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Gasoline Prices Could Be Pretty Low This Summer — Except for One Thing
The American oil refining business is a national colossus, with almost 130 facilities taking in some 16 million barrels of crude oil per day and turning it into nearly 10 million barrels of gasoline and 5 million barrels of diesel. And unlike some past years, inventories are looking pretty good heading into this summer. While they’re lower than the five-year average, gasoline supplies are still higher than where they were a year ago, and refineries are a ways away from running at their peak capacity. According to the forecasters at GasBuddy, we’re looking at relatively mild summertime prices of...
It Took More Than 4 Days to Put Out This Battery Fire
A fire at a battery storage site in San Diego County appears to have been extinguished after burning on and off for multiple days and nights.“There is no visible smoke or active fire at the scene,” Cal Fire, the state fire protection agency, said in an update Monday morning.The fire started sometime Wednesday at the Gateway Energy Storage facility, a 250 megawatt battery electric storage system in Otay Mesa, which is immediately adjacent both to the eastern border of San Diego and to the northern border of Mexico and near the Richard J. Donovan state prison facility.Firefighters first succeeded...
How Worried Should We Be About Hail?
Current conditions: Flooding killed nearly 100 people in Afghanistan over the weekend • Streets turned into rivers in southern Germany after heavy rain • It’s 110 degrees Fahrenheit in Delhi today, and the rest of the week will be hotter.THE TOP FIVE1. Hail damage is making insurers nervous Hail damage accounted for between 50% and 80% of the $64 billion in insured storm costs worldwide last year, according to international reinsurance firm Swiss Re. As storms become more frequent and more severe due to climate change, insurers are beginning to factor hail into their risk assessments on policies, Bloomberg...
The Electrolyzer Tech Business Is Booming
While the latest hydrogen hype cycle may be waning, investment in the fundamental technologies needed to power the green hydrogen economy is holding strong. This past week, two major players in the space secured significant funding: $100 million in credit financing for Massachusetts-based Electric Hydrogen and $111 million for the Australian startup Hysata’s Series B round. Both companies manufacture electrolyzers, the clean energy-powered devices that produce green hydrogen by splitting water molecules apart. “There is greater clarity in the marketplace now generally about what's required, what it takes to build projects, what it takes to actually get product out there,”...
Car Companies Are Energy Companies Now
It was my first truck-powered cocktail party. General Motors had gathered journalists at a Beverly Hills mansion last week for a vehicle-to-home show and tell. GM’s engineers outfitted the garage with all the components needed for an electric vehicle’s battery to back up the house’s power supply. Then they tripped the circuit breaker to cut off the home from grid power and let the plugged-in Chevy Silverado electric pickup run the home’s lights and other electrical systems for the remainder of the gathering. V2H tech, as it’s known, will be available in the top-of-the-line Silverado EV First-Edition RST that will begin...
What To Know About Biden’s Coal Lease Crackdown
Current conditions: Rain and cool temperatures are stalling wildfires in an oil-producing region of Canada • A record-setting May heat wave in Florida will linger through the weekend • It is 77 degrees Fahrenheit and sunny in Rome today, where the Vatican climate conference will come to a close.THE TOP FIVE1. Severe storms in Houston kill 4 At least four people were killed in Houston last night when severe storms tore through Texas. Wind speeds reached 100 mph, shattering skyscraper windows, destroying trees, and littering downtown Houston with debris. “Downtown is a mess. It’s dangerous,” said Houston Mayor John...
America’s Entire Energy Story in a Single Oregon Canyon
On a stormy May evening in 1882, approximately 10 gigawatts of electricity split from the sky above southeastern Oregon and struck a cattleman named Hiram Leslie as he approached his camp on the Owyhee River. Leslie’s horse died instantly; Leslie did not. Legend has it the pioneer survived for six days after the lightning strike — his brain pulsing and visible through his cleaved-open skull — only to finally expire in his bed back in the boomtown of Silver City, Idaho. Dugout Gulch, an 8-mile canyon near the ranchers’ camp that contains some of the most jaw-dropping scenery in...
Gas Utility Misadventures in Neighborhood Electrification
Natural gas utilities spend hundreds of millions of dollars each year on pipelines and related infrastructure — costs they typically recoup from ratepayers over the course of decades. In the eyes of clean energy advocates, these investments are not only imprudent, but also a missed opportunity. If a utility needs to replace a section of old pipeline at risk of leaking, for example, it could instead pay to electrify all of the homes on that line and retire the pipeline altogether — sometimes for less than the cost of replacement. Utilities in climate-leading states like New York and California, under...
How Republicans Engineered a Fake Meat Controversy
At a triumphant bill-signing earlier this month, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis sounded less like the leader of the nation’s third largest state and more like the host of a QAnon podcast. “Today, Florida is fighting back against the global elite’s plan to force the world to eat meat grown in a petri dish or bugs to achieve their authoritarian goals,” he said. DeSantis was there to trumpet a new state law that outlaws the sale of lab-grown meat, also known as cultivated meat. One might reasonably ask why DeSantis and his Republican allies care about lab-grown meat at all....
Florida’s New Climate Change Law Is About Much More Than Words
Current conditions: Areas surrounding Milan, Italy, are flooded after intense rainfall • Chile is preparing for its most severe cold snap in 70 years • East Texas could see “nightmare” flash flooding today and tomorrow. THE TOP FIVE1. Biden expands solar tariffs to include bifacial modules The Biden administration is expanding existing solar panel tariffs to include the popular two-sided (or bifacial) modules used in many utility-scale solar installations. The solar manufacturing industry and elected representatives in states that have seen large solar manufacturing investments have been pushing to end the tariffs exclusion. With this move, the Biden administration is...
