NordStream’s simulation of a robot scanning the seabed for unexploded mines from World War II. (image: nordstream.com)

To transport natural gas from Russia to Western Europe, the Russian natural gas giant Gazprom is leading an effort to build a new pipeline called Nord Stream across the Baltic Sea. They’ve hit a possible snag, though, says Yonah Freemark of The Infrastructurist—the Baltic Sea is still littered with mines from World War II. Enter Bactec International and its mine-detecting robots, which will detonate and clear all mines in the pipeline’s path.

Paolo Scaroni, the CEO of Eni, an Italian oil company, worries about the future of international oil companies and writes in the Wall Street Journal that they may have to change their business strategy. The solution? Be more like Eni.

The Times of London reports that some people are trying to lower their heating bills by burning wood instead of oil or gas. What they don’t mention is that consumers who heat their homes exclusively with heating oil or natural gas have cut their expenses on wood and wood burners to as low as $0.

At Energy Tribune, Robert Bryce examines how the Senate climate bill, which seemed like a sure thing at the time of President Obama’s first address to Congress last February, has gotten derailed. Burgeoning skepticism about climate change and the resurgence of Republicans play big roles in his story, but the takeaway is that any real legislative action will happen at the local and state levels instead of in the US Congress.

Three senators at the center of the debate over cap and trade’s place in energy legislation (left to right): Graham, Kerry, Liebeman. (image: mnn.com)

Key Senate Democrats say they will support an existing energy bill that does not include a cap and trade provision, and are trying to convince their colleagues to do the same, an article on the website MotherJones.com reported on Tuesday. Buzz about a climate change of heart on the part of the Democrats grew louder last week, when the media reported that Sens. John Kerry (D-Mass.), Joseph Lieberman (I-Conn.), and Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), who are trying to win bipartisan support for their own compromise energy and climate legislation in the Senate, were planning to do away with cap and trade altogether. The two anti-cap and trade movements represent a larger trend in the Democratic caucus: the perception that dropping cap and trade (or any carbon dioxide emissions limits) from climate legislation is the only way to get it passed.

Possible elimination of the cap and trade provision from the American Clean Energy Leadership Act (ACELA), which was approved by the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee last June, raises several concerns. For starters, doing away with a carbon cap may spell doom for an international climate treaty. Other big carbon emitters, most notably China, want to see the U.S. make meaningful reductions in carbon emissions before they commit to their own reductions. In November, China agreed to curb its carbon intensity 40–45 percent from 2005 levels by 2020, although it does not want these emissions targets to be legally binding.

Another potential problem with the bill, according to environmentalists, is that it could increase, rather than decrease, carbon emissions by making too many concessions to big energy interests. The bill would lift a ban on drilling on the eastern Gulf of Mexico, just 45 miles off the Florida coast. In addition, an expansion of federal authority over the placement of power lines called for in the bill could increase emissions, said David Lashof, director of the climate center at the National Resources Defense Council. He explained that more electricity infrastructure without a corresponding cap on carbon would make it easier to bring new coal plants onto the grid and increase output at existing plants.

ACELA also contains few provisions for clean, renewable energy. Although it requires utilities to produce 15 percent of power from renewable resources within the next 11 years, solar and wind advocates say that renewable electricity standard is not ambitious enough Grist.com reported.

Although the bill would establish an agency called the Clean Energy Deployment Administration, or CEDA, it also would empower the Department of Energy to distribute an unlimited number of loan guarantees to underwrite the construction of nuclear power plants without congressional review. According to the Congressional Budget Office, the chance of default on these loans is at least 50 percent, so the bill could wind up costing taxpayers billions of dollars.

Those who support ACELA include Democrats Jim Webb (Va.), Mary Landrieu (La.), Evan Bayh (Ind.), Ben Nelson (Neb.), Kent Conrad (N.D.), Byron Dorgan (N.D.), Mark Pryor (Ark.), and Blanche Lincoln (Ark.). Republicans Lisa Murkowski (Alaska), Sam Brownback (Kan.), Bob Corker (Tenn.), and Jeff Sessions (Ala.), who voted the bill out of committee, could also come on board.
Supporters of the bill argue that getting the measure passed is more politically feasible than getting a cap and trade provision thorough the Senate. In an omission that cold signify the White House’s quiet assent to the elimination of cap and trade from climate legislation, President Obama did not refer to a cap and trade system or any plans to cut greenhouse gas emissions in last week’s State of the Union speech.

