Budget & Policy

Researchers in the West Permian Basin are gearing up to release one of the only publicly-available studies to date on the state of oil extraction operations from water-saturated deposits in the region using CO2 flooding. 

The Department of Energy announced this week that it is allocating a total of $7 million in one-year grants to support research into eight oxy-combustion capture technologies.

Lindsay Kalter GHG Monitor 07/27/12 AT HECA: NEW COAL PLANTS DIFFICULT TO BUILD IN CALIF., EXPERTS SAY Hydrogen Energy California’s (HECA) ability to gain significant public support for its new-build poly-generation carbon capture and storage project in Kern County, Calif. is yet to be seen, according to some experts in the state, with transportation-sector concerns […]

Tamar Hallerman GHG Monitor 07/27/12 IN CONGRESS Lawmakers on the House Energy and Commerce Energy and Power Subcommittee approved a bill this week that would essentially wind down the Department of Energy’s loan guarantee program. The “No More Solyndras Act,” which was reported out of the subcommittee largely on a party-line vote, would bar DOE […]

Political debate surrounding the possibility of a federal tax on carbon has resurfaced here in Washington in recent weeks following a closed-door meeting hosted by the conservative think tank the American Enterprise Institute. 

As the country’s two remaining integrated gasification combined cycle coal plants under construction continue to face hurdles surrounding substantial cost overruns, developers of a new wave of IGCC projects with carbon capture and storage argue that they have found a way to skirt those issues—by producing sellable products beyond exclusively electricity. 

Coal company and utility executives testifying at a House Energy and Power Subcommittee field hearing this week said that proposed Environmental Protection Agency performance standards for new fossil fuel-fired units will disincentivize companies from investing in carbon capture and storage because the technology is not yet developed enough to be cost-competitive with natural gas. 

Lindsay Kalter and Tamar Hallerman GHG Monitor 07/20/12 AT HECA: PROJECT’S WATER USE, EMISSIONS CONCERN LOCAL RESIDENTS Residents of Kern County, Calif., raised concerns about water use and the effects of potential emissions related to the proposed Hydrogen Energy California (HECA) poly-generation carbon capture and storage project last week at a public hearing on the […]

Tamar Hallerman GHG Monitor 07/20/12 AT EPA The White House recently weakened the Environmental Protection Agency’s proposed standard for fine particulates emissions under 2.5 micrometers in diameter (PM 2.5), the Washington Post reported this week. The newspaper said that a Freedom of Information Act request yielded documents that said EPA originally sought to set a […]

Several researchers presenting at the National Energy Technology Laboratory’s CO2 Capture Technology Meeting here this week touted enzyme-induced carbon capture technology as a promising way to help decrease costs and increase efficiencies in post-combustion capture systems. 

A nearly $50 million Department of Energy investment in ‘high-risk, high-reward’ carbon capture technologies is yielding fruit as smaller-scale R&D and pilot work wraps up for many projects, one department official said here.

Some highly durable advanced materials developed for the international space station and other aeronautic purposes have the potential to be applied terrestrially for processes like carbon capture, according to the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. 

A recent Congressional Budget Office report that questions the trajectory of the Department of Energy’s investments in carbon capture and storage technologies “underestimates” the Office of Fossil Energy’s CCS program, according to DOE Deputy Assistant Secretary for Clean Coal Jim Wood. 

Tamar Hallerman GHG Monitor 07/13/12 AT KEMPER: MISS. POWER SEES MORE COST OVERRUNS, FILES SUIT Mississippi Power continues to face an uphill battle politically in order to get its 582 MW Kemper County integrated gasification combined cycle plant built on schedule and on budget, with a new report this week indicating that the project has […]

07/13/12 A July 6 story in GHG Monitor (Vol. 7 Issue 28) incorrectly refers to Southern Company’s Plant Barry facility in Bucks, Ala., as the host site for the Department of Energy’s National Carbon Capture Center. The NCCC is housed near Alabama Power’s Gaston power plant in Wilsonville, Ala. GHG Monitor regrets this error. 

