Expedite wind and solar – but block coal, oil, gas, pipelines, jobs and economic recovery
“This
is not the same industry we had 15 years ago,” Natural Gas Supply Association
VP Jennifer Fordham said recently. That’s an understatement. The oil,
petrochemical and manufacturing industries are also far different from those of
15 years ago. Together, they’ve created hundreds of thousands of new jobs and
generated countless billions of dollars in economic activity. No thanks to the
Obama Administration.
From
EPA to Interior and even the Energy Department, the Administration continues to
display a strong animosity toward fossil fuels. Its war on coal has hounded
mines, power plants, jobs and communities. Its opposition to the Keystone XL pipeline has thwarted the creation of tens
of thousands of construction jobs. Its bans on leasing, drilling and hydraulic
fracturing on federal
onshore and offshore lands have caused a 6% drop in oil
production from those lands and a 28% plunge in natural gas output – costing
thousands of jobs and tens of billions in bonus, rent, royalty and tax revenues
to the U.S. Treasury.
Nevertheless,
you’d think Obama regulators and policy makers would support natural gas
pipelines. Even the Sierra Club promoted this fuel as a “clean alternative to
coal” just a couple years ago. But no.
The fracking revolution
on America’s state and
private lands has unleashed a gusher of mammoth proportions.
In just six years, 2008-2014, it has generated a 58% increase in oil production
(from 5 million to 8 million barrels per day) – and a 21% rise in natural gas
production. By the end of this year, U.S. crude oil production is projected to reach 9 million
bpd. In the Marcellus Shale region, gas production is expected to reach 16 billion
cubic feet a day, twice the volume of only two years ago.
However,
this miraculous cornucopia is overwhelming the nation’s existing delivery
systems and, far from striving to eliminate the bottleneck, the Obama
Administration is creating new ones.
Not
having the Keystone pipeline to transport Upper Midwest crude to refineries has
forced oil companies to move that oil by train. Rail accidents have caused
spills and deaths, but the regulatory focus has been on stronger tanker cars,
with insufficient attention paid to track maintenance and safety – or
pipelines.
Insufficient
natural gas pipelines mean producers cannot deliver this vital fuel to homes,
hospitals, factories and electricity generating plants, or to petrochemical
plants that use it as a feed stock for literally thousands of products. Pipeline
companies are clamoring for construction permits.
With
supplies rising, prices for oil and natural gas are declining. Global crude oil
prices have fallen more than $20 a barrel and are cheaper in the United States
than in Europe. Natural gas prices in the Marcellus area have been
about half the U.S. benchmark price, which is below $4 per thousand cubic feet
(mcf), compared to prices as high as $9 or even $20 per mcf (or Btu)
in Europe and Asia. As a result, despite a clear need for gas, some drillers
are re-examining their Marcellus plans, and an estimated 1,750 Pennsylvania
natural gas wells are not currently
producing because
pipeline connections are not available.
Natural
gas pipelines also ensure energy conservation and reduce air pollution. A North Dakota pipeline would collect gas produced with
crude oil, eliminating the need to “flare” the gas. But permit delays, largely
by federal agencies, mean enough gas to heat 160,000 homes goes up in smoke
every month.
Why
are pipelines lagging behind production? First, pipeline companies build new
capacity only when there is a demonstrated need. Second, and most important,
pipeline permit approvals are being delayed.
A
2013 INGAA Foundation
study found that
the number of interstate natural gas pipeline authorizations issued more than
90 days after federal environmental assessments were completed climbed from 8%
to 28% since Congress passed the 2005 Energy Policy Act. Rather than
streamlining permits, as Congress had intended, the law had the opposite
effect. It removed the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission’s ability to keep
project reviews on a strict schedule, allowed both state and federal agencies
to drag their heels on pipeline permitting, and opened the door to more
objections by environmental pressure groups.
Authorization
delays were caused by conflicts among federal agencies, as well as inadequate
or under-trained agency staff, applicant changes to projects requiring
additional or revised environmental review (often in response to
environmentalist or other third-party protests and demands), site-access
problems, and FERC and other agency reviews of requirements for mitigating
asserted environmental impacts, INGAA concluded. Increased
partisanship at
FERC has also increased delays.
The
Obama Army Corps of Engineers slowed pipeline permits by citing the Clean Water
Act. Its Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) cited the Migratory Bird Treaty Act
to justify slow-walking permits. Its Environmental Protection Agency wants to
control all “waters of the United States” (WOTUS),
so as to exert regulatory authority over activities on federal, state and private lands –
including drilling, frackingand pipelines – in the name of
sustainability, climate change prevention and other
eco-mantras.
The
MBTA bans the “taking” (harassing, harming, killing, capturing or wounding) of
migratory birds, their nests and eggs related to natural gas pipelines and
other projects. Because building a pipeline requires clearing a right-of-way,
excavating and other activities that could affect wildlife for a short time, a
permit is required. But native grasses soon cover the route, and
state-of-the-art steel, valves and safety features greatly reduce the likelihood
of ruptures and spills, compared to earlier generation pipelines.
And
yet the Obama FWS drags its feet on pipeline permits – while approving numerous
renewable energy projects beloved by the President and his “green” base,
including massive wind turbines that slaughter millions of eagles, hawks, bats
and other threatened, endangered and migratory species every year.
The
FWS also blessed the huge Ivanpah Solar Electric Generating
System on the Nevada/California border. It uses 300,000 mirrors to reflect the
sun’s rays onto three 40-story water-filled towers to produce steam and
generate electricity. Eagles, owls, falcons and other birds that fly between
the solar panels and towers become “streamers,” because the 500-degree heat
turns them into smoking, disintegrating corpses as they plummet to earth.
There’s little left to find or bury – making it easy for Big Solar regulators,
operators and promoters to claim “minimal” wildlife impacts. In fact, during the Ivanpah project’s
environmental review, the FWS focused on desert tortoises and missed the bird crematorium
issue.
Meanwhile,
the Bureau of Land Management unveiled a sweeping plan that would revise
longstanding resource management plans, to install buffer zones around
“sensitive” Gunnison sage grouse habitats, impose seasonal restrictions on oil
and gas drilling and livestock grazing, and close roads and trails wherever
grouse are present. But in the midst of this effort, BLM and various state
governments are also working to streamline “eco-friendly” solar, wind, geothermal and
transmission line projects that they claim will reduce “dangerous” carbon
dioxide emissions. Natural gas would do that, too, of course.
Natural
gas is clean, affordable and reliable – if it can reach consumers through
pipelines, which are the safest form of energy transportation. Unfortunately,
the Obama principle seems to be: If it requires subsidies, raises energy
prices, costs jobs, impacts thousands of acres, and butchers birds and bats –
expedite approval. If it generates royalty and tax revenues, produces reliable,
affordable energy, creates jobs, and has minimal impacts on endangered and
migratory species – delay or ban it. Talk about crazy.
The
administration’s fixation on ideological environmentalism is not helping the
environment, the economy, or consumers. It is a political ploy designed to
garner liberal votes and rake in more money from campaign donors like
Tom Steyer, the billionaire hedge fund manager who got his money from
coal.
America
needs more pipelines. The Obama Administration needs to let industry build
them. Perhaps a reconstituted Senate (with Harry Reid as Minority Leader) can
lead the way. America will prosper!
Source:
http://joeforamerica.com/2014/11/obama-war-pipelines/
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