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MORNING ENERGY NEWS  |  03/19/2020
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Solar panels or ventilators? 


Boston Herald (3/18/20) column: "Coronavirus is causing working-age people to worry about missing paychecks, caring for kids home from school, stockpiling groceries and canceling plans. But people in their 50s, 60s or older have bigger worries. Many are lying awake wondering if this is how they’re going to die. At its most severe, coronavirus attacks the lungs, making it impossible to breathe without a ventilator. Landing in the hospital on a ventilator is bad. But worse is being told you can’t have one. After learning that the state’s stockpile of medical equipment had 16,000 fewer ventilators than New Yorkers would need in a severe pandemic, Gov. Andrew Cuomo came to a fork in the road in 2015. He could have chosen to buy more ventilators. Instead, he asked his health commissioner, Howard Zucker to assemble a task force and draft rules for rationing the ventilators they already had...Cuomo could have purchased the additional 16,000 needed ventilators for $36,000 apiece or a total of $576 million in 2015. It’s a lot of money but less than the $750 million he threw away on a boondoggle 'Buffalo Billion' solar panel factory. When it comes to state budget priorities, spending half a percent of the budget on ventilators is a no-brainer."

"Americans who are self-quarantining themselves at home today need to look around them and think about what their lives would be like if they no longer had ample and affordable power, or natural gas to use to cook their meals. Because, make no mistake about it, that is what Biden and Sanders are really proposing."

 

– David Blackmon, Forbes

Have you heard of the six degrees of Kevin Bacon?  


E&E News (3/18/20) reports: "The coronavirus pandemic is not a climate crisis. But what if it were? Experts say global health emergencies can impart important lessons — and warning signs — about how to respond and adapt to climate change. Both phenomena are scientifically complex and confusing. They also reach across geographies, economies and social strata. For some, the parallel is clear...So far, the U.S. response to COVID-19 has in many ways mirrored the country's response to climate change, experts say. Those responses — both institutional and by individuals — reflect long-standing American culture as well as recent expressions of isolationism and the devaluation of science...'It's a fundamental theme of human nature, and it's bigger in American society than many others,' Frumkin said. 'When we face big societal-scale problems that need to be solved by collective action, are we willing and culturally inclined to do that?'"

Practice social distancing! Unless of course you feel need to wonder the halls of Congress looking for a handout.


E&E News (3/19/20) reports: "House Democrats and some corners of the renewable energy industry are looking to inject clean energy tax issues into negotiations surrounding the $1 trillion coronavirus economic package under assembly. Leaders of the Sustainable Energy and Environment Coalition (SEEC) are eyeing the next round of economic stimulus to revive the debate over the suite of clean energy tax breaks that were the subject of intense December negotiations between Congress and the White House, only for them to fall apart at the last minute...The American Energy Alliance, a longtime critic of renewable energy tax incentives, criticized the push to include the breaks in stimulus talks. 'Some Democrats in Congress are showing their true colors today,' said AEA President Thomas Pyle in a statement. 'Determined to never let a good crisis go to waste, they are seizing the coronavirus pandemic as an opportunity to slip failed green policies into legislation designed to protect the American economy and stop the spread of this deadly virus.'"

Major financial companies are interested in financing profitable projects. Imagine that.


Power Magazine (3/17/20) reports: "A new report from a half-dozen environmental groups says global banks financed $2.7 trillion of fossil fuel projects from December 2015, when the Paris Agreement on climate was reached, through year-end 2019...The report is backed by the Rainforest Action Network, BankTrack, Indigenous Environmental Network, Oil Change International, Reclaim Finance, and the Sierra Club. It tracks banks’ financial commitments to about 2,100 companies in the fossil fuel industry. The report notes that financing of fossil fuel projects is dominated by large U.S. banks, including JPMorgan Chase, Wells Fargo, Citi, and Bank of America. The report said those four institutions account for about 30% of all financing in the sector since the Paris Agreement was adopted...'These Green fundraising groups are completely tone deaf and incredibly insensitive to the world around them,' Dank Kish, senior vice president of policy for the American Energy Alliance, told POWER. 'They support policies that would have people freezing in the dark or without desperately needed medical attention during a worldwide pandemic like the one we are currently facing. They have no accountability or realistic solutions to meet our very real energy needs and their advice should be completely ignored.'" 

Disgusting.

Energy Markets

 
WTI Crude Oil: ↑ $22.43
Natural Gas: ↑ $1.62
Gasoline: ↓ $2.19
Diesel: ↓ $2.71
Heating Oil: ↑ $97.54
Brent Crude Oil: ↑ $26.04
US Rig Count: ↑ 812

 
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