Obama did, however, praise the House of Representatives for passing the American Clean Energy and Security Act (ACES), also known as the Waxman-Markey bill, which includes a cap and trade provision. He also urged the Senate to make a bipartisan effort to do the same.

ACES calls for the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions in the US to 17 percent below 2005 levels by 2020 and 83 percent below 2005 levels by 2050. It also requires utilities to generate an increasing amount of power from renewable sources and reduce dependence on foreign oil.

The Clean Energy Jobs and American Power Act (CEJAPA), sponsored by Sens. Kerry and Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) and a companion bill to ACELA, would begin with the same 3 percent cut in carbon emissions by 2012 as ACES, but would require a sharper cut of 20 percent by 2020. Kerry, Lieberman, and Graham have proposed cutting U.S. greenhouse gas emissions by 2020 by about 17 percent of 2005 levels, the same goal put forth in the Waxman-Markey bill.

Both ACES and CEJAPA would establish a system of carbon credits, in which regulated industries would have to acquire carbon permits. However, the Waxman-Markey bill would establish a relatively free carbon market, allowing emitters to purchase carbon credits as needed, while the Boxer-Kerry measure would try to control costs to polluting industries by capping the price of credits at $28 per unit. Kerry, Lieberman, and Graham initially pledged continued support to the concept of a cap and trade system, although the senators said that they do not support the name “cap and trade.” Take a look at this comparison of the various climate bills in Congress posted in October of last year to get a more detailed description of each piece of legislation.

As cap and trade loses favor in Congress and the chances of passing comprehensive climate and energy legislation appear as bleak as ever, the Natural Resources Defense Council has stepped up efforts to force legislative action. The NRDC’s Action Fund this week launched a web-based video in which Leonardo DiCaprio and a host of Hollywood stars, with Cornell West of Princeton University thrown in the mix, exhort Americans to urge their senators to support comprehensive clean energy and climate legislation.

[There is a video that cannot be displayed in this feed. Visit the blog entry to see the video.]

The campaign uses online tools such as social networking, blogs, and e-mail to tell the Senate that the country needs legislation that will reduce carbon pollution and create clean energy jobs. It appears that the NRDC believes that grassroots action by green-minded citizens reinforced by major star power could turn around the fate of climate legislation. However, the way the political winds are currently blowing in Washington, it would take no less than a hurricane of constituent pressure to change the minds of senators who have taken up firm positions against the enactment of any greenhouse emissions reduction laws any time soon.

Although Obama included conventional energy resources like nuclear power and offshore oil drilling in his speech, he also called for “continued investment in advanced biofuels”—an important mention for the heating oil industry. Assuming Obama follows through with his intention to continue and/or ramp up government support of the biofuel industry, heating oil consumers and expect to see more readily available biofuel to power their heating systems at a lower price.

[There is a video that cannot be displayed in this feed. Visit the blog entry to see the video.]

The World Economic Forum played host to a forum of the oil industry’s leaders. (image: eyeofdubai.com)

A day after Barack Obama’s State of the Union address, in which the president somberly admonished the United States for its dependence on Middle Eastern crude, an assortment of oil executives convened at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, to pronounce their own thoughts on the matter of energy policy and, with thumbs to their noses, toast the continued predominance of fossil fuels.

According to CNNMoney.com, the forum was attended by top executives from oil giants like BP, Saudi Aramco (the national oil company of Saudi Arabia), and Royal Dutch Shell. Displeased with President Obama’s vocal endorsement of alternative fuels, and worried by Congress’s consideration of a cap and trade bill that would effectively limit demand for oil in the United States, the CEOs hoped to dispel what they consider a fanciful notion of an oil-free world. Rather, these men described a bright future for crude, which, they said, would continue to dominate energy markets for decades to come despite interference from the Obama administration.

