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Crucial week for GOP tax push, spending
The pressures to maintain the final bill’s total cost within the limits allowed under the process of budget reconciliation adds another layer of pressure on conferees as they sort out a number of lower-tier energy issues. The House’s decision to reopen the terms of a 2015 tax deal that extended key renewable breaks, as well as other energy provisions, ensures those will be sticking points in the talks. The House bill reduces the value of the renewable production tax credit by nearly a third, for $12 billion in savings. [ read more … ]
Trump’s Plan to Bail Out Coal May Be Unraveling Under New Regulator
The Trump administration, which was looking to have a plan in place by next week to bail out America’s coal country, will instead have to wait until the new year. Kevin McIntyre, sworn in Thursday as chairman of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, asked for a 30-day extension to act on a sweeping proposal by Energy Secretary Rick Perry that would subsidize struggling coal and nuclear plants. Perry, who had called on the commission to come up with a plan by Dec. 11, granted the delay late Friday, saying he “respects the reasons” but “looked forward to swift action.” [ read more … ]
FERC requests more time on Perry grid proposal
Federal Energy Regulatory Commission Chairman Kevin McIntyre asked the Department of Energy yesterday for 30 more days to review DOE’s controversial grid-pricing proposal. Acting in the immediate wake of his swearing in as FERC chief, McIntyre requested that DOE give the commission a month beyond the original Dec. 11 deadline to work on the plan, citing a high volume of comments and his and Democrat Richard Glick’s recent arrivals on the five-member commission. [ read more … ]
An American energy plan straight from coal country
Robert E. Murray, founder of Murray Energy and a major Trump supporter, presented a four-page “action plan” to rescue the coal industry. The plan said that commissioners at three independent regulatory agencies “must be replaced,” Environmental Protection Agency staff slashed, and safety and pollution rules “overturn[ed],” according to photos and documents seen by The Washington Post. [ read more … ]
FERC needs better data on capacity market, GAO says
The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission should do a better job assessing the performance of capacity markets, the Government Accountability Office said in a report released yesterday. Four out of the seven grid operators that FERC oversees use capacity markets, which are designed to provide financial incentives to operate enough power plants to match consumer demand. The capacity markets are meant to address the fact that revenue from energy and ancillary service markets might not be sufficient to cover the costs of some plant owners. [ read more … ]
Massachusetts doubles investment in energy storage
Massachusetts will invest $20 million in 26 energy storage projects, Gov. Charlie Baker (R) announced yesterday, more than doubling the Bay State’s previous commitment to storage. The state grants are part of an initiative that aims to see 200 megawatts of storage capacity installed across the commonwealth by 2020. Massachusetts originally committed to providing $10 million to finance pilot projects [ read more … ]
U.S. EPA chief says may launch public climate debate in January
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency could launch a public debate about climate change as soon as January, administrator Scott Pruitt said on Thursday, as the agency continued to unwind Obama-era initiatives to fight global warming. The agency had been working over the last several months to set up a “red team, blue team” debate on the science relating to manmade climate change to give the public a “real-time review of questions and answers around this issue of CO2,” Pruitt said. [ read more … ]
Pruitt discredits non-agency science. That claim lost in court
Pruitt told members of the House Energy and Commerce Committee that the agency’s endangerment finding — its 2009 determination that carbon dioxide emissions pose a threat to public health and welfare — relied on “borrowed” work from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. He said the finding’s overall process had been “short-shrifted.” In fact, the endangerment finding was informed not only by reports from the IPCC, but also from the U.S. Global Change Research Program, U.S. Climate Change Science Program and National Research Council, as well as studies and reports from other independent research grou [ read more … ]
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