Energy in BC & beyond

BC Hydro, March 11, 2010

BC Hydro has selected 19 projects for the award of electricity purchase agreements in the first set of awards under the Clean Power Call. The list of the selected Proposals can be viewed on the Selected Proposals page.

by Marvin Shaffer , Policy Notes, March 11, 2010

Every now and again you read something so outrageous you have to laugh. So it is with the report recently released by BC Citizens for Clean Energy: A Triple Legacy for Future Generations.

Rena Delbridge, Alaska Dispatch, March 6, 2010

Less and less oil is flowing through that engineering masterpiece that is the trans-Alaska oil pipeline, built in the 1970s to link the North Slope's liquid gold with insatiable markets.

By Dina O'Meara, Calgary Herald, March 3, 2010

Utilization recovers after painful 2009

CALGARY - Dire predictions of low drilling activity in Western Canada to start the year have faded, with rig utilization averaging a strong 60 per cent for January and February, according to an industry association.

By JEFF BARNARD, Associated Press, March 2, 2010

GRANTS PASS, Ore. — Senators from Oregon and Washington have joined with East Coast counterparts to file a bill in Congress that would return control over liquefied natural gas ports to the states.

By Lan Lan, China Daily, 2010-Feb-25

But country 'still committed' to reducing carbon intensity

China has no intention of capping its greenhouse gas emissions even as authorities are committed to realizing the nation's target to reduce carbon intensity through new policies and measures, the country's top climate change negotiators said yesterday.

Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), March 1, 2010

For immediate release (Stockholm/Oslo)

China is preparing for the Arctic being navigable during summer months. An ice-free Arctic would provide China shorter shipping routes, possible access to natural resources and the incentive for closer cooperation with Arctic nations, especially the Nordic countries. But it also raises the possibility of new international tensions, according to a new SIPRI study launched in Oslo today.

Liz Kalauger, Environmental Research Web, Feb 26, 2010

It's likely that commercial whaling has released around one hundred million tons of carbon to the atmosphere over a century or so. That's according to researcher Andrew Pershing, who believes that carbon credit schemes could be employed as an incentive to protect whales and large fish such as bluefin tuna.

Mark Hume, Globe and Mail, Mar. 03, 2010

Subsidies to oil and gas industry negates clean-energy initiatives, argue environmentalists

DAVID EBNER, Globe and Mail, Mar. 03, 2010

Province predicts three more years of deficits as Horn River and Montney fields' cash output undermined by lower gas prices

It's an equation that's written in red ink: Less revenue from more gas.

KAREN HOWLETT, Globe and Mail, Mar. 03, 2010

It was a tough-talking Premier Dalton McGuinty who warned last year that he wouldn't tolerate the "not-in-my-backyard" attitude of opponents to green-energy projects, his flagship job-creation initiative.

The BC government introduced its 2010/2011 budget on Tuesday, March 2, 2010.

Revenues $39.2 billion; Expenses $40.6b; Deficit $1.7b

By George Monbiot, the Guardian, 2nd March 2010

The feed-in tariffs about to be introduced here are extortionate, useless and deeply regressive.

By Dave Coper, Edmonton Journal, February 17, 2010

Tiny nuclear reactors originally designed to power mini-submarines could eventually replace wind power in a local firm's plans for storing energy as compressed gas in pipelines across North America.

SCOTT SIMPSON, Vancouver Sun, March 2, 2010

Terasen Gas will create 300 permanent jobs and 600 temporary ones in B.C. with a new in-house customer care program, the utility announced on Monday.

By ANNE C. MULKERN of Greenwire,New York Times,February 26, 2010

The oil industry's biggest trade group has nabbed one of the environmental community's top grass-roots organizers as it ramps up efforts to build a network of citizen lobbyists.

LYNN MOORE, Montreal Gazette, February 27, 2010

Premier Charest wants Washington and state authorities to recognize Hydro-Québec power as 'renewable' energy in various pieces of legislation

CBC News, Friday, February 26, 2010

The New Brunswick government is delaying the $3.2-billion sale of NB Power assets to Hydro-Québec for nearly two months in order to hold a full public debate on the controversial deal.

By Laura Drake, Edmonton Journal, February 25, 2010

EDMONTON — While Wiebo Ludwig and several supporters were camped near a well site overnight to protest the danger the industry poses, a natural gas well several kilometres away blew out, shooting flames into the sky.

CBC News, February 25, 2010

One of B.C.'s biggest natural gas plants is fouling the air because its smokestack is too short, CBC News has learned.

Shannon Montgomery, Globe and Mail, Wednesday, Feb. 24, 2010

Calgary — A new report says Alberta needs to completely rethink its conventional oil-and-gas royalty rates if it wants to compete for investment with other energy hotspots in North America.

By Shaun Thomas, The Northern View, February 23, 2010

On February 18, a meeting was held by the Douglas Channel Watch group in the Raven room at the Jim Ciccone Civic Centre to discuss the dangers that the Enbridge Northern Gateway Project could cause Kitimat and its surrounding communities - including Prince Rupert.

Ed Stoddard, National Post, Reuters, February 23, 2010

Many Americans are skeptical about global warming and that makes it harder to get a bill through Congress.

SCOTT SIMPSON, Vancouver Sun, February 24, 2010

Utilities commission also denies request to include ad material in Terasen bill statements

The British Columbia Utilities Commission has shot down a bid by natural gas marketers to widen their access to the B.C. residential gas market.

By Hanneke Brooymans, Edmonton Journal, January 20, 2010

Saddle Hills County residents live in a corner of the province with some of the highest numbers of accidents, mistakes and outright flouting of oilpatch regulations, a Journal analysis finds