News Headline

High-Speed Train Advocates Hopeful

OurFuture.org Staff — Wed, 27 Aug 2008 11:44:13 -0400

American advocates of high-speed train travel have dreamed of a day when travelers in the U.S. would zip from city to city faster than they could drive and nearly as fast as they could fly. Those dreams were always dashed by financial realities and political impediments. That was before $4-a-gallon gasoline, ever-worsening highway traffic jams and financially strapped airlines cutting the number of flights. Advocates of high-speed rail say the nation is primed like never before to accept a kind of transportation that has never quite caught on in the land of the automobile. Surging gas prices, congested highways and airports, and soaring air fares all are contributing to an increasing demand for passenger rail, says Mark Yachmetz of the Federal Railroad Administration.

Railways Getting Crowded

OurFuture.org Staff — Wed, 27 Aug 2008 11:42:40 -0400

Rising costs of traveling by air and car, brought on by record oil prices, drew a record 2.8 million people onto America's cash-strapped passenger railway network in July, the largest of any single month in Amtrak's 37-year history and up nearly 14 percent from a year earlier. But as passenger numbers grow, so too are complaints of overcrowding and delays.

Ancient Power Grid Stalls Wind Energy

OurFuture.org Staff — Wed, 27 Aug 2008 11:39:56 -0400

The dirty secret of clean energy is that while generating it is getting easier, moving it to market is not. The grid today, according to experts, is a system conceived 100 years ago to let utilities prop each other up, reducing blackouts and sharing power in small regions. It resembles a network of streets, avenues and country roads. While the United States today gets barely 1 percent of its electricity from wind turbines, many experts are starting to think that figure could hit 20 percent. Achieving that would require moving large amounts of power over long distances. Builders are also contemplating immense solar-power stations in the nation’s deserts that would pose the same transmission problems. The grid’s limitations are putting a damper on such projects already.

States Sue EPA on Oil Refineries

OurFuture.org Staff — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 13:55:01 -0400

Twelve states, including New York, are suing the Environmental Protection Agency over greenhouse gas emissions from oil refineries. The lawsuit, led by Attorney General Andrew M. Cuomo of New York, accuses the agency of violating the federal Clean Air Act by refusing to issue standards, known as new source performance standards, for controlling the emissions. In a ruling last year, the Supreme Court found that the agency had the power to regulate greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act. Since then, the agency's director has said it is the job of Congress to regulate them.

Oil Rises Over Russian Tensions

OurFuture.org Staff — Fri, 22 Aug 2008 10:07:46 -0400

Crude oil prices have climbed sharply, after soaring in their biggest rally for three months, as tensions between the West and Russia escalated. Fresh political tensions between Russia and the US are fueling the rally, after Russia said yesterday that it would respond with more than just a diplomatic protest to a US deal with Poland to station parts of a U.S. missile defense shield in Poland. There are also concerns about when Russia would pull all its troops out of Georgia, which it invaded earlier this month.

Speculators Dominate Oil Trading Market

OurFuture.org Staff — Fri, 22 Aug 2008 09:40:02 -0400

Regulators had long classified a private Swiss energy conglomerate called Vitol as a trader that primarily helped industrial firms that needed oil to run their businesses. But when the Commodity Futures Trading Commission examined Vitol's books last month, it found that the firm was in fact more of a speculator, holding oil contracts as a profit-making investment rather than a means of lining up the actual delivery of fuel. The discovery revealed how an individual financial player had gained enormous sway over the oil market without the knowledge of regulators. Other CFTC data showed that a significant amount of trading activity was concentrated in the hands of just a few speculators.

China Besting U.S. on Green Tech

OurFuture.org Staff — Fri, 22 Aug 2008 09:34:50 -0400

Jim Rogers, chief executive of Duke Energy Corp., went to the World Affairs Council with a message about China — the Asian giant is ready to pass the United States as a leader in energy technology. China, he said, already leads the world in manufacturing solar energy panels. Next year the country will become the world’s top manufacturer of wind turbines. “They are living the balanced solution on energy,” he told his audience. “They are making it happen while we are still talking about it.” He said China is putting its economy first, but they are not ignoring the environment. Rogers said China is creating the technology and developing “the creativity and the brain power to ... blow by the United States” on green energy. And it is creating jobs for its future.

New York Mayor Eyes Wind Power

OurFuture.org Staff — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 04:12:37 -0400

New York City will likely benefit more from energy efficiency and conservation than mounting wind turbines on city skyscrapers and bridges. Mayor Michael Bloomberg asked renewable energy developers to propose ideas for generating wind energy and other pollution-free power sources within the city's five boroughs. Along with offshore wind farms, other ideas included tidal and solar power and geothermal energy. Responses are due Sept. 19.

Iraq to Revive Oil Deal With Chilna

OurFuture.org Staff — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 00:25:02 -0400

Iraq is on the verge of reviving an 11-year-old contract with China worth $1.2 billion, its largest oil deal since the invasion in 2003, an Oil Ministry official said. The deal sets new terms for an agreement reached between China and Iraq under Saddam Hussein in 1997. Unlike that agreement, which included production-sharing rights, the new one is a service contract, under which China would be paid for its work at the Ahdab oil field southeast of Baghdad but would not be a partner in the profits.

Companies Bid on Offshore Oil Leases

OurFuture.org Staff — Tue, 19 Aug 2008 22:42:01 -0400

The Interior Department received 423 bids from 47 companies to explore a swath of the Gulf of Mexico off Texas. The bids cover 319 of the 3,412 tracts the federal government put up for lease, or about 10% of the 18 million acres available. The preliminary results of the lease sale underscore the problems politicians face in arguing for more domestic drilling to ease high energy prices: Making more land available does not necessarily mean it will be drilled. Also, most offers — 237 — were for 10-year terms, an extended timetable that will have little impact on gasoline prices now.