Report Finds Pipeline Oversight Wanting

By DAN FROSCH April 30, 2012, 3:30 pm

A report issued on Monday by the National Wildlife Federation asserts that federal laws regulating oil pipelines are inadequate in several crucial areas and that local regulations do not provide sufficient protection against safety and environmental risks.

The report, which focuses on the Great Lakes region, said that current federal rules do not take into account the long-term risks and environmental impacts of new pipeline routes.

It also found that the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration, which oversees pipelines in the United States, gives companies too much discretion in how they manage their own pipelines.

“We concluded that current laws leave the door open to future spills,” said Sara Gosman, an adjunct professor at the University of Michigan Law School who researched pipeline regulation and wrote the report with three law students.“Oil pipelines are out of sight, but that doesn’t mean the risks of these pipelines should be out of mind.”

To read the entire article go to: http://green.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/04/30/report-finds-pipeline-oversight-wanting/?ref=energy-environment

Energy Transfer Partners to Buy Sunoco for $5.3 Billion

By TOM FOWLER and BEN LEFEBVRE Updated April 30, 2012, 5:55 p.m. ET

Energy Transfer Partners LP, which operates natural-gas pipelines, will pay $5.3 billion to acquire refiner Sunoco Inc. in a deal that would expand its pipeline system into the more lucrative oil sector.

Energy Transfer is trying to build an oil-transportation business and cut its exposure to the natural-gas industry, where overproduction has helped push prices to 10-year lows.

The key assets for Energy Transfer in the deal are Sunoco's 7,900 miles of crude-oil and refined-fuel pipelines, which will give the Dallas-based company a toehold in the Marcellus and Utica Shale regions in Pennsylvania and Ohio. Those areas are becoming important sources of oil and "gas liquids" such as butane and propane, which fetch higher prices than natural gas. Energy Transfer currently has gas-liquids pipelines but not oil pipelines.

To read the entire article go to: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702303916904577375711419983308.html?mod=WSJ_Energy_leftHeadlines

Offshore drilling regulator lays out agenda for OTC

Posted on May 1, 2012 at 8:15 am by Jennifer A. Dlouhy

The nation’s top offshore drilling regulator today laid out an ambitious agenda for his agency, including plans to issue new mandates for emergency equipment and update decades-old regulations governing oil and gas production safety systems.

Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement Director James Watson said in prepared remarks that he anticipated proposing the new rules later this year. That puts the agency on a faster track than Watson’s predecessor, Michael Bromwich, outlined a year ago.

Instead of issuing an “advance notice of proposed rulemaking” and then spending months soliciting public comments about the scope of the potential mandates before unveiling them, Watson said he expects his agency to quickly issue draft rules.

To read the entire article go to: http://fuelfix.com/blog/2012/05/01/offshore-drilling-regulator-lays-out-agenda-for-otc/

Utilities Give Coal the Heave-Ho

Power Plants Abandon Longtime Staple for Generating Electricity as Price of Natural Gas Plummets

By REBECCA SMITH Updated April 30, 2012, 6:57 p.m. ET

U.S. electric utilities are renegotiating coal contracts and finding other ways to reduce coal deliveries as a mild winter and competition from less-expensive natural gas combine to weaken demand for power plants' longtime staple fuel.

Coal consumption by power generators fell 18.8% in the fourth quarter from the preceding quarter and 9.4% from the fourth quarter of 2010, the Energy Information Administration said last week.

The agency hasn't calculated first-quarter coal use yet. But utilities have indicated that they are shifting power production to natural gas, the price of which recently dipped below $2 per million British thermal units, roughly half what it was a year ago.

Xcel Energy Inc, which owns utilities in eight states, typically entered into advance coal contracts sufficient to meet the company's entire annual need. Now, "we're keeping a more open position" because Xcel is using less coal and more natural gas, said Susan Arigoni, the company's vice president of fuels. The Minneapolis-based company said it expects to leave about one-fifth of its anticipated coal purchases open—taking its chances on short-term market prices—to preserve the option of buying other fuels.

To read the entire article go to: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304868004577376311839047378.html?mod=WSJ_Energy_leftHeadlines

Duke Takes Big Charge for Plant

By REBECCA SMITH April 30, 2012, 9:49 p.m. ET

Duke Energy Corp. said it would take a $420 million charge for cost overruns at its Edwardsport coal gasification plant in Indiana, one of the costliest fossil-fuel generating stations ever built.

The company also announced a settlement agreement that would allow it to pass on to its customers $2.6 billion of the plant's expected $3.3 billion cost, if state utility regulators approve the deal. Duke, which previously took $265 million in charges for the plant, said rates would rise 9.6% on top of an earlier 5% increase attributable to the plant.

The plant is 99% complete and is expected to be put into service this fall.

The settlement agreement has the support of the state agency that represents ratepayers, a group representing industrial customers and Nucor Steel-Indiana, a large customer. Previously, they had recommended that Duke's cost recovery be held to about $2 billion, which would have forced the utility to absorb the remainder of the cost.

