President Obama once praised it as a shining example of America's clean energy future. "With projects like this one," he said at the site of a solar plant just before construction started, "we're putting Americans to work producing clean, home-grown American energy."
And his Department of Energy showered $1.6 billion in loan guarantees, as well as $600 million in tax credits.
The plant is the Ivanpah Solar Power Facility, a behemoth that uses hundreds of thousands of mirrors spread out over more than five square miles of the Mojave Desert. The mirrors all aim at the tops of three 459-foot towers, where the heat boils water in tanks held there, which generates steam to turn the electricity-producing turbines.
But it turns out that Ivanpah isn't so squeaky clean after all.
According to the Press Enterprise in Riverside, Calif. , Ivanpah emits enough CO2 that it will "be required to participate in the state's cap-and-trade program to reduce carbon emissions."
In its first year, Ivanpah emitted 46,000 metric tons of CO2. That's about as much as a Frito Lay plant in Bakersfield emits.
How is that possible? It turns out that the Ivanpah plant uses natural gas to function.
First, it burns natural gas to pre-heat the water at the top of the three towers before the sun comes up. Then, the Press Enterprise explains, it "has auxiliary gas boilers that kick in whenever cloud cover blocks the sun."
In another sign of the oil industry slowing down and infrastructure catching up in North Dakota, the state engineer’s office is discontinuing a program that allows irrigation permit holders to sell water to the oil industry for use in hydraulic fracturing.
The engineer’s office launched the Industrial Water Use in Lieu of Irrigation Policy, or ILOP, in 2011 as an emergency measure to meet the industry demand. The voluntary program allows farmers who held the permits to suspend their irrigation use for a season and use that water for fracking in the oil industry.
Vandalism at root of one spill; a fracking-related blow-out south of White Earth (separate incidents); The Bismarck Tribune is reporting:
First incident: The blowout of a well south of White Earth at 11 p.m. Saturday remains uncontrolled as the State Health Department’s new spill investigation team is on scene.
The department's team manager Bill Suess said Oasis brought in a well control team to stop the flow of oil and salt water. The Oil and Gas Division reports that approximately 8,200 barrels were spilled in the incident, with that number was still in flux as of late Monday.
Second incident:Health Department authorities also are reporting a separate 300-barrel spill in Williams County that was apparently caused when vandals opened two tank seals. Sixty barrels have been recovered so far, and it appears no water drainage has been impacted. An investigation is continuing. The vandalism was discovered Friday about 2 miles northwest of Tioga at a Murex Petroleum well.
Back to the first incident: At the blowout well, fluids are contained within the well pad berm, which is being pumped to prevent overflow, Suess said. An oily sheen from the blowout mist is visible on the White Earth River, and absorbent booms were placed there to prevent downstream contamination, he said. The river empties into Lake Sakakawea, 4 miles to the south.
The incident was caused when Oasis hydraulically fractured another nearby well, apparently causing this one to blow, even though it had been shut in to safeguard against exactly that outcome, according to Oil and Gas Division spokeswoman Alison Ritter. She said oil companies have to provide notice when they'll be fracking within 1,300 feet of an existing well, so operators can take necessary precautions.
The GDPNow model nowcast for real GDP growth (seasonally adjusted annual rate) in the third quarter of 2015 is 0.9 percent on October 14, down from 1.0 percent on October 9. The model's nowcast for real consumer spending growth in the third quarter fell from 3.6 percent to 3.2 percent after this morning's retail sales report from the U.S. Census Bureau. This was partly offset by an 0.1 percentage point increase in the nowcast for the contribution of inventory investment to third-quarter real GDP growth following this morning's update on retail inventories from the Census Bureau.
U.S. homebuilders have not felt this good about their business in a decade.
Sentiment jumped 3 points in October to a level of 64 on the National Association of Home Builders/Wells Fargo Housing Market Index. Anything above 50 is considered positive sentiment. The index stood at 54 last October.
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Maybe Green Energy Jobs Will Move The Needle
From "Lackluster" To "Dismal" In One Administration
Is the Labor Department preparing us for some "bad" news? CNBC is reporting:
Evidence is mounting that the jobs recovery's best days are in the rear view mirror.
Recent Labor Department indicators show that the employment market is tightening, with both fewer job openings and workers willing to leave their current jobs for better environs.
