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MORNING ENERGY NEWS  |  7.16.2019
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You think Sunday's blackout was a cascading and widespread failure? You ain't seen nothin' yet!


New York Post (7/15/19) reports: "Con Edison warned Monday that New Yorkers may have to endure another blackout this weekend, when the temperature is expected to reach a sweltering 97 degrees — and feel like 106. 'We expect that there could be service outages — those things happen during heat waves,' company spokesman Mike Clendenin said. Later in the day, Con Ed further fueled fears of a potential power outage when it completely backtracked and blamed a fault in a 13,000-volt power cable that caught fire for triggering Saturday’s blackout....He also said an investigation into the cause of the blackout was ongoing and would take time to complete — echoing remarks on Sunday by Con Ed President Timothy Cawley, who said the company couldn’t explain 'the cascading or sort of the widespread nature of the failure.'"



"Compounding the [fuel economy mandate] issue is the unlawful pressure that the state of California has placed on every other state in the nation, and on Michigan’s automobile manufacturers."

 

– Jason Hayes, Mackinac Center

Can we learn a political lesson here? By nearly tripling the CAFE penalty at random, Obama made the historic norm look out of step.


E&E News (7/15/19) reports: "The Trump administration is lowering penalties for automakers that fail to meet corporate average fuel economy requirements. In a final rule published late Friday, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration said it was instituting a $5.50 penalty rate for automakers that fall short of the CAFE requirements. The move, which was first reported by Reuters, effectively kills an Obama-era regulation that more than doubled the penalty rate, from $5.50 to $14. The CAFE standards require vehicles to travel farther on a single tank of gas, thus conserving oil and reducing pollution. The penalty rate applies to every 0.1 mile per gallon. Environmentalists blasted the development, saying it would let polluters off the hook. 'This is yet another example of the Trump administration telling polluters they don't need to take the rules seriously,' said Dave Cooke, a senior vehicles analyst at the Union of Concerned Scientists.'"

It's not that the Dems are lazy, it's that they just don't care.


The Hill (7/15/19) reports: "The president of the United Mine Workers of America characterized the progressive Green New Deal's goal of transitioning to renewable energy over 10 years as 'almost impossible.' The Green New Deal, introduced by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) and Sen. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) earlier this year, aims to cut greenhouse emissions in half by shifting to 100 percent renewable energy over the next decade. The proposal also calls for creating millions of 'good, high-wage' jobs to achieve that goal. 'It’s almost impossible to transition in 10 years away from fossil fuels even if everybody was for it,' Cecil Roberts told Hill.TV on Monday. 'It just can’t really be done but if you did do that, you’re going to have a massive, terrible economic problem on your hands.'"

What's the cultural impact of energy insecurity?


The Guardian (7/11/19) reports: "Kenya has been urged to halt construction of the country’s first ever coal-powered plant near the coastal town of Lamu, until an assessment is made of its environmental and cultural impact, in the latest setback to the $2bn project (£1.6bn). Plans for the 981MW station, backed by a Chinese-led consortium, are in limbo after Kenyan judges revoked the environmental licence at the end of June. They ruled the authorities had failed to carry out a rigorous environmental assessment and to inform local people of potential impacts."

"Be a hero for nature."


Buzzfeed News (7/11/19) reports: "The World Wide Fund for Nature is keeping evidence of brutal crimes under wraps — including the gang rape and torture of pregnant women by rangers backed by the charity at a national park in the Democratic Republic of Congo. A confidential report commissioned by the global megacharity and the Congolese government, and obtained by BuzzFeed News, includes testimony that rangers from Salonga National Park whipped and raped four women carrying fish by a river. Two of the women were pregnant and one later had a miscarriage. The draft report also found evidence that rangers from the park — which is funded by the US and German governments — had killed one villager and tortured others by tying their penises with fishing lines. The findings were submitted in March this year but have not been made public, and two legal experts who worked on the report said their investigation was cut short and that they were prevented from looking into other alleged crimes."

Energy Markets

 
WTI Crude Oil: ↑ $59.77
Natural Gas: ↓ $2.37
Gasoline: $2.79
Diesel: $3.01
Heating Oil: ↑ $195.61
Brent Crude Oil: ↑ $66.71
US Rig Count: ↑ 1001

 
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