- National Journal: Murkowski to unveil crude exports bill next week
POLITICO Morning Energy for 5/8/2015
By ALEX GUILLÉN 5/8/15 10:02 AM EDT
MURKOWSKI — ‘WAY PAST TIME’ FOR BROAD ENERGY BILL: Sen. Lisa Murkowski declared on Thursday that “it’s way past time” for the first broad, bipartisan energy bill since 2007, and she’s aiming to sidestep controversy to craft a package that can pass. Yet whether the chairwoman of the Energy and Natural Resources committee can avoid the contentious issues that have dominated eight years of congressional energy policy making — from Keystone XL to offshore drilling revenue sharing — remains to be seen. Elana Schor has more: http://politico.pro/1ccQ8x3
Not to be outdone, ENR ranking member Maria Cantwell has introduced her own legislation that an aide said is “meant to start a conversation.” Some provisions ultimately could end up in Murkowski’s package. The bill would double non-cybersecurity funding for DOE’s Office of Electricity Delivery and Energy Reliability, authorize an R&D program on grid-scale storage, create programs focused on distributed technologies and microgrids, require utilities and states to consider resilience in future investments, and directs DOE to develop new tools in areas like grid modernization and distribution planning for states and regional planners. Text: http://politico.pro/1ctlhwN. Summary: http://politico.pro/1AJoDkJ
Meanwhile, in the House: The Energy and Power Subcommittee has released a discussion draft of its own energy reliability and security language to be included in the E&C energy package Republicans are working on. A large chunk of the draft is dedicated to what would be an entirely new section of the Federal Power Act giving the Energy secretary emergency powers to protect the bulk power system from physical attacks, cyber threats or geomagnetic disturbances. Other provisions include ones helping generators avoid violating environmental laws to comply with DOE reliability orders; directing FERC and NERC to analyze federal rules affecting power plants; boosting federal-state-local-private sector coordination on energy supply disruptions; directing DOE to study the possibility of setting a reserve of transformer parts; and promoting “cyber-secure” products for the grid. Text: http://1.usa.gov/1Efg7ve. Summary: http://1.usa.gov/1zHzZKX
HATE THE EMISSIONS, NOT THE EMITTER: Pope Francis and the U.S. Catholic bishops are escalating their call for political leaders to act on climate change, seeking to add a moral element — and the weight of the United States’ largest religious denomination — to a debate that has provoked a sharp rift between the Obama administration and the GOP-led Congress. Darren Goode has more: http://politico.pro/1P5B32b
ATTENTION FERC WORLD — MAY MEETING MOVED UP TO AVOID PROTESTS: FERC has moved up its monthly May meeting at the recommendation of federal law enforcement in order to avoid planned large-scale protests. The commissioner’s regularly scheduled monthly public meeting had been slated to take place on May 21, but because of plans for protest actions involving potentially hundreds of people, FERC has moved up the meeting to next Thursday, May 14. The decision was made after a recommendation from the Federal Protective Service “to better ensure the safety of its staff and the public during the protests planned for May 21 at FERC headquarters,” FERC spokesman Craig Cano wrote in an email.
About the protests: An umbrella group called Beyond Extreme Energy that charges FERC is a “rubber stamp” for the energy industry has long planned a weeklong series of protests and other events to coincide with FERC’s May meeting. Those events begin on May 21 and last until May 29, and could include nonviolent arrests. FERC has increasingly found itself the target of climate protestors and others opposed to expanding natural gas use and exports, and has taken steps to limit disruptions at its public meetings. The commissioners argue that they have a specific, limited role granted by Congress to review proposed projects that means FERC is not an environmental regulator.
‘Dishonest and deceitful,’ protestors say: Lee Stewart of BXE slammed FERC’s change-of-date, saying that FERC’s statement about protecting staff is “dishonest and deceitful, and demonstrates unambiguously that they are more interested in the needs and profits of industry than in the needs of the American people,” he said in a statement. “Instead of changing its meeting dates to try to avoid protests, FERC should have the courage and integrity to end its subservience to industry, and start being concerned with the health and safety of people being victimized by fracking and gas infrastructure expansion, not make up false charges and insinuations.” He did not say whether the protest events would be rescheduled, but promised that protestors would continue to show up at FERC’s public meetings.
A FAIR SPRING FRIDAY to you and welcome to Morning Energy, where we’re wishing a happy Mother’s Day to all you mothers out there. We promise to try and call more often. Darius Dixon is back in the saddle on Monday, so send your news to ddixon@politico.com, and follow on Twitter @alexcguillen, @dariusss, @Morning_Energy and @POLITICOPro.
PICKENS PUTS $100,000 INTO BUSH CAMPAIGN: Oil tycoon T. Boone Pickens has given $100,000 to efforts to elect Jeb Bush president, the New York Times reports. “I’ve already backed him,” Pickens told the paper at a hedge fund conference in Las Vegas. The Times adds that Pickens added it will take $100 million to get Bush elected. Speaking at the conference, Pickens got the crowd cheering when he called Hillary Clinton a “loser,” and Pickens complained to the Times about Obama’s veto earlier this year of legislation approving Keystone XL. More: http://nyti.ms/1Ri1tfK
History lesson: Pickens has a long history of spending big on Republicans. FEC records show he gave $244,600 in 2013 and 2014 to various candidates, PACs and GOP parties. That includes $100,000 to John Bolton’s super PAC, $25,000 to Carly Fiorina’s Unlocking Potential PAC and $32,400 to the RNC. Plus campaign checks to lawmakers such as John Boehner, Paul Ryan, Susan Collins, Dan Sullivan, Thom Tillis, Louie Gohmert, Joe Barton, Mike McCaul, Pete Sessions, John Carter, Ralph Hall, Pat Meehan and Bob Barr.