The Job Opening and Labor Turnover Survey, released last week, adds to signs that the market is maturing, and signals to Wall Street that hopes for future blockbuster nonfarm payrolls reports should be tempered.
"Don't expect the employment situation report to print nonfarm payrolls above 200,000 going forward," market strategists at New York-based brokerage Convergex said in a report. "The last two readings fell below that threshold and, unless more highly educated individuals enter the workforce, it's likely to stay there."
Indeed, the most recent payrolls reports have been lackluster, to say the least.
The September number showed just 142,000 new positions created, far less than the more than 200,000 economists had expected. August was even worse, with just 136,000 jobs, and though July's came in at a more respectable 223,000, that number was revised down from 245,000.
Paul Krugman has a solution. More deficit spending.
The US Nuclear Regulatory Commission has completed a series of measures needed before issuing an operating license to Tennessee Valley Authority for its 1,150-MW Watts Bar-2 unit, and could decide on the license in a "couple of weeks."
If issued, it would be the first operating license for a US power reactor since February of 1996, when NRC approved the operations of Watts Bar-1.
Macrumors is reporting that Apple drove electric motorcycle startup Mission Motors into bankruptcy.
Electric motorcycle startup Mission Motors
has ceased operations after losing some of its key talent to
competitors such as Apple, and failing to develop a viable business
model, according to Reuters.
As soon as I read that post, it became a bit clearer why Elon Musk said the things he did, and then tried to walk back those comments. Macrumors had that story also.
Elon Musk raised eyebrows yesterday when he called Apple the "Tesla Graveyard" in an interview with German newspaper Handelsblatt, but this afternoon he attempted to smooth things over with a series of tweets clarifying his stance on the company.
"Yo, I don't hate Apple," he said before stating "it's a great company with a lot of talented people." Musk says he loves Apple products and he's "glad they're doing an [electric vehicle]." [Sure.]
In the interview, Musk called Apple the Tesla Graveyard after being questioned about Apple hiring some of Tesla's "most important engineers." Musk laughed off the idea that important Tesla employees had left the company for Apple and said people Apple hired had already been fired from Tesla. "If you don't make it at Tesla, you go work at Apple," he said. "I'm not kidding."
Musk also made fun of products like the Apple Watch, the iPad Pro, and the Apple Pencil, comments that he explained in a bit more detail today. In a second tweet, Musk said he wasn't a fan of the Apple Watch's functionality, but expects it to be a much more compelling product in the future.
Elsewhere it was pointed out that the customer base for both Apple and Tesla (especially Apple fanboys) overlap. One disses Apple at its own peril.
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Family Leave
Washington, DC, is proposing 16-family leave -- paid leave -- for all workers. I don't understand why they just don't propose 50-week paid family leave and two weeks paid vacation for all workers. Sixteen weeks is only four months and if it takes a village to raise a child, it takes a full 18 years to raise a child.
**************************** Political Theory
Turmoil in the House GOP with regard to new speaker? I don't think so. This is exactly what "they" want. Everyone knows that President Obama was able to get what he wanted by twisting the arm of one person when it came to the House, whether the House was in the hands of the Democrats (Pelosi) or the Republicans (Boehner). If there is no GOP house leader, a) whose arm does President Obama twist; b) who sets the agenda to move along Obama initiatives; c) who deals with Pelosi? This is all quite fascinating. I wonder if the real reason no one wants the GOP House leadership (until after November 3rd) is because that person will have to sign off on raising the US debt ceiling. President Obama has already said he won't even discuss the issue.
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Martha Gellhorn
I finished Caroline Moorehead's Selected Letters of Martha Gellhorn. Very worthwhile reading. I have much of it outlined, making it easier to go back and re-read different selections based on my mood.
About a week ago, after reading a particular letter, I fell into a deep depression, and unable to really do anything for several days. Saturday night was probably the worse but a day of sports activities with the granddaughters changed all that.
This morning, I was back to "normal," but finishing the book -- as often happens -- puts me in an "ambivalent" mood.
