Free Republic

President Barack Obama will impose steeper cuts on greenhouse gas emissions from power plants across the country than previously expected, senior administration officials said Sunday, in what the president called the most significant step the U.S. has ever taken to fight global warming. The Obama administration is expected to finalize the RULE at a White House event on Monday, a year after proposing UNPRECEDENTED carbon dioxide limits. Obama, in a video posted on Facebook, said the limits were backed up by decades of data and facts showing that without tough action, the world will face more extreme weather and escalating...

Now that the international community plans to lift the embargo on Iranian oil, it's time for Congress to lift the one on U.S. oil. For 40 years, the United States has banned almost all exports of U.S. crude in the mistaken belief that energy independence is the same thing as energy security. The result is that U.S. oil companies are forced to sell their product at a substantial discount to prevailing international prices to U.S. refiners who then export gasoline, diesel and jet fuel at a significant profit. Congress needs to repeal this misguided federal ban so that U.S. crude...

Most of the 1.5 million electricity consumers served by the Tri-State Generation and Transmission Association probably don’t think about it. But when they wake up and flip on their light switches each morning, they can thank in significant part Tri-State’s Craig Station power plant in Moffat County, the second largest in Colorado. And that power plant can operate only thanks to hundreds of local workers digging in, not just figuratively at the plant itself, but literally at the two area surface mines — Colowyo and Trapper — that provide the plant’s coal. ... With 220 people working at Colowyo, some...

Three coal-fired power plants in West Virginia have shut down operations. Media outlets report that Appalachian Power's Kanawha River Power Station at Glasgow, the Kammer Power Station near Moundsville and the Phillip Sporn Power Station at New Haven were closed Sunday. Appalachian Power had announced in 2011 that it planned to close the plants, along with three coal-fired plants in Virginia, Ohio and Indiana. The company had said it would be cost-prohibitive to equip them to comply with new federal emission standards for mercury and other hazardous air pollutants. Another coal-fired plant in Virginia is being converted to natural gas....

One of the country's largest coal utilities will begin closing power plants next month in four states, as strict federal environmental regulations begin to kick in. The company, American Electric Power, made the announcement in a notice advising employees at the electricity stations that it plans to close six power plants in Virginia, West Virginia, Ohio and Indiana, according to news reports. The company said it plans to shutter as much as 6,000 megawatts of power plant capacity in seven states by the start of 2016. The closures were planned as far back as 2011 to comply with new pollution...

Saudi Arabia and OPEC may have dropped oil prices to stifle production in the U.S. and other competing nations, but they didn’t drop it enough to stifle the U.S. oil and gas boom from fracking, a senior expert with McKinsey and Company said in Chicago. “If the Saudis think they’re going to put U.S. shale players out of business, they’re probably not, although there will be less drilling,” Joe Quoyeser told about 125 people, mostly graduate students, at Northwestern University’s Kellogg Energy Conference on Wednesday. ”But there are other elements of oil supply that are needed to balance the market...

WASHINGTON -- In the days leading up to President Obama's veto of the Keystone XL pipeline, 14 oil tanker railroad cars derailed in West Virginia and exploded in a fiery environmental disaster. It was reported that residents in the area compared the thunderous fireball and poisonous smoke that blackened the sky to "a scene from the apocalypse" -- describing it as "something biblical, or wrath-of-God type stuff." This wasn't a rare, isolated accident. In the last several years it's become all too common across our country, as the oil industry has struggled to find ways to transport its petroleum to...

President Barack Obama will veto the Keystone XL bill if Congress passes a measure green-lighting the oil pipeline, White House press secretary Josh Earnest announced on Tuesday. Newly minted Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has scheduled a vote on the Keystone XL pipeline project as the first of the new Congress. The bill has some bipartisan support, but environmentalists and progressives have heavily lobbied the White House to oppose the pipeline.... Earnest added that the White House reviewed the text of the bill to authorize the pipeline on Monday....

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi's choice for a powerful committee position was defeated by the Democratic conference on Wednesday, a rare intra-party setback for the Californian. Rep. Frank Pallone (D-NJ) won in a 100-90 caucus vote to be ranking member of the Energy & Commerce Committee, according to two Democrats in the room.

