China has a growing problem: It wants cleaner air and needs to upgrade the quality of its fuels to get there. But China traditionally has regulated retail prices to ensure they don’t get to levels that might cause unrest. In this week’s Oilgram News column Petrodollars, Yen Ling Song discusses the conundrum.
Archive for the ‘emissions’ Category
Petrodollars: The challenges of cleaner motor fuels in China
By News Desk | February 25, 2013 12:01 AM Comments (0)
MidAmerican deal on coal shows that it may be Bloomberg bucks, not Obama, that leads the fight against it
By Kathy Larsen | January 22, 2013 05:43 PM Comments (1)
On Tuesday, MidAmerican Energy said it would stop burning coal at five generating units in Iowa by 2016. Its settlement with the Sierra Club affects about 673 MW of capacity.
The announcement came a day after President Barack Obama devoted a surprisingly big part of his inaugural speech to the subject of climate change. It is unknown just what his administration will actually do about it. Read the rest of this entry »
Savvy builders, Congress seeing payback from energy-efficiency
By Derek Sands | December 6, 2012 02:36 PM Comments (3)
Making buildings, air conditioners and refrigerators run better and use less energy does not attract the kind of attention that comes with seismic shifts in the natural gas market or fights over OPEC oil-production ceilings. But according to a high-thinking panel of experts that advise the US energy secretary, serious money is making the conversation around efficiency more interesting.
Ever since coming to DOE in 2009, Energy Secretary Steven Chu has been singing the praises of energy efficiency, entertaining audiences with PowerPoint presentations on how refrigerator standards have reduced energy use while at the same time bringing down costs.
But even after raft of new appliance standards over the past four years, and a push to tighten enforcement, energy efficiency still has a way to go, according to Chu.
Dubai World Energy Forum: A right royal affair
By Herman Wang | October 29, 2012 09:43 AM Comments (0)
The three-day World Energy Forum in Dubai this past week was full of pomp and circumstance. Sheikhs, kings, presidents and prime ministers from across the world were there. UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon was in attendance.
The proceedings were even graced by a speech from Her Royal Highness Princess Haya of Dubai, whose appearance at the First Ladies Summit at the forum was greeted by dozens, if not hundreds, of photographers and a crowd of twittering bystanders, craning for a glimpse of the glamorous wife of Sheikh Mohammed al-Maktoum, ruler of Dubai.
Budget busters: exploring Mars and preserving coal at Kemper
By Kathy Larsen | August 7, 2012 01:28 PM Comments (0)
One budget buster is fabulous and fascinating: OMG, we have an apparently robust explorer on Mars, and we can see what it’s doing more than a hundred million miles from here. A hard-fought triumph of brilliance and doggedness. But some wonder if the
The other budget buster, at Mississippi Power’s Kemper plant, is minus the glamour, though some believe the integrated gasification combined-cycle project represents a strong opportunity to save coal as a major source of electricity. Here, too, some wonder–with real material effect–about the wisdom of spending money on it.
Both projects have had cost overruns. Both cost more than $2 billion: Curiosity around $2.5 billion and Kemper maybe about $2.9 billion.
Needing a better thesaurus for energy reporters
By Elizabeth Bassett | August 2, 2012 05:24 PM Comments (0)
I consider myself an environmentalist.
I don’t have a family or a job or hobby requiring a big vehicle, so I drive a Honda Civic, and the back is always filled with assorted re-usable bags to tote around groceries. I recycle and try to remind my husband, also an energy journalist, to put the beer bottles in the recycling bin and not the trash.
Regulation & The Environment: the Saudis are going green
By News Desk | July 23, 2012 11:56 AM Comments (0)
The many words out of the Middle East about turning to renewable technologies and cutting carbon emissions are turning into concrete actions, as Tamsin Carlisle discusses in this week’s Oilgram News column, Regulation & The Environment.
Taking California’s low carbon fuel standard, and making it national
By John Kingston | July 19, 2012 05:11 PM Comments (0)
“I’ve never heard anybody come up with a definitively better approach.”
That statement by Daniel Sperling wrapped up the first of three presentations he and other mostly academics are making in Washington this week to launch a push for a national Low Carbon Fuel Standard. It’s a clear statement of confidence in his plans, which is not surprising; as a member of the California Air Resources Board, Sperling, who is also a professor at the University of California-Davis, is one of the key backers of that state’s own LCFS.
“All of the above” energy policy includes cow dung
By Derek Sands | July 18, 2012 04:08 PM Comments (0)
Republicans in Congress have been blunt in their assessment of the Obama administration’s renewable energy policies: they are a pile of manure.
But Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack said on Tuesday earlier this week that manure could be just the solution to some of the county’s energy woes.
New Frontiers: celebrating natural gas’ new age…cautiously
By News Desk | July 2, 2012 12:45 PM Comments (0)
At the recent World Gas Conference in Malaysia, the bright prospects for developing new markets for natural gas was a major topic of discussion. But the road isn’t going to be without bumps, or plenty of cost issues. Thomas Hogue talks about them in this week’s Oilgram News column, New Frontiers.