OIL, ETHANOL DUKE IT OUT OVER RFS METHODOLOGY: The oil and biofuels industries have both hit up EPA in recent days urging the agency to take a certain path on setting Renewable Fuel Standard mandates for the coming years. In a May 1 letter from the American Petroleum Institute and American Fuel & Petrochemical Manufacturers, the groups urge the agency to maintain the original RFS methodology proposed for the 2014 rule because of “blend wall” issues. “Congress provided the authority to adjust the statutory volume standards when implementation of the RFS would severely harm the environment, the economy, or result in an inadequate domestic supply,” they wrote, adding that they will continue lobbying for a total repeal of the RFS. Letter: http://politico.pro/1EeJEVM
In a response letter sent yesterday, a coalition of biofuel companies and groups including the Renewable Fuels Association and the Advanced Ethanol Council fired back that the API/AFPM letter “confirms that the erroneous methodology initially used by EPA to set its proposed 2014 RVOs caters to the whims of the oil industry.” They add: “The entire purpose of this program would be subverted if the oil industry is rewarded for its failure to take the steps necessary — steps it has known about since 2007 — to ensure that it is capable of distributing, blending, and dispensing the renewable fuel volumes required under the statute.” Read: http://politico.pro/1IkDB8J
Yo, prez: President Barack Obama is making his first visit as president to South Dakota today (his last state to visit as president, coincidentally), and ethanol interests are hoping to snag his eye with an ad in a local paper today. The American Coalition for Ethanol has an ad in today’s Watertown Public Opinion (daily circulation 9,336, according to the South Dakota Newspaper Association) featuring a local rancher who invested in an ethanol company with facilities in South Dakota. The ad: http://bit.ly/1IkD86h
Reminder: EPA has sent its RFS rules for 2014 through 2016 to OMB for review. A settlement agreement with oil industry groups means EPA is slated to get the 2014 and 2015 rules proposed by June 1 and finalized by Nov. 30.
BIPARTISAN GOOD FEELINGS ON TSCA — WITHOUT BOXER: Barbara Boxer doesn’t leave the Senate for another 20 months, but she was already absent Thursday from the latest development on the chemical safety law that she’s fought so hard to shape. Darren Goode reports: http://politico.pro/1Ef8eGf
NO MARYLAND EXELON-PEPCO MERGER DECISION TODAY: In case you missed it earlier this week, the Maryland Public Service Commission has once again extended its deadline to make a decision on the proposed $6.8 billion Exelon-Pepco merger. The regulator previously planned to decide by today, but earlier this week gave itself an extra week, until May 15 — though since they’ve already pushed back the decision date five times, that’ hardly set in stone. Maryland and D.C. regulators are the last entities needed to greenlight the deal, but fierce opposition in both places threatens to derail the merger.
WITH THEIR POWERS COMBINED: The Natural Gas Supply Association and the Center for Liquefied Natural Gas are shacking up. NGSA, which notes it has made “significant progress” toward boosting LNG exports, will bring CLNG under its umbrella, but the two industry groups will maintain their separate brands. “CLNG will benefit from the leverage of natural gas suppliers as well as LNG producers, shippers, terminal operators and developers working together toward common LNG goals,” NGSA President and CEO Dena Wiggins said.
NERD ALERT — U.S., CERN TO COLLABORATE ON PARTICLE PHYSICS: Darius Dixon may still be on vacation, but your special guest host can nerd out nearly as well (just nowhere near as intelligently). DOE and the National Science Foundation have inked a deal with the European Organization for Nuclear Research — aka CERN — to collaborate on research into particle physics. White House Office of Science and Technology Policy Director John Holdren called the deal “a model for the kinds of international scientific collaboration that can enable breakthrough insights and innovations in areas of mutual interest.”
Wait, where have you heard of CERN before? Depending on your level of nerdiness, you may think of CERN as the place where the Internet was invented, the place that built the Large Hadron Collider, or the place from which a priest stole antimatter in the Dan Brown novel “Angels and Demons.” (Sorry, CERN doesn’t actually produce much antimatter. No one anywhere creates the amount of antimatter used in the novel. CERN explains why: http://bit.ly/1H2jusx)
QUICK HITS
— POLITICO Europe looks at Gazprom’s mounting problems in Europe: http://politi.co/1Iln846
— Green groups sue to stop oil companies from injecting wastewater into potentially useful aquifers in parched California. San Francisco Chronicle: http://bit.ly/1Efgp56
— Analysts are urging investors to avoid oil sands developers in Alberta and look for opportunities elsewhere after the New Democratic Party’s election victory this week. Bloomberg: http://bloom.bg/1bAJFeL
— Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf names a new chair of the state Public Utility Commission. StateImpact: http://n.pr/1bC5x9x
— T. Boone Pickens predicts oil prices will rise to $70 a barrel by year’s end. MarketWatch: http://on.mktw.net/1zGZVq0
— Defense One looks at Tesla’s new batteries and the military: http://bit.ly/1F2itBw
— The oil industry may get into 3D printing. Houston Chronicle: http://bit.ly/1F82LXk
— Kate Hudson, Kurt Russell, and John Malkovich have joined the cast of the Mark Wahlberg movie about the Deepwater Horizon disaster. Deadline: http://bit.ly/1GSlcdw
Tags: energy, fuel, gas, oil, policy