Utica shale gets infrastructure boost with new processing plant

Posted on 05/09/2013 by EnergyWire

(Photo by Penn State via Creative Commons)

By Peter Behr

Another link in an industrial chain Ohio hopes to see growing around the Utica Shale play was added Tuesday with the opening of a factory in Youngstown that builds natural gas processing equipment.

Houston-based Exterran Holdings Inc. said it built the 65,000-square-foot plant in northeast Ohio to be close to the Appalachian shale gas and oil plays. It has been supplying the region’s gas and oil operators from its Texas and Oklahoma plants.

“Our customers are actively participating in the development and production of oil and gas in this region, including the Marcellus and Utica shale plays, making this a natural geographic fit for us,” said Exterran President and CEO Brad Childers. The $13 million plant will ship its first completed units in about three weeks and will have 100 employees at full capacity, the company said. →

Advocates say Iowa utility’s plan doesn’t go far enough on efficiency

Posted on 05/07/2013 by Karen Uhlenhuth

(Photo by Jeff Gitchel via Creative Commons)

An Iowa utility with plans to build a new natural gas-fired power plant is also cutting back on efficiency efforts, in what advocates say is a case of misplaced priorities.

Several organizations have critiqued a five-year energy efficiency plan filed in November by Interstate Power and Light (IPL), one of three investor-owned utilities serving the state. Every five years, Iowa’s large power companies are required to submit a plan to state regulators for reducing energy consumption over the next five years.

Interstate’s latest proposal, to take effect on Jan. 1, left some of the state’s efficiency advocates underwhelmed.

“They’re leaving a lot of energy efficiency that is achievable on the table,” said Josh Mandelbaum, a Des Moines-based staff attorney for the Environmental Law & Policy Center. The center, together with the Iowa Environmental Council and the Iowa Policy Project, last month filed a response to Interstate’s plan. →

As Indiana gasification plant stalls, so does CO2 pipeline

Posted on 05/03/2013 by ClimateWire

A computer rendering of a proposed coal-to-gas plant near Rockport, Indiana. (Image via Indiana Gasification)

By Christa Marshall

A major “clean” coal project that was once viewed as a keystone for cleaning up the Midwest’s greenhouse gas emissions appears near collapse.

Wednesday, a spokesman for the Indiana Gasification project — which envisioned the capture and storage of carbon dioxide from a coal-to-gas facility in Rockport, Indiana — said the initiative was suspended and “likely dead” after passage of a bill in the state Legislature last weekend.

The $2.8 billion project’s suspension also stalls a first-of-its-kind CO2 pipeline from Denbury Resources that was considered a potential emissions game changer because it would have provided a link for additional, emissions-heavy Midwestern projects to carry captured carbon dioxide to enhanced oil recovery operations in the Gulf Coast. →

EPA official: Carbon rules for existing power plants ‘on the table’ in 2014

Posted on 04/12/2013 by Environment and Energy Daily

(Photo by Michael M. via Creative Commons)

By Jean Chemnick

Acting U.S. EPA Administrator Bob Perciasepe said on a call with reporters Wednesday that the agency would collaborate with states to curb greenhouse gases from existing power plants in an effort that would start in fiscal 2014.

On the call to discuss EPA’s new budget proposal, Perciasepe said the agency continues to review comments on its proposed new source performance standard for future power plants. The agency faces a statutory deadline Saturday to finalize the rule, but EPA hasn’t sent it yet to the Office of Management and Budget for review.

When the new power plants rule is finished, Perciasepe said, EPA looks forward to “working with states on existing sources, but we’re not there yet.”

He added, “But that’s certainly something that will be on the table in this next fiscal year.” →

Coal makes a comeback in Europe as conventional gas dries up

Posted on 04/03/2013 by EnergyWire

Open pit coal mining in Germany. (Photo by Rene Schwietzke via Creative Commons)

By Arthur Max

Europe’s declining competitiveness with U.S. industry has its leaders worried, but they admit having no hope of matching the shale revolution that is powering a revival of manufacturing across the Atlantic.

For Europe to remain in the game, energy taxes must be held in check and no new taxes levied, said the European Union’s energy commissioner, Gunther Oettinger.

Instead, Europe must use its energy more efficiently and the European Union’s 27 member countries should open their energy markets to cross-border competition, Oettinger said at a news conference last week in Brussels.

With its conventional gas fields nearly depleted and gas prices four times higher than in the United States, Europe would like to develop a thriving shale gas industry, but that seems unlikely in the near term. →

Intrigue in Illinois after House Speaker calls for fracking moratorium

Posted on 03/18/2013 by Kari Lydersen

$Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan surprised observers last week by announcing support for a two-year moratorium on fracking. (Associated Press)$

Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan surprised observers last week by announcing support for a two-year moratorium on fracking. (Associated Press)

Illinois House Speaker Mike Madigan’s statement last week that he supports a moratorium on fracking has thrown both industry and environmental groups for a loop.

