- New York Times: Consumers Thrive as Oil Shares Dive
- National Journal: Why Environmentalists Are Anxious About a Hillary Clinton 2016 Run
- Washington Post: EPA says it will get back on schedule in issuing rules for biofuels
POLITICO Morning Energy for 4/13/2015
By DARIUS DIXON, with help from Darren Goode
HILLARY CLINTON MAKES 2016 RUN OFFICIAL: POLITICO’s Annie Karni: Hillary Clinton on Sunday formally announced her second run for the White House with a digital blitz that portrayed her as a champion of everyday Americans. In striking contrast to her 2008 presidential bid, Clinton’s campaign took great effort to take the focus off her. In her two-minute announcement video, Clinton doesn’t even appear until the 1:35 mark. The announcement marks an end to the first, awkward phase of Clinton’s roll-out — a non-campaign that has frustrated Democrats who were anxious for her to turn the ignition switch on a presidential run that the party is deeply invested in.
Clinton is following up the digital launch by hitting the road in Iowa this week to talk to voters. The soft launch also means Clinton won’t formally hold a political rally or give a campaign speech until May. http://politi.co/1CyZ6LM
Although Clinton’s campaign website and video didn’t offer any new specifics about her positions on energy and environment issues, she’s not a blank either. Here are some of her past statements:
— At Sen. Harry Reid’s National Clean Energy Summit last summer Clinton called climate change “the most consequential, urgent, sweeping collection of challenges we face as a nation and a world.”
— On natural gas, also at Reid’s conference: “The boom in domestic natural gas production is an example of American innovation changing the game,” she said. “With the right safeguards in place, gas is cleaner than coal,” Expanding production, Clinton added, also creates jobs. “It’s crucial that we put in place smart regulations and enforce them, including deciding not to drill when the risks are too high,” she said. http://politico.pro/1z90CCK
— In a 2010 interview, on Keystone, while Secretary of State: “[W]e’ve not yet signed off on it. But we are inclined to do so and we are for several reasons — going back to one of your original questions — we’re either going to be dependent on dirty oil from the Gulf or dirty oil from Canada.” She has since declined to comment on the project ever since. http://bit.ly/1Errowc
— Clinton’s memoir, “Hard Choices,” praised Obama for “moving forward with strong executive actions” in addressing climate change.
Environmental activists have been calling on Clinton to oppose fracking and the Keystone XL oil pipeline. Also, it’s worth noting that Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta, former chief of staff to her husband Bill, was perhaps the biggest climate hawk in the Obama White House until he left in February after more than a year as a counselor to the president. And yesterday Podesta tweeted: “Helping working families succeed, building small businesses, tackling climate change & clean energy. Top of the agenda. #Hillary2016”
The Twitterverse got restless yesterday when the assumption that Clinton would roll out her campaign announcement at noon didn’t materialize for a few hours. The tagline “Ready for Hillary” morphed snarkily into “Waiting for Hillary.”
The New York Post front page: “OH HILL NO!”
There’s at least one big nerd on the staff: @DaveStroup: “Logo in the source of HillaryClinton.com. pic.twitter.com/dYxxTfhbnX”
READY FOR RUBIO: Florida GOP Sen. Marco Rubio is expected to officially announce his own bid for the presidency tonight at the Freedom Tower in Miami. It’s just that time of year.
WELCOME BACK FOLKS, IT’S MONDAY. I’m your host, Darius Dixon, and with all the hyperventilating over Clinton’s candidacy, it’d be a shame if you missed Saturday Night Live’s Hillary spoof this weekend: http://bit.ly/1aVLGCQ. (And, total non sequitur, Taraji Henderson’s Sesame Street skit: http://bit.ly/1CGwcIi). Send your energy tips to ddixon@politico.com, and follow us on Twitter @dariusss, @Morning_Energy and @POLITICOPro.
** A message from the Auto Care Association: The auto care industry is a coast-to-coast network of more than 500,000 independent manufacturers, distributors, parts stores and repair shops that keep every motorist moving. Our four million employees generate 2.3 percent of America’s gross domestic product. Our network delivers products at the speed that keeps America’s cars on the road. autocare.org **
THE FALL OF THE HOUSE OF COAL: POLITICO Pro Energy’s Erica Martinson gets retro on us: On a sweltering day in July 1979, President Jimmy Carter flew to Kentucky with a message: The nation’s energy future rested on coal. Not only was coal cheap and abundant, Carter made clear as he donned a hard hat to tour the Cane Run power plant near Louisville — it could also exist side by side with protecting the environment. Cane Run was ecologically state-of-the-art, one of the first plants in the country equipped to scrub acid-rain-causing chemicals from its exhaust, making it “a testimony to the technological genius of Americans,” the president said. And for a nation traumatized by soaring energy prices, where more than a fifth of the power supply still came from burning oil, coal could help free the U.S. from its dangerous reliance on the Middle East. “I would rather burn a ton of Kentucky coal,” Carter said later that day in a high school gym, “than to see our nation become dependent by buying another barrel of OPEC oil.” But five presidents later, coal’s future is closing at Cane Run: Louisville Gas & Electric is shutting down the plant’s three coal-fired boilers next month, replacing them with natural gas.
