Energy Industry Archive

What do Washington, D.C.’s Capitol Power Plant, an E.ON plant in Kingsnorth, England and a mine in Konin, Poland have in common? Two things: The first is coal, and the second is a problem with protesters. Coal companies and investors have long known lower profit margins lay ahead due to carbon regulations and more difficulty in getting plants permitted. But one wonders if they foresaw an...

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Obama rejects Yucca Mountain nuclear waste project — President Obama’s budget released this week removes almost all funding for the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste storage project, effectively killing a plan 20 years in the making. The administration will focus on a new strategy of how to handle waste, and the only funds spent on Yucca Mountain will be used to meet a legal requirement...

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General Motors, Ford and Chrysler are in trouble, and everyone knows it. The running assumption is that if they just clean up their acts and start making fuel-efficient vehicles, both their prospects and our energy profile will be improved. Yet the goalposts might be moving too quickly for the already-damaged companies to catch up in the game. The problem is Asia. But not the part that contains...

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The Obama administration is signaling, from more than one direction, that it is not particularly sympathetic to the country’s oil and gas industry. The President’s draft budget, first shown this week, proposes getting rid of $31.5 billion in tax breaks for the industry by lengthening amortization periods and getting rid of depletion allowances for small companies. It would also...

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The solar investment tax credit is turning out to be the bait the industry needs to keep money flowing in an economy running short on investors willing to fund renewable energy projects. When the federal tax incentives package was passed last October, which included the solar investment tax credit, there was some hand wringing over whether the inclusion of utilities would wrest business from...

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Oil companies can find a few nuggets to cheer about in the Obama energy plan. One proposal would create incentives for injecting captured industrial carbon dioxide emissions into oil reservoirs in order to improve oil recovery. This would boost domestic energy production while addressing climate change via carbon sequestration. Is this apparent win-win plan for oil companies workable? Oil...

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President Barack Obama’s personal aura tends to give his policy prescriptions a feeling of inevitability. But as the fight over the stimulus package showed, his power only extends so far. At times, the new Administration will need to make compromises, and likely bigger ones than occurred with the stimulus. Which is why climate change activists might do well to start worrying about whether...

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While San Francisco’s mayor Gavin Newsom gets plenty of attention — often national — for his renewable energy initiatives, an equally large city just to the south, San Jose, has been outspoken in its own quiet way. What that means is that it often aims its message at businesses, rather than voters and consumers. The city has long been a force in computing, and many...

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Chesapeake Energy is digging in for the long haul on shale gas as it weathers the market downturn. The one-time Wall Street darling took a rough tumble in second half of 2008, posting an $866 million net loss in the fourth quarter alone. The natural gas producer had been riding a wave spawned by the hottest drilling play in North America: shale gas. Since 2000, the company has amassed the...

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It’s not a free-for-all, yet. But more oil producers and refiners — even the ones who have dragged their feet for years — are testing the renewable energy waters. Oil companies have primarily dipped their toes into ethanol, once the bane of refiners’ existence, including Valero’s bid earlier this month for a number of ethanol plants owned by bankrupt-plagued...

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