Biden Takes a Side in the Solar Industry’s Family Feud
The Biden administration continued its campaign to support domestic green energy manufacturing via trade policy on Thursday, this time by expanding existing solar panel tariffs to include the popular two-sided modules used in many utility-scale solar installations. With this move, the Biden administration is decisively intervening in the solar industry’s raging feud on the side of the adolescent-but-quickly-maturing (thanks, in part, to generous government support) domestic solar manufacturing industry. On the other side is the more established solar development, installation, and financing industry, which tends to support the widespread availability of cheaper solar components, even if they come from...
The U.S. Oil Industry Is Full of Hypocrites
The Federal Trade Commission earlier this month threw sand in the gears of one of several big oil company deals currently in the works, the $60 billion acquisition of shale oil company Pioneer by Exxon. While the FTC didn’t block the sale, it said that Pioneer’s chief executive, Scott Sheffield, could not join Exxon’s board, as proposed in the merger agreement, because of his role in seeking to coordinate oil production and push up prices. It was yet another Rorschach test of the mid-transition — oil folk saw regulator overreach or pettiness under a Democratic administration, while climate campaigners...
Biochar Is Dominating the Carbon Removal Market — But No One Seems to Care
Low-tech carbon removal is all the rage these days. Whether it’s spreading crushed rocks on fields or injecting sludgy biomass underground, relatively simplistic solutions have seen a boom in funding. But there’s one cheap, nature-based method that hasn’t been able to drum up as much attention from big name climate investors: biochar. This flaky, charcoal-like substance has been produced and used as a fertilizer for millennia, and its potential to lock up the carbon contained in organic matter is well-documented. It’s made by heating up biomass such as wood or plants in a low-oxygen environment via a process called...
Last Summer Was the Hottest in 2,000 Years
Current conditions: Wildfires continue to burn out of control in western Canada • An early season heat wave will bring record high temperatures to parts of Florida • One in eight Europeans now live in an area at risk of flooding. THE TOP FIVE1. Study: Last summer was the hottest in 2,000 years We already know that last summer was the hottest “on record” – but those records only really go back to the 1850s or so. A new study published in the journal Nature looks further into the past and concludes that last summer was the warmest in...
It Was a Big Week for the Power Grid
Transmission has been one of the biggest obstacles of decarbonizing the power grid in America. In the past week, however, the country has taken two big steps toward finally removing it. Last week, the Department of Energy published a list of 10 high-priority areas for grid development, called National Interest Electric Transmission Corridors, designed to help accelerate some of the most annoying aspects of the siting process. Then on Monday, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission passed a new rule directing grid planners to take a longer view on what America’s future electricity needs will look like. On this week’s episode of...
13 Ways of Looking at Biden’s New China Tariffs
The United States raised tariffs on a range of Chinese-made climate technologies on Tuesday, including electric vehicles, solar panels, and battery components. Inspired by the poet Wallace Stevens, here are 13 ways of looking at them: 1. The biggest tariffs in the bunch are for Chinese-made electric vehicles. The Biden administration has more than quadrupled them, imposing a 100% tariff on all vehicle imports. That means that Chinese-made EVs now face higher tariff levels than any other imported goods. Right now, the U.S. imports relatively few electric vehicles from China, and the few vehicles that we do import — which are made...
The Wildfire Smoke is Back
Current conditions: A giant billboard collapsed during a dust storm in Mumbai, killing at least 14 people • Tornado watches are in place across northern parts of Florida • The water is rising again in the flooded Brazilian state of Rio Grande do Sol. THE TOP FIVE1. Fires continue to burn in western Canada Wildfires are still raging out of control in Canada, fueled by drought and strong winds. One, the Parker Lake fire, is approaching the town of Fort Nelson, where more than 4,700 people have been evacuated. The fires have sent plumes of smoke into northern states. Parts...
America’s Power Line Problems Just Got a FERC Fix
On the two ends of the energy transition, public policy is working to encourage more non-carbon-emitting electricity generation (think wind, solar, and batteries) and convert what was once powered by combustion in electric power (think electric cars and heat pumps). But then that leaves the middle.The solar arrays and wind farms that the federal tax code and many state policies promote and subsidize can’t serve all that new electric demand from cars and heat pumps (not to mention existing demand for electricity) if they can’t connect to the grid. That’s where the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission steps in —...
Vermont Is One Signature Away From Making Big Oil Pay for Climate Change
A first-of-its-kind attempt to make fossil fuel companies pay for climate damages is nearly through the finish line in Vermont. Both branches of the state legislature voted to pass the Climate Superfund Act last week, which would hit oil and gas companies with a bill for the costs of addressing, avoiding, and adapting to a world made warmer by oil and gas-related carbon emissions. The bill now heads to the desk of Republican Governor Phil Scott, who has not said whether he will sign it. If he vetoes it, however, there’s enough support in the legislature to override his decision,...
Biden’s War on Chinese EVs is Heating Up
Current conditions: Indonesia’s Mt. Ibu erupted this morning • Flash floods in Afghanistan killed at least 300 people • Gulf Coast states could see severe storms and hail today. THE TOP FIVE1. Biden expected to announce 100% tariffs on Chinese EVs President Biden is expected to announce tomorrow that tariffs on electric vehicles made in China will quadruple – from 25% to 100%. The move is an attempt to stop cheap EVs from flooding the U.S. market. The news was reported by The Wall Street Journal Friday, and reaction has been mixed: “A quadrupling of this tariff rate … would more effectively...
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