Coal power isn’t going away entirely — it’s still the No. 1 fuel for U.S. electricity and will remain a major source for decades to come. But its shrinking role is hard to miss. Since 2012, when the EPA finished its mercury rule, at least 58 coal-burning power plants have partially or entirely shutting down, according to data from the U.S. Energy Information Administration. That has taken more than 16,000 megawatts of capacity offline, enough to power roughly 16 million homes. http://politico.pro/1JDb5wm
OBAMA TALKS CLIMATE, CLEAN ENERGY DOWN SOUTH: Speaking at the Summit of the Americas in Panama City this weekend, President Barack Obama highlighted new U.S.-Cuba relations and efforts to re-engage Latin America with “mutual respect.” But he also gave a few shoutouts to climate change and clean energy. “We’re partnering with countries across the region to develop clean, more affordable and reliable energy that helps nations to combat the urgent threat of climate change,” he said, according to a White House transcript. “We have to keep investing in the clean energy that creates jobs and combats climate change. The United States is today leading this global effort, along with many of you. And I should point out that America’s carbon pollution is near its lowest level in almost two decades. Across the Americas, I think we have the opportunity to expand our clean energy partnerships and increase our investments in renewables.”
OBAMA, HARPER TALK K…IDS: Obama and Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper crossed paths at the summit, according to pool reports, but reporters couldn’t pick up on any discussion about the Keystone XL oil pipeline. “Mr. Harper said what sounded like that he has kids in college now; that the first year’s the hardest.”
Speaking of renewable energy, Bloomberg New Energy Finance’s “Future of Energy” summit kicks off today, and runs through Wednesday, in New York City. On today’s agenda: Former Vice President Al Gore. The rest of the week includes former FERC Chairman Jon Wellinghoff, CPUC President Michael Picker, New York State Public Service Commission Chairwoman Audrey Zibelman, former NYC mayor Michael Bloomberg and United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon. The full schedule: http://bit.ly/1yiztlQ
THEY’RE HEEERE: Both houses of Congress clock back in today after the two-week Easter/Passover recess and there’s plenty on the schedule — it’s one of those weeks where you have to be in too many places at once.
— TUESDAY: There are overlapping morning hearings on rail and pipeline rulemakings, EPA’s greenhouse gas regulation for existing power plants, Toxic Substances Control Act legislation, and the crude oil export ban.
— WEDNESDAY: NRC commissioners testify to a Senate committee in the morning while the House energy and water spending panel marks up fiscal 2016 legislation. Other committees will consider reforms to the Export-Import Bank, discuss Obama’s UN climate pledge, president’s offshore energy plan, and mark up legislation on coal combustion residuals and grid-enabled water heaters.
WRITE ME FROM CHINA: Commerce Secretary Penny Pritzker and Deputy Energy Secretary Elizabeth Sherwood-Randall have kicked off a U.S. trade mission to China, along with Ambassador to China Max Baucus and 25 U.S. companies. The delegation will make stops in Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou, and aims to help launch or increase American business operations in the country for “smart growth” products such as building energy efficiency improvements, carbon capture technologies, and expand greener options for transportation and data centers. Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz was originally slated to go instead of Sherwood-Randall but got reassigned last Friday to stay and talk to lawmakers about the framework agreement around Iran’s nuclear program.
LCV TO LAUNCH ADS PRESSING SENATE AGAINST ‘POLLUTER AGENDA’: The League of Conservation Voters plans to unveil a new mid-six-figure multi-media ad buy today urging members of the Senate to reject Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell’s “big polluter agenda,” ME is told. LCV will be running television and digital ads in the D.C. metro market. The TV ad highlights “big polluter spending on elections and lobbying” as well as McConnell’s energy agenda, including his efforts to stop the EPA’s efforts to regulate greenhouse gas emissions from existing power plants.
EX-UN CLIMATE CHIEF: POLITICIANS TOO ‘COWARDLY’ TO PUT PRICE ON CARBON: Although Yvo de Boer said it’s good for cities to take a global view of their investments and put their money into “good causes [like] windmills rather than machine guns,” the former climate chief for the United Nation sympathized with the energy needs of developing countries while sniping at politicians. “I must admit that I do see coal, for example, being an essential part of the energy mix for many developing countries for decades to come,” he told Responding to Climate Change. “So you need to be a bit careful that you don’t cut off your nose to spite your face — that you’re not investing in a technology which might actually be quite essential to the future of your country. It’s a bit strange for me to say that as a climate person, but it’s an honest answer.” De Boer said that politicians have acted “too cowardly” in not putting a price on carbon. “If politicians finally found the courage to put a proper price on carbon, we wouldn’t be having the discussion about coal.” Responding to Climate Change: http://bit.ly/1ynrvYQ. Video of the interview: https://youtu.be/OxtM2rnTv5M
QUICK HITS
— Colorado’s big coal-burning utilities take a turn to renewable energy. The Denver Post: http://dpo.st/1z9iQEb
— New U.S. Offshore Oil and Gas Drilling Rules Seen Imminent. The Wall Street Journal: http://on.wsj.com/1Hjcol0
— North Carolina Gov. refuses to sign bill that funds coal ash commission. The Associated Press: http://bit.ly/1JCRJro
— Ontario and Quebec will sign cap-and-trade deal to curb climate change. The Canadian Press: http://bit.ly/1Esgwyb
— FBI joins state probe into tax credits for university solar projects. The Oregonian: http://bit.ly/1CN1fTd
— Quebec City climate-change march draws 25,000 people. CBC News: http://bit.ly/1am6xhi
— US crude export policy and Curb Your Enthusiasm: Platts Crude Oil podcast: http://bit.ly/1FBtTs0
Tags: energy, fuel, gas, oil