduced legislation this week aimed at clarifying subsurface pore space ownership and patching regulatory gaps for the permitting of carbon capture and storage projects within the state. 

Assistant Secretary for Fossil Energy Chuck McConnell said he is preparing the Department of Energy’s Office of Fossil Energy for the impending fiscal cliff in a manner similar to the way he has managed operations under recent temporary budget measures. 

Tamar Hallerman GHG Monitor 12/14/12 IN CONGRESS Recently-elected Senate Democrats Martin Heinrich (N.M.) and Mazie Hirono (Hawaii) will be joining the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee in the new Congress, the party’s Senate leadership said this week. The Democratic Steering Committee, the panel in charge of making committee assignments for the party, also confirmed […]

Tamar Hallerman GHG Monitor 12/14/12 AT TCEP: FINANCIAL CLOSE PUSHED BACK TO Q2 2013 Developers of the Texas Clean Energy Project (TCEP) had hoped to declare financial close on their 340 MW integrated gasification combined cycle project by the end of the year, but that decision will likely get pushed to the second quarter of […]

Officials from ExxonMobil Corp. this week clarified that the company conditionally supports a carbon tax only if lawmakers are looking for an approach to price carbon but clarified that the oil and gas giant is not actively lobbying for the cause. 

A federal appeals court this week tossed out a lawsuit from utility industry petitioners aimed at shooting down the Environmental Protection Agency’s proposed greenhouse gas performance standards for new fossil fuel-fired power plants. 

Seattle-based development company Summit Power Group is planning to announce two new carbon capture, utilization and storage projects in west Texas that will use a business model similar to its Texas Clean Energy Project.

A key ruling expected next week from Illinois utility regulators could seal the fate for the Department of Energy’s flagship FutureGen 2.0 project. 

The end of 2012 brings to a close a year that in more ways than one tested the vitality of carbon capture and storage technology—a sluggish economic recovery, budget cuts, competition from other clean energy technologies and project delays challenged the industry worldwide. 

12/21/12 As is our annual practice, GHG Monitor will not publish next week in observance of the December holidays. The next regular issue will be in your inbox Jan. 4. As always, we will publish a special issue should any major news break in the interim.    

Tamar Hallerman GHG Monitor 12/21/12 AT DOE The U.S. has at least 2,400 billion metric tons worth of potential CO2 storage resources in saline formations, oil and gas reservoirs and unmineable coal seams, the National Energy Technology Laboratory concluded this week. In its atlas of the country’s carbon utilization and storage resources released on Dec. […]

Tamar Hallerman GHG Monitor 12/21/12 AT BOUNDARY DAM: CENOVUS TO PURCHASE ALL OF PLANT’S CO2 SaskPower said this week that it signed a 10-year contract with Cenovus Energy for the regional oil company to purchase all of the CO2 captured at Unit 3 of its Boundary Dam facility currently undergoing retrofit work in southeast Saskatchewan. […]

Six months after a widely-circulated article from two Stanford geophysicists argued that carbon storage triggers earthquakes and should not be widely deployed, a trio of Massachusetts Institute of Technology professors have published a letter defending the safety record of the technology.

The Environmental Protection Agency finalized revisions to its emissions standards for industrial boilers, incinerators and cement kilns late this week. 

Moving to comply with a federal court order, the Environmental Protection Agency tightened air quality standards for fine particulate matter pollution late last week from 15 to 12 micrograms per cubic meter. 

The Illinois Commerce Commission this week approved a power procurement plan for the state that requires utilities to purchase all of the electricity generated at the FutureGen 2.0 facility for 20 years, handing the FutureGen Alliance a key victory. 

The head of the Department of Energy’s ‘clean coal’ program is leaving the Department Dec. 21 to return to the private sector, where he has spent most of his career. 

Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lisa Jackson announced last week that she will soon be stepping down from her position, ending a four-year tenure marked by the implementation of landmark controls on coal-fired generation that frequently placed the agency at odds with industry and Congressional Republicans. 

Rep. Ed Markey (D-Mass.), one of the House’s most outspoken supporters of pricing carbon emissions to stymie climate change, announced late last week that he plans to run in a special election for the Senate seat to be vacated by Democrat John Kerry.