Tony Hayward, group chief executive of BP, announced that regardless of lower demand for oil in developed countries, BP is forecasting a 40 percent increase in energy consumption among non-OECD nations over the next 20 years. He added that despite developments in alternative energy, he believes that oil and gas will remain the preeminent sources of fuel. “Even in the most aggressive climate change legislation perceived, hydrocarbons will represent 80% of energy consumption over next 20 years,” Hayward said, briefly outlining BP’s plans to boost production in their Iraqi oil field from 1 million barrels a day to 3 million barrels by 2020.

Representing Saudi Aramco, Khalid Al Falih declared the debate concerning “peak oil” to be no longer worth mentioning—an opinion common among oil executives. He dismissed the goal set by President Obama to reach energy independence as “unachievable and misleading to the public,” complaining that while Saudi Arabia continues to invest in oil production, “we don’t see reciprocal assurances from customers, by which I mean policy makers, to signal to us a long-term commitment.” Al Falih’s comments are rather more severe than those he made only a month ago, when he conceded that alternative fuels will ultimately displace crude and that, while sometimes exaggerated, the theory of peak oil was in fact supported by evidence.

Peter Voser, CEO of Royal Dutch Shell, hoped to offer a more “realistic” view of the energy industry, arguing that should alternative fuels come to replace fossil fuels, it will not be anytime soon. “It takes 25 to 30 years to gain 1% of global market share from the moment we start investing in a major project,” he said. In recent months, Shell has faced a number of challenges, including setbacks in their Nigerian operations caused by attacks by local militants and slumping third quarter profits, which forced the company to slash its workforce in December.

Amidst the oil executives, Andrew Liveris, chairman and CEO of Dow Chemical, elected himself to speak on behalf of US energy consumers. Noting that Dow has recently suffered under rising fuel costs, Liveris declaimed both the proposed carbon tax, which he said would simply pass on costs to consumers, and cap and trade system, which rewards speculators rather than energy providers. It is debatable whether Liveris, the wealthy head of the largest chemical company in the United Sates, is in fact representative of energy consumers, but his distrust of government interference in matters of energy production certainly reverberated at the World Economic Forum.

Support for domestic oil drilling and nuclear energy expansion was a point of common ground in the President's address and the Republican response. (image: cbc.ca)

In his State of the Union speech on Wednesday, President Obama urged the U.S. Senate to pass comprehensive energy and climate legislation, and turned away from any discussion of cap and trade or putting a price on carbon to focus on job creation and energy independence. Such legislation can put Americans work today, “building the infrastructure of tomorrow,” said Obama.

Framing clean technology in terms of national competitiveness, Obama went on to say that “There’s no reason Europe or China should have…the new factories that manufacture clean energy products.” Building the facilities to create clean energy and offering homeowners rebates for making their homes more energy efficient will create those jobs in the US.

China and India, Obama said, are “putting more emphasis on math and science,” and investing in clean energy, “because they want those jobs.

“No area is more ripe for innovation than energy,” said Obama. However, when he named the types of energy that would drive job production, he did not include many of the renewable sources of energy that the environmental movement considers central to the future of US energy. Instead of wind and solar, Obama called for expanded nuclear power, offshore oil and gas development, advanced biofuels, and clean coal technology. Focusing on these sectors of the energy industry represents the Democrats’ compromise position, since they have already tried to entice Republican support for the climate and energy bill by offering concessions for offshore drilling and nuclear energy.

Mention of advanced biofuels holds special relevance for the heating oil industry and heating oil consumers. Biofuels may represent the future of the heating oil industry, and industry pioneers such as Hart Petroleum are leading the way to the development of cleaner heating fuels. The Department of Energy has already awarded a great deal of money to biofuels research, and Obama’s inclusion of biofuels in his State of the Union address indicates that such favorable funding is likely to continue.