The Department of Energy is looking to more formally shift the focus of its regional carbon sequestration partnerships away from the geologic sequestration of CO2 in saline aquifers and toward enhanced oil recovery, a move that, if implemented, could continue a trend that has increasingly characterized the partnerships and DOE’s demonstration program in recent years. 

The Department of Energy’s current carbon capture and storage program is unlikely to help advance the widespread deployment of the technology unless the federal government enacts other policies to incentivize utilities to limit greenhouse gas emissions, according to a Congressional Budget Office analysis.

Rep. Mike Pompeo and Environmental Protection Agency Assistant Administrator for Air and Radiation Gina McCarthy sparred last week over the implications of EPA banking on the commercialization of carbon capture and sequestration technology under its recently proposed performance standards for new fossil fuel-fired power plants. 

Researchers examining the effects of a simulated underwater CO2 leak on marine life ecosystems off the west coast of Scotland are calling initial release operations a “success,” reporting that the CO2 behaved as the team expected. 

Rep. Bobby Rush expressed hope late last week that a recent federal appeals court ruling upholding various Environmental Protection Agency regulations related to emissions from stationary sources and the transportation sector will prompt Republicans to work more with Democrats on clean air issues. 

Tamar Hallerman GHG Monitor 07/06/12 AT KEMPER: CREDIT RATINGS AGENCY DOWNGRADES MISS. POWER Fitch Ratings has downgraded Mississippi Power’s credit rating following a state Public Service Commission (PSC) ruling last month to deny the utility a rate increase to pay for its 582 MW Kemper County integrated gasification combined cycle plant. Fitch downgraded Mississippi Power […]

Tamar Hallerman GHG Monitor 07/06/12 IN CONGRESS A group of nearly a dozen senators signed a letter to President Obama late last week asking him to issue an executive order extending the compliance period for the Environmental Protection Agency’s mercury and air toxics rule by two years. The group of Republicans and moderate Democrats, mainly […]

Proponents of carbon capture and storage this week argued that the industry already has protections in place limiting the potential for the technology to spur seismic events such as earthquakes, a fact they say weakens many of the conclusions presented in two recently published papers on the topic. 

In a landmark ruling that handed a major victory to the Obama Administration and its climate policies, a federal appeals court this week upheld the Environmental Protection Agency’s determination that greenhouse gases are a danger to public health. 

Sens. Lamar Alexander and Mark Pryor co-wrote a letter to President Obama this week urging him to codify an extension to the compliance period for the Environmental Protection Agency’s mercury regulations. 

The House Appropriations Committee reported out a Fiscal Year 2013 Interior and Environment Appropriations bill that slices deeply into climate change programs, proposing a cut of more than $100 million, or 29 percent, across several government agencies. 

Skyonic Corporation has received $9 million from industry giants BP, ConocoPhillips, Northwater Capital and PVS Chemicals as part of a $35 million investment in its for-profit carbon capture project, the company announced this week. 

The Environmental Protection Agency this week proposed delaying pollution standards for the Portland cement manufacturing industry by an additional two years and loosening emissions targets, in a move celebrated by industry and criticized by environmental groups. 

House Energy and Power Subcommittee Chairman Ed Whitfield said this week that the Environmental Protection Agency failed to take into account the effect of its recently proposed fine particulate standards on the economy, despite agency claims that most counties are already in compliance with the rulemaking. 

Tamar Hallerman GHG Monitor 06/29/12 AT KEMPER: PSC DENIES RATE INCREASE TO COVER CAPITAL COSTS The Mississippi Public Service Commission late last week denied a rate increase request from Mississippi Power to help pay for construction costs on its 582 MW Kemper County integrated gasification combined cycle project. In an unexpected move at its June […]