In this week’s Energy News and Notes, the big news was confirmation of a new U.S. energy secretary who’s on the record in favor of fracking. We also saw Colorado’s governor sign a couple of alternative energy measures while hearing calls for him to veto another, and a large software manufacturer talks about its move […]
If someone were to offer you two tickets for the handsome sum of $500 each to a concert featuring a dream lineup of U2, The Rolling Stones, Fleetwood Mac, Elton John, Earth Wind and Fire, Jimi Hendrix, Bob Dylan, Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, Heart, The Moody Blues, The Grateful Dead, The Who, Crosby Stills […]
William Least Heat Moon, the great explorer and describer of places familiar and obscure, has made a career of reflecting on the meaning of motion. It was he who, in his book Roads to Quoz, introduced the notion that when we travel a road we have traveled before, we are moving through a landscape of […]
The New York Times has spoken (again), so it must be true: If the Keystone XL pipeline’s critical leg from the Canadian border to Kansas isn’t completed, most of the synthetic oil gleaned from the thick goo mined in in northern Alberta won’t find a market anywhere else. But that begs the question of why […]
In this installment of Energy News of Note, we focus on the downside of shifting energy fortunes, and government allegations that JPMorgan Chase manipulated energy prices to boost the apparent value of money-losing power plants. We welcome your suggestions for future ENN items. As always, we’re interested in the entire spectrum of energy-related topics, from consumer […]
We don’t give much thought to what’s buried under us because we can’t see it. But to get an idea of what’s underground, picture a route map in the back of an airline in-flight magazine. There are more than 1.5 million miles of natural gas transmission and distribution pipelines criss-crossing the United States. Since nearly 30 […]
If you, like me, wince a little every time you fill up at the gas station, I’ve got, as the old joke line goes, some good news, and I’ve got some bad news. The good news: gas prices have come down from their painful and unusual winter peak near $3.90 a gallon. Nationally the average […]
There has been quite a bit written lately about how cities are surprisingly energy efficient. But one area where cities don’t fare as well is with the energy consumed by cars and trucks that crawl through the streets, many of them simply looking for a parking space. According to this study by the UCLA Department […]
We at Energy Viewpoints run across lots of interesting headlines each week – far more than we can possibly address with individual blog entries. To keep these nuggets from passing unnoticed, we came up with Energy News of Note (ENN), an occasional roundup of the best we can find. We hope you’ll like it, and […]
You would think that with gas prices creeping back up toward $4 again this past winter, people would be lining up to buy electric cars. At today’s utility rates, what you’ll pay charging an electric car at home is around $1 to $2 per hour of operation. That works out to 20 to 25 percent […]