Moving to post-parody

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DAILY ENERGY NEWS | 06/14/2023

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Not sure if this is real or something from SNL.

Climate Wire (6/13/23) reports: "When Florida Power & Light Co. held its hurricane drill this year, it rolled out a new piece of equipment: a trailer mounted with six charging stations for electric vehicles. The custom-built trailer spends most of its time connected to a solar array at a microgrid in Palm Beach County, Fla., charging its onboard batteries. But it’s designed to be hauled to roadside stops along evacuation routes to power up cars carrying people away from hurricanes. The trailer is a small sign of big changes in coastal states. Power companies, transportation officials and even the venerable AAA are looking for ways to help the growing number of people who drive electric vehicles evacuate during storms and get back home in the aftermath. 'We think about our EV network in the same way we think about our energy grid. It’s critical infrastructure,” said Crystal Stiles, who manages EV charging at Florida Power & Light. Congress included $7.5 billion in the 2021 infrastructure law for building a network of high-speed vehicle chargers, known as the National Electric Vehicle Initiative. Florida, which has weathered three major hurricanes since 2017, has the most electric vehicles of any state except California. The state needs 5,000 charging points to keep pace with the spree of EV sales. Electric cars are expected to make up 26 percent of light-duty vehicles in Florida within a few years, up from about 1 percent now, Stiles said. The state Department of Transportation noted the need for a network of direct current chargers, which are the fastest type, in the plan it submitted to the federal government for the National Electric Vehicle Initiative."

"CPSC, EPA, Department of Energy. It’s the same thing for all of them: that indescribable thrill of exercising the vast federal power and showing who’s boss and making everybody’s life just a little bit worse by imposing your version of virtue by force."

– Francis Menton,
Manhattan Contrarian

Coming out of its...

Bloomberg (6/13/23) reports: "Shell Plc will increase its dividend 15% and boost natural gas production as new Chief Executive Officer Wael Sawan refocuses on the fossil fuels that drove record profits last year. It’s part of a pivot by the European oil major to expand the most profitable parts of its business, even if they are carbon-intensive, while scaling back ventures that don’t make high enough returns. The company reiterated its pledge to achieve net-zero emissions by 2050, but didn’t present a clear plan to achieve that target. 'We will invest in the models that work — those with the highest returns that play to our strengths,' Sawan said in a statement. The CEO and his management team will lay out more details of the plan to shareholders at a presentation in New York later on Wednesday. Shell has been gradually building back its dividend since former CEO Ben van Beurden slashed it during the depths of the pandemic. While the latest increase will still leave the payout about 30% below the pre-Covid level, the move may help convince investors that the company can be a reliable source of cash, like its more highly valued American peers. Shell will now seek to grow its integrated gas business and stabilize oil output to 2030, after cutting production by about 20% from a peak in 2019. That follows in the footsteps of BP Plc, which rolled back its plans to cut oil production earlier this year. Investors rewarded that move with a 15% jump in BP’s share price. Shell shares rose as much as 0.5% to 2307.5 pence as of 10:20 a.m. in London."