"PITTSBURGH -- As natural gas prices continue to drop, the recent nationwide boom in drilling is slowing. Drillers don't make money if prices go too low — and drilling wells isn't cheap."
"Harry Truman was president the last time we exported more energy than we imported. Now complete energy independence may be within reach as President Obama plans to tap all domestic sources to achieve that goal."
President Obama will send his budget request for fiscal 2013 to Congress today. It is expected to fund the clean energy programs he mentioned in his State of the Union speech. But Congress, which actually appropriates the money, will have the last word. Republicans want to cut many environmental and clean-energy programs drastically. After agency-specific budget briefings today, some agency heads will explain the budget requests to Congressional committees later in the week.
"When US government scientists began sampling the air from a tower north of Denver, Colorado, they expected urban smog — but not strong whiffs of what looked like natural gas. They eventually linked the mysterious pollution to a nearby natural-gas field, and their investigation has now produced the first hard evidence that the cleanest-burning fossil fuel might not be much better than coal when it comes to climate change."
"The nuclear industry is celebrating the federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission's decision to give the go-ahead for a utility company to build two new nuclear reactors in Georgia, the first license to be granted for a new reactor in the U.S. since 1978. But last year's accident at reactors in Fukushima, Japan, still clouds the future of nuclear power, as does the cost of new power plants."
"Pacific Gas and Electric Co.'s old gas lines are riddled with potentially lethal weld flaws, and new welding that the company's crews did during pipeline testing last year is suspect, two veteran welders told state regulators this week."
The Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board is worried about the safety of pipes and equipment which will entomb in glass decades worth of nuclear waste from the cold-war Hanford weapons facility.
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"RICHLAND, Wash. -- Bechtel National, Inc. is designing and building the world's largest radioactive waste treatment plant for the U.S. Department of Energy at the Hanford Site near the Columbia River in southeastern Washington state.
"An obstacle to greening L.A.'s energy portfolio is the Department of Water & Power's contract with a Utah plant, which requires the city to buy coal power until 2027. The gritty fuel is now stoking controversy over energy policy, environmental damage and how much consumers should pay to kick the habit."
"Sen. Richard Burr's vocal opposition to the STOCK Act raised some eyebrows in Washington this week, and with good reason. Burr, a North Carolina Republican who was one of just three senators to vote against the ban on congressional insider trading Thursday, owns investments in the natural gas industry that would benefit from legislation he co-sponsored offering tax credits for natural gas-fueled vehicles."
"Across the country, activists with ties to the Tea Party are railing against all sorts of local and state efforts to control sprawl and conserve energy. They brand government action for things like expanding public transportation routes and preserving open space as part of a United Nations-led conspiracy to deny property rights and herd citizens toward cities."