To read the entire article go to: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304868004577376561741164728.html?mod=WSJ_Energy_leftHeadlines

TransCanada Pipeline To Eastern Canada? CEO Mulling Plan That Could Lower Oil Prices In Canada

CP |  Posted: 04/29/2012 11:14 am Updated: 04/29/2012 11:14 am

CALGARY -- The CEO of TransCanada Corp. confirmed Friday that the company is in the early stages of weighing a plan to ship Western Canadian crude to eastern refineries that currently rely on expensive imports from overseas.

"We have a lot of work to do technically. We have a lot of work to do in conversations with our shippers. But at the 30,000-foot level, it seems to make sense to people,'' Russ Girling told reporters following the pipeline and utility company's annual general meeting.

"So we're going to actively pursue it and see if we can turn it into an opportunity for both the oil and gas industry and for TransCanada.''

Eastern Canadian refiners have asked TransCanada whether it's feasible to send Western Canadian crude their way so that they don't have to buy a raw product based on higher international prices.

To read the entire article go to: http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2012/04/29/transcanada-pipeline-eastern-canada_n_1462597.html?ref=green&ir=Green

BP Expects to Spend $4 Billion a Year in Gulf

By ISABEL ORDÓÑEZ And ÁNGEL GONZÁLEZ April 30, 2012, 1:26 p.m. ET

HOUSTON—After self-examination following the April 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill, BP PLC decided not to leave the Gulf of Mexico and opted instead to increase investment as part of its renewed commitment to the region, a company executive said Monday.

"After much soul-searching in the fall of 2010, we concluded it would be wrong to walk away," BP Executive Vice President Bernard Looney said in a presentation at the Offshore Technology Conference here. "We would have been walking away not only from our past, but from a key component of our future."

BP is planning to add three drilling rigs in the Gulf by the end of the year, bringing the total number to eight, more than the company had before the oil spill, Mr. Looney said. BP also plans to spend $4 billion in the Gulf this year and expects to spend at the same level for years to come, he said.

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Exxon Cleaning Up Oil Spilled From Louisiana Pipeline

By ÁNGEL GONZÁLEZ April 30, 2012, 1:06 p.m. ET

HOUSTON—Exxon Mobil Corp. said Monday it was cleaning up oil that spilled from a company pipeline in rural Louisiana.

An estimated 1,900 barrels of oil from the North Line crude pipeline were contained in the immediate vicinity of the spill, and there were no injuries reported, Exxon said. Also, air-quality monitoring detected "no danger to the public," although further checks are ongoing, the Irving, Texas, company said. The cleanup started Sunday, using vacuum trucks to collect the oil.

The cause of the spill was still being investigated, the company said. The pipeline was shut down after Exxon detected a loss of pressure on Saturday night.

To read the entire article go to: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702303916904577376052971265394.html?mod=WSJ_Energy_leftHeadlines

Will Oil Extraction Harm Western Parks?

By HILLARY ROSNER April 30, 2012, 10:11 am

As the public comment period ends this week on a proposal to develop oil shale and oil sands in vast areas of the Rocky Mountain West, conservationists are making a stand on behalf of the area’s national parks. The National Parks Conservation Association, a 90-year-old organization, is concerned that eight national parks and monuments are at risk from energy development of this type and scale.

The Bureau of Land Management is considering whether to open roughly 2.3 million acres of land in Colorado, Utah, and Wyoming to these two types of energy development, both highly controversial because of their environmental impacts. Oil shale is fossilized algae trapped inside rock that must be mined, ground up and heated to 900 degrees Fahrenheit to yield oil. Oil sands contain bitumen, a heavy black viscous oil that is extracted through open pit mining. Both types of production involve intensive use of water, a scarce resource in the region.

To read the entire article go to: http://green.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/04/30/will-oil-extraction-imperil-western-parks/?ref=energy-environment

Nuclear Safety Advocates Accuse Industry And Regulators Of Foot-Dragging On Basic Safety Measure

Posted: 04/30/2012 1:19 pm Updated: 04/30/2012 2:10 pm

From her home, Mary Lampert, 70, has a clear view of the Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station, which sits just across the Duxbury and Plymouth Bays in coastal Massachusetts. The proximity, Lampert says, lends itself to a good deal of contemplating "what ifs." Among these: what if the Pilgrim plant experienced a meltdown like the one that unfolded just over a year ago in Fukushima, Japan?

"I live just six miles from that plant across open water," says Lampert, a staunch advocate for tougher oversight of the nuclear power industry. "It always comes down to public safety versus the cost to industry of implementing something."

So it has been, Lampert argues, with one seemingly straightforward emergency feature: Requiring a filtered vent in the concrete containment buildings surrounding nuclear reactors like the one at Pilgrim.

To read the entire article go to: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/04/30/nuclear-safety-advocates-_n_1464812.html?ref=green