Many had thought Madigan supported the fracking regulatory bill introduced last month and widely described as the strongest in the nation.

Now people close to the issue are not sure if Madigan has had a change of heart; they also speculate he was trying to pressure industry groups to agree to significant extraction (or severance) taxes for fracking.

Such taxes were indeed added to the bill as an amendment during a committee hearing Thursday. The committee was expected to vote on Friday whether to move the amended bill to the House floor for consideration by the full chamber, but that meeting was postponed.

Like the environmental provisions of the regulatory bill, the taxes apply to fracking for both gas and oil. →

Bakken’s top producer wants to snuff out natural gas flaring

Posted on 03/04/2013 by EnergyWire

(Photo by Craig Hennecke via Creative Commons)

By Saqib Rahim

Continental Resources Inc., the top producer in the Bakken Shale, plans to reduce natural gas flaring from its well sites to “as close to zero percent flaring as possible,” the company said Thursday.

That announcement may have been lost behind the company’s towering profit numbers; Continental reported net income of $739 million for 2012, a 72 percent gain versus 2011.

But buried in its annual report, Continental said it has halved its 2011 rate of flaring, a common practice in the Bakken Shale that has lit up environmentalists’ radar.

Continental joins other Bakken operators that say they are getting a handle on flaring and can drive it toward the zero mark in the coming years. →

In Illinois, environmentalists and industry compromise on fracking bill

Posted on 02/22/2013 by Kari Lydersen

$Illinois Rep. John Bradley, D-Marion, speaks to reporters during a news conference at the Illinois State Capitol Thursday to announce proposed new fracking regulations. (Associated Press / Seth Perlman)$

Illinois Rep. John Bradley, D-Marion, speaks to reporters during a news conference at the Illinois State Capitol Thursday to announce proposed new fracking regulations. (Associated Press / Seth Perlman)

Environmental leaders are calling a bill introduced Thursday in the Illinois legislature potentially the strongest measure nationwide for regulating hydraulic fracturing, also commonly known as fracking.

The legislation — called the “Bradley bill” after its sponsor, Rep. John Bradley — included nearly all the provisions that leaders of major environmental groups had expected after months of discussions with industry, legislators and the state’s attorney general.

“But there’s a caveat when saying (a fracking bill) is the ‘strongest in the nation,’” said Jennifer Cassel, a staff attorney with the Environmental Law and Policy Center (ELPC). “That’s not saying all that much – we don’t think the floor is high enough. It doesn’t mean we’re doing the most protective standards that could possibly be done.”

A representative of the oil and gas industry also described the bill as “not perfect by any means.” →

Illinois fracking rules could be strictest in the nation

Posted on 02/18/2013 by Kari Lydersen

(Photo by Randy von Liski via Creative Commons)

Illinois legislators are expected to introduce a bill in coming days or weeks that would regulate hydraulic fracturing in the state.

Known as Democratic Rep. John Bradley’s bill, it is expected to be shaped by months of discussions that have taken place among environmental and industry leaders and legislators. Last year, legislation that started with support from both environmental and industry groups died after undergoing various permutations, including the addition of a two-year fracking moratorium.

“We’re 85 percent there in terms of where the environmental groups, industry and the Attorney General’s office want it to be,” said Tom Wolf, executive director of the Energy Council of the Illinois Chamber of Commerce. “But the last 15 percent can sometimes be very difficult.” →

Coal’s other lives: Natural gas disrupts other key markets

Posted on 02/13/2013 by Kari Lydersen

Coal and iron ore piles outside a steel mill in the Netherlands. (Photo by Jules Stoop via Creative Commons)

Cheap natural gas is decimating demand for coal used in power plants — which accounts for the great majority of coal production. But coal is also crucial to other industries including steel, cement and even plastics.

Natural gas is also affecting such non-power roles of coal, but the full extent remains to be seen.

In 2012 coal use in power plants was expected to fall below 900 million short tons for the first time since 1996, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA), from more than a billion short tons burned in 2008.

After electricity production, coal’s second most prominent use is as a central component in making steel.

The coal used in steel production is referred to as “metallurgical,” with less sulfur and phosphorus and able to withstand higher temperatures than the “steam” or “thermal” coal used for power plants. Metallurgical coal is significantly more expensive than steam coal, and in the U.S. it is mined primarily in Appalachia.

The market for metallurgical coal is somewhat linked to the market for steam coal, according to National Mining Association spokesman Luke Popovitch. That’s partly because metallurgical coal can be used in power plants if desired, when steam coal prices are relatively high. →

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