Ensuring that innovation in energy moves forward “means passing a comprehensive energy and climate bill with incentives that will finally make clean energy the profitable kind of energy in America,” said Obama. He also expressed gratitude to the House of Representatives for passing the Waxman-Markey bill in June of last year, which included provisions for cap and trade, and urged a bipartisan effort (such as that led by Senators Kerry, Graham, and Lieberman) in the Senate this year to do the same.

Incentives for energy efficiency and clean energy are the right thing to do for America’s future, Obama said, because “the nation that leads the clean energy economy will be the nation that leads the global economy. And America must be that nation.”

In an effort to reduce the deficit, Obama stated that tax cuts for oil companies will be discontinued, which could lead to increased costs that will be passed on to heating oil consumers.

As an indication of how President Obama’s proposals on energy aimed to find common ground, Republicans seemed to agree that innovation and clean energy have key roles to play in America’s economic future. In the Republican response to Obama’s speech, Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell said that all Americans can agree that the country must become more energy independent.

“We are blessed here in America with vast natural resources and we must use them all,” said McDonnell. He went on to say that technological advances can “unleash” alternative energy sources such as wind, solar, and nuclear power, which can lower energy costs.

However, McDonnell said, the Obama administration’s policies delay offshore production and hinder the expansion of nuclear energy. The Obama administration and congressional Democrats also want to impose what McDonnell called “job-killing” energy taxes in the form of cap and trade—objections that Obama had hoped to steer clear of by avoiding any mention of cap and trade.

Members of both parties can certainly agree with McDonnell that, “Now is the time to adopt energy policies that create jobs and lower energy prices.”

(image: seattlepi.com)

In the wake of the largely-seen-as-failed climate talks in Copenhagen this month, news outlets, analysts, and politicians alike are trying to wrap their heads around what happened in Denmark. Most agree that the talks were a failure, many blaming the process itself. After all, getting 193 countries, all with their own challenges and interests, to agree on anything is a tall order.

Bloomberg columnist Eric Pooley takes it a step further. He points out that all parties going in to this conference knew it wasn’t going to produce a strong agreement, and that fact hinged on one country alone: the United States. Without a firm commitment from the U.S. Senate concerning emissions reduction, few others were willing to lay their cards on the table, and talks suffered because of it. George Monbiot of the U.K. Guardian said as much, perhaps in a more blunt fashion, in his commentary entitled “If you want to know who’s to blame for Copenhagen, look to the U.S. Senate.”

According to Pooley, President Obama knew this going into the Copenhagen talks, having decided to direct his focus on health care instead of climate change. He also believes that Obama needs to mount a “full-scale public education campaign” to educate Americans just exactly what is at stake. He needs to convince his public that addressing climate change will help the economy, not doom it to fail. And after all the preparation that went into Copenhagen, all the hoopla, the posturing, and the protest, “we are where we were: waiting for Obama to lead the charge in the Senate.”

Over at the Wall Street Journal, Nigel Lawson, former U.K. Chancellor of the Exchequer under Margaret Thatcher, calls for a Plan B in dealing with climate change. Lawson first acknowledges that Copenhagen “predictably – achieved precisely nothing.” He attributes the failure to the massive costs associated with decarbonizing the world’s economies. Coal and oil are largely used for one reason: they are cheap. And in the developing world, where hundreds of millions of people are still dealing with extreme poverty, switching from these dirty forms of energy while continuing to industrialize is just not feasible.

Lawson proposes what some might see as a radical approach to climate change, which is abandoning Kyoto, abandoning Copenhagen, and adapting “to whatever changes in temperature may in the future arise.” He argues this will allow us to derive the many benefits of a warmer world while at the same time reducing the costs. Addressing these problems directly as they arise, he says, will be far more cost-effective than our current ideas, and does not require a global agreement. Beyond the idea of adaptation, his plan includes “a relatively modest, increased government investment in technological research and development—in energy, in adaptation and in geoengineering.”

He then points out that it will likely never happen, due to the trauma and deprivation many would feel at having no climate conference to attend.