I talked with either Arianna or Olivia -- I think it was Arianna -- about the word "ambivalent." I think it would have been Arianna because of her knowledge about "valence electrons" and the root "valent" in ambivalent. From the internet:
"simultaneous conflicting feelings," 1924 (1912 as ambivalency), from German Ambivalenz, coined 1910 by Swiss psychologist Eugen Bleuler (1857-1939) on model of German Equivalenz "equivalence," etc., from Latin ambi- "both" (see ambi-) + valentia "strength," from present participle of valere "be strong" (see valiant). A psychological term that by 1929 had taken on a broader literary and general sense.
Wiki also has a nice summary of the etymology of valence as used in chemistry, and it does relate to "strength."
Somewhat ironic, I suppose. One would think that one might be weak to be ambivalent, when, in fact, "valency" suggests strength.
This is simply some housekeeping; nothing new will be posted.
I am moving some of the items at the sidebar on the right to this post, to get rid of some of the clutter at the sidebar.
In a few days, this post will be buried, but a link at the sidebar will capture it. The dates may refer to the initial blog entry; the date the deal was announced; the date the deal was closed; all dates are approximate and somewhat arbitrary in some cases. Everything prior to 2015 was previously linked at the sidebar at the right. Current year deals are at the sidebar. Miscellaneous current year deals not at the sidebar may be captured below.
Deals in the Bakken, 2015
Tesoro Corp to acquire Great Northern Midstream, which has Williston crude oil transportation and storage assets.December 8, 2015.
The Mideast: This is also interesting. Tweeting now: Arab oil consumption to increase to 17.3 mil b/d by 2020, says new study by Organization of Arab Petroleum Exporting Countries. This is not a data point that I track but it seems consumption to increase by 17 million bopd in the Mideast goes a long way in explaining why Saudi Arabia has stepped up their drilling program (and don't have a whole lot to show for it, yet). Here's more of the story, as reported by PipelineMideast:
Energy consumption in Arab oil producing countries is expected to grow by as much as 4.9 per cent a year by 2020, according to a new study by the Organization of Arab Petroleum Exporting Countries.
At the lower end of the estimate – in a low growth scenario for OAPEC member countries, the organization expects energy consumption to be at around 3.2 per cent in the study period.
In its 2012 annual report, however, OAPEC estimated the annual rate of growth of energy consumption in OAPEC member countries was 5.3 per cent during the 2009- 2012 period.
The report by the Kuwait based organisation found that daily energy consumption would be between 15.4 to 17.3 million barrels of oil equivalent (boepd) by 2020, compared to 12.4 million boepd in 2013.
Saudi has not shown much increase in production for quite some time. Sure, they are hitting "new records" but the bar hasn't been rising all that much, certainly not enough to come anywhere close to several million more bopd. Currently about 12.4 million boed (most recent figures available), it seems quite a stretch to get to 17.3 million boepd by by 2020.
Be that as it may, one would assume that similar growth will be seen outside the Mideast.
After a year’s delay due to permit issues, Enbridge now expects the
expanded and reversed 300 Mb/d Line 9B pipeline to Montreal will come
online next month (November 2015). The pipeline is an important cog in
Enbridge’s Eastern Access and Light Oil Market Access expansion projects
and will supply mostly light crude to two refineries in Quebec. As we
explain today, the payload will travel a winding route to get to
Montreal.
In previous blogs we reviewed the huge Enbridge Mainline system (made up of multiple
pipelines) which delivers up to 2.5 MMb/d of hydrocarbon liquids (mainly
heavy crude from Western Canada) to the US border in Minnesota where
the system name changes to Lakehead.
At
Clearbrook, MN Enbridge Lakehead receives incoming light sweet Bakken
crude from the Enbridge North Dakota system.
Once it reaches the Great Lakes at Superior, WI, the Lakehead system
winds its way around Lake Michigan in two directions - flowing light
crude north on Line 5 direct to Sarnia, Ontario while the
majority of its payload travels south along two routes – one through
Chicago that mostly feeds refineries in the Windy City and the other
further west to Flanagan, IL. The Flanagan terminal in
Pontiac, IL is the central pivot point in the Enbridge US system with
crude flowing from there either northeast through Illinois to Griffith,
IN and then back into Canada at Sarnia or southwest to Cushing, OK (in
the future crude will also flow south from Flanagan to Patoka,
IL). Crude that will end up in Montreal once Line 9B is reversed all has
to pass through Sarnia – either southeast from Superior on Line 5 or
northeast from Flanagan to Griffith and then east on Line 6B.