BEGIN TRANSCRIPT RUSH: Okay. I mentioned the plummeting oil price, and there are a lot of people trying to figure out, why is this happening? There are a lot of people that do not understand what it is that's driving down the crude oil price. What explains it? When it happens and it's a mystery, people look to traditional explanations, "Well, are people driving less? Is the demand for gasoline down? The economy bad? What's going on?" And in this case that's not the answer The simple explanation for much, not at all, but for much of the drop in...

The rules put in place by the Obama administration’s Environmental Protection Agency have dealt a severe blow to the economy of the Appalachian region. The most recent proposal could be the death knell if they are enacted. More than 500 active and retired coal miners from West Virginia and other parts of Appalachia delivered that message to Washington Tuesday. The protest is the most recent demonstration against the clean power rule which would change the rules for emissions on existing coal fired power plants in the United States. The rally, led by the United Mine Workers Union, called on the...

Former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin said in a phone interview with Alaska Dispatch News on Tuesday that she plans to speak out against oil company-funded efforts to maintain the oil tax structure put in place in January. “I don’t want Alaskans to be deceived,” she said.

This Independence Day weekend, drivers won't see any relief from high gas prices. Although prices retreated by a fraction of a cent at the beginning of the week, AAA predicts holiday travelers will pay the most at the pump since 2008. In its monthly gas price report released June 30, AAA said, "With Independence Day only a few days away, today's national average price of gas is $3.68 per gallon. This average is considerably more expensive than recent years for the holiday. The national average on July 4 in previous years was: $3.48 (2013); $3.34 (2012); $3.57 (2011); $2.74 (2010);...

NEW YORK (AP) — Companies are taking advantage of new ways to export oil from the U.S. despite government restrictions, and in the process helping the U.S. become an ever bigger exporter of petroleum on the world stage. The Obama Administration has opened the door to more exports — without changing policy — by allowing some light oils to be defined as petroleum products like gasoline or diesel, which are not subject to export restrictions. Although U.S. production has boomed in recent years, the nation still consumes far more crude oil than it produces and remains heavily dependent on imports....

Supporters of the Keystone XL pipeline have found a new talking point: Iraq Violence exploding in one of the world's largest oil-producing nations is ricocheting in the debate over U.S. energy policy. Backers of the pipeline, which would run from Alberta, Canada, to Texas, are pointing to the crisis in Iraq as a rationale for pushing the project forward. Often billed as a possible component for supplying the U.S.'s voracious energy markets with crude oil, TransCanada's long-delayed $5.3 billion pipeline has been mired in delays for six years. On Wednesday, the Senate Energy and Natural Resources committee voted 12-10 to...

Well it seems the President is still trying to keep up appearances. This week the Obama administration completed the installation of new solar panels on top of the White House. It was almost 30 years ago that Reagan removed the solar panels that Jimmy Carter had built on top of the president’s residence, but shockingly enough, President Obama has once again ruined everything Reagan created. This is a reminder to the American people that President Obama is supposed to be a big proponent of stopping climate change. According to a White House spokesman, “Continuing President Obama’s commitment to lead by...

At $3.67, US Regular gasoline prices are their highest since March 2013 having risen over 12% (40c) in the last 2 months. This must be great news, right? It must mean world demand is picking up and driving up prices of crude oil as global trade soars (amid a collapsing Baltic Dry and decelerating Chinese growth). This can't be related to "war premia" right? - as we noted here - because stocks (which always know best) have discounted all this tomfoolery. However, as the following chart shows, each time gas prices have surged up toards the Maginot Line of $3.80,...

Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter joined nine other Nobel Peace Laureates in sending a strongly worded letter to President Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry, urging them not to approve construction of the Keystone XL Pipeline. The letter opened as follows: "You stand on the brink of making a choice that will define your legacy on one of the greatest challenges humanity has ever faced – climate change. As you deliberate the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline, you are poised to make a decision that will signal either a dangerous commitment to the status quo, or bold leadership that...

The average price for a kilowatthour (KWH) of electricity hit a March record of 13.5 cents, according data released yesterday by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. That was up about 5.5 percent from 12.8 cents per KWH in March 2013. ... The BLS’s seasonally adjusted electricity price index rose to 209.341 this March, the highest it has ever been, up 10.537 points—or 5.3 percent--from 198.804 in March 2013. ... per capita electricity production peaked in the United States in 2007.

Worst. Venture capitalist. Ever: -snip- My mistake. He’s not a venture capitalist. They use their own money. He’s just a typical Marxist. No idea about business but freely wastes everyone else’s money.