Opinions continue to abound in every direction over the climate talks. An editorial on FinancialTimes.com calls for a revival of international cooperation, arguing that the U.S. and China, not as ideologically far apart as they might think, can take the lead. The U.K. Guardian even had a positive spin on their political blog, saying that if countries come to Mexico (where the next large-scale international meeting on climate change is scheduled to take place) with a greater sense of realism and a new attitude, Copenhagen “may yet be seen as a useful fresh start.” And the staff over at Politico.com posted a bevy of takes and opinions from various politicians and commentators that range from calling Barack Obama the big winner, to calling the U.N. process limited.

The fallout from Copenhagen will likely keep coming for months, if not years. With all their talk of “action now” and making real progress in Denmark, we still walked away from the table with little to show. Perhaps Copenhagen’s greatest legacy will be in teaching the world how not to get things done. Which, at this point, would be a step in the right direction.

(image: Nick Anderson of the Houston Chronicle, via americanprogress.org)

Looks like the Copenhagen conference was kind of a bust, but what likelihood was there that the US could pass any international treaty, anyway? If President Obama can’t get 60 votes for any legislation, how could he get the 67 needed for a treaty? He might not have to, says <a href=”>Michael Livermore at the Vine, a blog of The New Republic. Livermore details some of the ways that Obama could use executive authority to bring the US into a binding international agreement. It might not come up after Copenhagen, but another set of talks is scheduled for Mexico City.

Christmas in Copenhagen might mean shopping for gifts at stores that keep their doors open, pumping heat out onto the cold street, but it also means a Christmas tree that’s green in more ways than one, says Spencer Schwartz at the Wall Street Journal’s Environmental Capital blog. At City Hall Square, a massive Christmas tree stays lit through the power of volunteers on bikes that generate electricity for the lights. At night, when the volunteers go home, wind power keeps the tree bright.

Denmark seems a likely place for environmentally friendly innovation. What about China? In the New Yorker, Evan Osnos details China’s 863 Program, the clean-technology program that could progress by such bounds that the US would not even be competitive in the clean-tech sector. And this from a country whose capital, Beijing, often has air quality that the US typically associates with forest fires.

Natural gas drilling has come under criticism recently for the pollution it can cause in air and water, and in response the industry has taken steps to curb emissions and remove toxins from its drilling. But according to Abrahm Lustgarten at ProPublica—which has extensively and often critically covered problems associated with hydrofracking—these practices are still underused in natural gas drilling. According to Lustgarten, this doesn’t do much good for gas companies or local communities, since many of these steps not only cut pollution but boost productivity and save money.

South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham. (image: ingodisourtrust.wordpress.com)

The Washington Post reported that the senators who were attempting to draft a second bill to cap greenhouse gas emissions released a “framework” of the legislation on Thursday. However, the legislators offered few details about their ideas, and said that they were open to negotiation.

When UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon met with a bipartisan group of senators at the US Capitol on Nov. 10, he urged the Senate to act on climate change before the UN climate change summit. Although Ban acknowledged that the Senate was unlikely to move that quickly, he urged the Senate to draft principles to establish pollution reduction goals, because such a framework would be a sign of commitment to reducing carbon emissions on the part of the US.

The nascent bill, authored by Sens. John Kerry (D-Mass.), Joseph Lieberman (I-Conn.), and Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), is intended to send the message to delegates at the UN climate talks in Copenhagen that “the movement for climate change legislation in the United States Senate is alive and well,” Lieberman said at Thursday’s press conference announcing the framework.

The senators proposed cutting U.S. greenhouse gas emissions by 2020 by about 17 percent of 2005 levels, the same goal put forth in the Waxman-Markey bill passed by the House and articulated by President Obama last week. In addition, although the senators said that they do not support the name “cap and trade,” they pledged continued support to the concept of a cap and trade system, in which regulated industries could purchase and trade carbon credits as needed. They also said they support expanded offshore drilling for oil and natural gas, more nuclear power plants, and more funding for research to reduce coal plant emissions.

