Remember VHS? Imagine this: VHS has been a staple of the American way of watching television and movies. VHS has supported countless manufacturing jobs, and even though there are better products out there, let’s face it: We need a variety of ways to watch our programs. The states and local economies that have VHS production facilities have experienced and benefited from VHS production, but without a little help from the taxpayers, jobs will be lost and the industry will atrophy. VHS production has bipartisan support, will be good for American …
Today, Senators Jim DeMint (R–SC) and Mike Lee (R–UT) introduced legislation that would move the United States a giant step forward in making our country’s energy market freer by eliminating targeted tax credits for energy sources and technologies. Their legislation, a companion to Representative Mike Pompeo’s (R–KS) bill, would force any tax policy that picks certain industries as winners and losers in the market to expire at the end of the year and expedite sunsets for tax credits extending multiple years. And it goes after all targeted tax credits: oil, …
President Obama has been on a kick to promote natural gas production. He said in his State of the Union address, “And by the way, it was public research dollars, over the course of 30 years, that helped develop the technologies to extract all this natural gas out of shale rock—reminding us that government support is critical in helping businesses get new energy ideas off the ground.” There are two very big problems with this statement. First, it makes it sound as if the government invented the technology, commercialized it, …
In his State of the Union address, President Obama emphasized, “We don’t begrudge financial success in this country. We admire it.” That may be the case if you make iPods, iPads, and iPhones, but when it is “big oil” (i.e., stockholders, pension funds, and IRAs investing in oil companies) that has a successful quarter, let the public onslaught commence. The most recent attack has been legislatively, when Representative Dennis Kucinich (D–OH) introduced “the Gas Price Spike Act.” The provisions in the bill threaten the entrepreneurial spirit and our system of …
Whether he likes it or not, President Obama’s logic-defying but unsurprising decision to deny TransCanada the permit to construct a 1,700-mile long pipeline to deliver up to 830,000 barrels of oil per day from Alberta, Canada, to Gulf Coast refineries put the ball in Congress’s court—and some Members are seizing that opportunity. On January 24, Representative Ted Poe (R–TX) and 11 co-sponsors, including Representative Dan Boren (D–OK) introduced the Keystone For a Secure Tomorrow Act (K-FAST) that would approve TransCanada’s permit submitted to the Department of State (DOS) on September …
The Department of Energy’s (DOE) Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E) is a program designed to fund high-risk, high-reward projects that the private sector would not embark upon on its own. ARPA-E has as its mission reducing energy imports, increasing energy efficiency, and reducing energy-related emissions, including greenhouse gases. The program is meant to “focus on creative ‘out-of-the-box’ transformational energy research that industry by itself cannot or will not support due to its high risk but where success would provide dramatic benefits for the nation.” The House Committee on Science, Space …
In President Obama’s statement denying TransCanada’s Keystone XL pipeline, he said, “The rushed and arbitrary deadline insisted on by congressional Republicans prevented a full assessment of the pipeline’s impact, especially the health and safety of the American people, as well as our environment.” The President referred to a five-page Department of State (DOS) report that echoed why he decided in November 2011 to postpone the decision until after the 2012 election. Despite a rigorous, three-year environmental review with multiple comment periods, DOS recommended that the current route was not satisfactory …
President Obama’s politically intoned decision to reject TransCanada’s permit application to construct a 1,700-mile pipeline from Alberta, Canada, to Texas refineries sent a clear message that special interest demands are of more importance than more energy and much-needed job creation. Building the pipeline would bring over 700,000 barrels of oil per day and directly create 20,000 truly shovel-ready jobs. The Canadian Energy Research Institute estimates that current pipeline operations and the addition of the Keystone XL pipeline would create 179,000 American jobs by 2035. Since TransCanada and Nebraska politicians have …
Last week, Representative Ed Markey (D–CA) sent a letter to Secretary of Energy Stephen Chu questioning whether exporting natural gas would benefit American businesses and consumers. He wrote, “I am worried that exporting America’s natural gas would raise energy costs for American consumers, reduce the global competitiveness of U.S. businesses, make us more dependent on foreign sources of energy, and slow our transition away from fossil fuels.” Natural gas prices have been consistently low in the United States for the past two years but much higher abroad. If the price …
Youngstown, Ohio, had a rockin’ New Year’s Eve, but not the kind it hoped for—a 4.0 magnitude earthquake shook the city just one week after a 2.7 magnitude earthquake hit. Fortunately, there was no significant damage or injuries; the focus has primarily been on the cause of the earthquake. Although no definitive connection has been made, seismologists are pointing to oil and gas activity as a likely culprit; consequently, Ohio state officials indefinitely closed five wells used to store wastewater from natural gas drilling. D&L Energy, the owners of the …
