Tag Archives: energy

Lauren Blosse Natural Resources Defense Council Joins AGA to Promote ‘Full-Fuel-Cycle’ Measurements for Appliances

Posted on September 17, 2009 by Lauren Blosse | Comments Off


The esteemed Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), known in Washington and around the country as the most effective environmental action organization, has banded together with AGA for an important cause- to improve the way the “carbon footprints” of our appliances are measured.

The two groups released a joint statement today urging Congress to heed the recommendations of a National Academies study, released in May, which concludes that a “full-fuel-cycle” measurement for appliances will give consumers the most scientifically accurate information about the energy consumption of their purchases.

Currently, the Department of Energy measures efficiency at the “site source” of an appliance – for example, the burner tip on your stovetop.  But that type of measurement doesn’t take into account the amount of energy lost along the way in the production, generation, and distribution of the fuel, i.e., the full-fuel-cycle.

So it’s fair to say that right now, consumers are only getting part of the energy efficiency equation when they purchase an appliance, and the National Academies, AGA and now NRDC have set out to help customers see the true size of their carbon footprint.

Visit this link for more.

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Andrew Soto Explaining dispatch in relation to energy

Posted on September 2, 2009 by Andrew Soto | Comments Off


How simple would it be to use electricity from renewable resources rather than coal or nuclear?  The answer may lie partly in the dispatch characteristics of the generating facilities.  Because electricity cannot be economically stored on a system-wide basis, electricity supply must match demand at all times during the day.  So, when demand is low much of the electric generating capacity on the system is turned off.  As demand increases throughout the day, capacity is added to meet the demand.   In general, electric plants can be categorized by when they are turned on or “dispatched” to meet demand.  Some plants are baseload, i.e, they run all of the time – 24/7; some plants are intermediate, i.e., they run mostly during the day during significant demand hours; and some plants are peaking, i.e., they run only in the hours when they are needed the most.  The order in which generating plants are dispatched is largely a function of price – cheapest first.

However, the ability of a plant to turn on and turn off in response to changes in electricity demand can vary with the fuel used to generate the electricity.  For example, nuclear power plants take a long time to turn on and provide electricity to the grid, and the use of nuclear fuel is highly regulated.  Consequently, once a nuclear unit is on, it generally stays on until it has to be refueled or be brought down for maintenance.  So, nuclear plants are almost exclusively baseload plants.  Coal plants also have long ramp up times.  They are generally baseload or intermediate plants.  On the other hand, natural gas-fired generators have fairly short ramp up times and are often used as peaking plants.

Based on these dispatch characteristics, I doubt that renewable resources would end up displacing nuclear generation – not necessarily an undesirable outcome from a carbon standpoint.  However, intermittent renewable resources such as wind or solar may have a hard time displacing coal-fired generation unless they can show themselves to be good baseload or intermediate resources.  It may be the case that renewables will displace gas-fired generation because gas plants can more easily turn on and off in response to changes in the amount of electricity capable of being generated from wind or solar – a potentially undesirable outcome from a carbon standpoint.

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Tom Moskitis House Begins Series of OCS Hearings

Posted on February 13, 2009 by Tom Moskitis | Comments Off


The House Committee on Natural Resources began a series of oversight hearings designed to look at our current offshore drilling policy, and to determine where we may need to go next. This first hearing featured a panel of witnesses from environmental groups. Two additional hearings scheduled for later this month will feature witnesses from state governments and the oil and gas production industry.

Opening the hearing yesterday, Committee Chairman Nick Rahall (D-WV) told the environmentalists “I understand your desire to see the (oil and gas leasing) moratoria reinstated. However, we may be in a situation where the ship has already sailed.” Although he derided chants made at last year’s Republican National Convention to “drill, baby, drill,” Rahall stated that “the political reality may be that the moratoria, as we knew it, will not be reimposed.”

This did not sit well with the day’s two star witnesses, actor Ted Danson, a board member of conservationist group Oceana, and Philippe Cousteau, a board member of the Ocean Conservancy and grandson of famed ocean explorer Jacques Cousteau. They repeatedly spoke in opposition to ALL offshore oil and gas development, not just drilling in new areas, on the grounds that the products produced were fossil fuels that, when consumed, would increase the level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, which is absorbed by the earth’s oceans, which then become more acidic, resulting in the death of all life in the sea. What?  I don’t know about you but this seems like it may be more science fiction than scientific. They were fine with the development of alternative energy on the Outer Continental Shelf (OCS), such as wind and harnessing tides and currents, so long as no environmental damage is done.

What do you think about all this? I think that with OPEC meeting next month to decide on steps to take to increase the price of oil, our country must aggressively develop all sources of energy, renewable, alternative and conventional. And this most emphatically means more exploration and production of clean natural gas from as much of the federal OCS as possible.

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Tom Moskitis Secretary Salazar takes objective approach to OCS

Posted on February 12, 2009 by Tom Moskitis | Comments Off


In an earlier posting I discussed how I was looking forward with cautious optimism toward how our new Secretary of the Interior would act following the expiration of the decades old ban on oil and gas leasing on the Outer Continental Shelf (OCS). Secretary Ken Salazar could have come out in favor of reinstating the OCS leasing bans or he could have scrapped the proposed 2010-2015 OCS Oil & Gas Leasing Plan and started over with a new plan.

But he did neither and instead has announced an extension of the comment period for the proposed new plan and a major effort to learn as much as possible about the energy potential of the federal OCS.

At a press conference on February 10, Secretary Salazar announced his strategy for developing an offshore energy plan that includes both conventional and renewable resources. His strategy includes expediting renewable energy rulemaking for the OCS, assembling  a detailed report from Interior agencies on conventional and renewable offshore energy resources and holding, within 30 days of the report’s publication, four regional conferences to review the report’s findings and to seek public comment.

Secretary Salazar will host one meeting in Alaska, one on the Pacific Coast, one on the Atlantic Coast and one on the Gulf Coast (dates and locations TBD.) He has also, as mentioned, extended the comment period on the proposed new 5-Year Plan for oil and gas leasing on the OCS by 180 days, until September 23, 2009. As you may know, one of the last action’s of the Bush Administration was the issuance of a proposed new 5-Year OCS oil and gas leasing plan to run from 2010 till 2015. The proposed plan included a deadline for public comment of March 23.

The Secretary’s action extends that deadline by six months. A copy of the statement from the Department of the Interior can be found here.

I think our Interior Secretary is taking a very objective approach to the OCS and I am encouraged. Secretary Salazar has said that he wants all interested parties to share their recommendations on how to move ahead with a comprehensive offshore energy plan. In that regard, AGA will be commenting on the plan and I urge you to be thinking about sending in comments as well and/or attending and speaking out at one of the upcoming regional conferences.

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