Free Republic

The brutal, unrelenting cold that lasted for several days over the Christmas holiday froze off a sizable portion of Appalachia’s ample gas production, cutting off supply to power plants when they needed it most. Gas transmission pipelines said the gas they were promised simply didn’t show up. On the electric grid that connects Pennsylvania to 12 other states, at one point almost 25% of the capacity on the system either didn’t start up or broke while operating, leaving coal and petroleum-fired units to pick up the slack. PJM, a Valley Forge-based grid operator, is still analyzing what happened during the...

EPA filed the order "without notice to Range, without offering Range an opportunity to be heard and without disclosing the evidence on which it relied... The Justice Department filed a complaint Tuesday in a Dallas federal court against Range, contending that the company failed to comply with all provisions of the EPA order.

WASHINGTON (AP) - California Democratic lawmakers are pushing new bills to install a permanent ban against drilling for oil or gas off the state's coast. The legislation introduced in the Senate by Sens. Dianne Feinstein and Barbara Boxer and in the House by nearly all of the state's 33 House Democrats comes as other lawmakers are renewing efforts to open coastal areas to energy development. Legislation by the Republican chairman and top Democrat on the Senate Energy Committee would require the Interior Department to begin selling leases for oil and gas development in an area of the central Gulf of...