The ideas proposed by Kerry, Lieberman, and Graham last week have similarities and differences to those in the Kerry-Boxer bill, which went before the Senate’s Environmental and Public Works, Finance, and Energy and Natural Resources committees last month. Although both bills require reductions in greenhouse gas emissions, the Kerry-Boxer bill requires an emission reduction of 20 percent, not 17 percent, by 2020. However, some legislators, chief among them Sen. Max Baucus (D-Mont.), argue that 20 percent is too aggressive.

Although Kerry-Boxer itself does not contain provisions for nuclear power, the American Clean Energy Leadership Act (ACELA), a bill written by the Senate’s Energy Committee in June as a companion to the bill, does contain such provisions. Democratic support of nuclear energy is largely seen as a compromise for Republican support of carbon trading and emissions caps.

Environmental groups showed mixed reactions to the Kerry-Lieberman-Graham proposal. The ocean preservation organization Oceana said an increase in offshore drilling could create a higher risk of spills, although other environmental groups said an agreement that included a key Republican was a step forward.

Kerry said at Thursday’s news conference that the three sponsors would have to discuss their framework and ideas with Senate committee chairmen, and that he did not think a bill would be voted on until the spring.

The stage is set for historic progress on battling man-made climate change at the Copenhagen Conference. Will it be a success or a dud? (image: Associated Press via dailymail.co.uk)

Editor’s Note: After literally years planning and shifting expectations, the Copenhagen Conference begins today and runs through December 18th. With so much at stake for the world and the country, HeatingOil.com has taken on the duty of providing daily Copenhagen Conference updates. Our reporter Kristy Kershaw will be bringing you the highlights of the conference and breaking down what happens there into how it will affect us here.

The wait is finally over! The 15th United Nations Climate Change Conference kicked off in Denmark today, amid a flurry of recent speculation over what, if anything, this summit will accomplish. We begin with a look at some recent announcements and predictions, ranging from the hopeful to the pessimistic:

First up is the White House’s announcement last Friday that President Obama will be shifting his attendance at the Copenhagen conference.  Originally slated to attend the talks this Wednesday before flying to Oslo to receive his Nobel Peace Prize, the president will now be going to the end of the talks on December 18th, when most other world leaders will be in attendance. The schedule shift was made, according to a White House press release, because the administration believed Obama’s presence would be most productive toward clinching a final deal at the end of the conference in concert with other national leaders.

With the United States recently pledging a 17 percent emissions cut,  and China announcing a 40 – 45 percent reduction in carbon intensity, it now seems as if Copenhagen has a real shot at being a productive meeting. However, just how effective depends on whom you ask.

In an editorial yesterday, the New York Times pointed out that the talks are just that – talk. To effect real change in our climate, there is a lot of work to be done beyond Copenhagen, starting right here at home with the U.S. Senate. Obama himself will have a tough road ahead of him trying to convince Republicans and “Rust Belt” Democrats to move forward with comprehensive energy reform that will center on a plan to cut greenhouse gas emissions. And without that legislation, the U.S. will be hard-pressed to meet whatever goal it sets forth in Denmark.

On the flip side, and in the same paper, is an optimistic look at the Copenhagen talks in an opinion piece by Paul Krugman.  Krugman cites the acid rain controversy of the 1980’s as proof that limiting emissions, sulfur dioxide in this case, through a cap and trade system, can be done without “grievous economic harm.” He points out that if those same conservatives who believe that capitalism is “infinitely adaptable” would apply that magic to cap and trade, it would likely work at a fraction of the expected cost.

And in an unprecedented move out of the UK, the Guardian drafted an editorial that was published today in 56 newspapers around the world.  The piece focused on the gravity of what is at stake in Copenhagen, saying “humanity faces a profound emergency.” The editorial, while not specifically optimistic or pessimistic about the talks, simply calls for action, saying we cannot afford to let the earth’s temperature rise another 2 degrees Celsius. It also declares the “era of flights that cost less than the taxi ride to the airport” over, saying citizens of the developed world will need to make some changes.

As you can see by this list of emissions reduction goals published earlier today by the Associated Press, there is a lot of work to be done, many details to be hammered out.  The task at hand is enormous, important, and urgent. Here’s hoping our nation’s leaders agree that it is time to act.