Energy & Climate Policy News

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    • Opinion

    Ignore the New Obama Administration Report on Climate Change Action

    The Obama administration released Tuesday a new report warning that with accelerating climate change comes accelerating costs: Costs will increase by 40 percent each decade of inaction on climate change. The report fails to mention, however, that the administration’s climate policies come with much steeper price tags. Nor is there any action that will actually…
    Nicolas Loris
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    • News

    ‘No Way’ Obama’s Climate Change Plan Will Reduce Temperatures, Says Rep. Mike Kelly

    Following a speech about extremism at the Environmental Protection Agency, Rep. Mike Kelly, R-Pa., called the Obama administration’s climate change proposal a “public relations piece.” He told The Daily Signal there’s “no way” the administration’s current plan will reduce global temperatures and warned of the “unintended consequences” for the American people.
    Kelsey Bolar
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    • News

    One of the World’s Biggest Sources of Oil Is Right Here in America

    SANTA FE, N.M.—Oil production in New Mexico keeps on booming, and it could continue to do so for some time. “I think the forecast is great,” said Parker Hallam, president and CEO of Crude Energy in Dallas. “I’m excited.” The Permian Basin, located in eastern New Mexico and West Texas, recently has become one of the world’s…
    Rob Nikolewski
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    • News

    Debate: Are Obama’s Climate Change Actions Helping or Hurting?

    President Obama promised he wouldn’t wait for Congress to combat climate change, vowing to use executive action wherever possible. One year later, are Obama’s actions helping or hurting? That was among the topics debated by David Kreutzer, research fellow in energy economics and climate change at The Heritage Foundation, and Daniel Weiss, senior vice president…
    Katherine Telford
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    • Opinion

    Cartoon: How to ‘Grow’ Gas Prices

    >>> This Standard Is One Reason the Price of Gas Will Increase
    Glenn Foden
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    • News

    $6 a Gallon? Where Gas Prices Might Be Without the U.S. Energy Boom

    If you think the price of gas is high, imagine paying up to $6 a gallon. That’s what energy expert Dan Steffens thinks the price could be if not for the domestic oil boom. “With what’s going on the Middle East, I think it would five or six bucks [a gallon],” said Steffens, president of the…
    Rob Nikolewski
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    • News

    Gas Prices Will Climb, and You Can Blame Corn

    JOHNSTON, Iowa — Most of what Tim Maher knew about the renewable fuel standard came from TV commercials. “They all talk about how it’s good for the environment and good for the country because we won’t have to import so much oil from the Middle East,” Maher said as he was filling up his car…
    Paul Brennan
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    • Opinion

    What Obama Has Wrong on Climate Change

    President Barack Obama again sought to make the case to the American people for “dealing with the rapidly growing threat of climate change” last month, in a speech to the League of Conservation Voters. Right up front he said that his speech would not have “a lot of spin, just the facts.” When a politician…
    Brett Schaefer
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    • Opinion

    This Standard Is One Reason the Price of Gas Will Increase

    Not thinking things through is a chronic problem with policy-makers in Washington. Superficial and easily sound-bite-able policies dominate the thoughtful-but-complex ones. For instance mandates for biofuel use would seem to be driven by basic supply and demand—more domestic fuel would lead to lower fuel prices for consumers. But the reality is more complex. On June…
    David Kreutzer
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    • News

    In 32 Seconds, Mick Mulvaney Boils Down the Debate Over Ex-Im Bank

    Who do you trust—a government agency justifying its existence or a private business trying to compete? That’s the question Rep. Mick Mulvaney, R-S.C., posed at today’s Financial Service Committee hearing on the Export-Import Bank. In just 32 seconds, Mulvaney explains why he’s siding with the free market.
    Rob Bluey
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    • Opinion

    New EIA Report Shows Government Interference in the Oil, Gas, and Coal Industries

    Nowhere in the song “This Land Is Your Land” do the lyrics mention the federal government. Yet, a new report released on June 19 by the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) confirms the large role the government has taken in regulating federally owned land in the oil, gas, and coal industries. Crude oil production in…
    Hanna Hebert
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    • Opinion

    House Energy Bills Work Toward ‘All of the Above’

    The House is set to take up several energy bills this week. In the wake of an Energy Information Report (EIA) report released last Friday which again showed decreasing energy production on federal lands, the House bills offer significant opportunities to correct President Obama’s “all of the above” but “none of the below” energy policy….
    Katie Tubb
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    • News

    1,000,000 Barrels a Day and Growing: Oil Production Skyrockets in North Dakota

    North Dakota has drilled its way into the record books, producing more than a million barrels of oil a day. Fueled by the energy revolution in the Bakken Oil Fields, North Dakota now supplies 12 percent of the nation’s total oil production. According to the state’s Department of Mineral Resources, in the month of April,…
    Philip Wegmann
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    • Opinion

    Hiking the Federal Gas Tax Is a Mistake. Here’s Why.

    Much clamoring for more federal transportation spending, and fuel tax hikes to pay for it, has come out of Washington recently. The Highway Trust Fund faces a $15 billion gap in 2015 between projected spending and the money it will collect in fuel taxes and fees. Trouble is, our Washington-centric approach isn’t solving our traffic…
    Emily Goff
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    • Opinion

    A Federal Gas Tax Hike for…What, Exactly?

    Senators Chris Murphy (D–CT) and Bob Corker (R–TN) have proposed hiking federal fuels taxes by 12 cents per gallon. Car and truck drivers and bus operators would pay a gas tax of 30.4 cents a gallon and a diesel tax of 36.4 cents a gallon—up from 18.4 cents and 24.4 cents, respectively. That is on…
    Emily Goff
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    • News

    Vermont Energy Project Would Reduce Heating Costs and CO2; Activists Oppose It Anyway

    An energy project that reduces greenhouse gas emissions and slashes heating costs might sound like an environmental activist’s dream. But one renewable-energy group is standing in the way of just such a project in Vermont—literally. Rising Tide Vermont, a group dedicated to “dismantling systems of oppression and domination such as sexism, racism and colonialism,” seeks…
    Bruce Parker
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    • Opinion

    Energy: Exporting Gas Is Now a Necessity for the United States

    The recent $400 billion energy deal between Russia and China, the largest of its kind, is set to reshape the global energy markets and geopolitics. Under the deal, state-controlled Russian energy giant Gazprom will supply China with liquefied natural gas (LNG) for at least 30 years starting in 2018. It seems a natural fit. China…
    William T. Wilson
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    • Opinion

    $34 Billion Energy Bill Could Use a Few More Cuts

    The House Energy and Water Appropriations Subcommittee released its draft bill today. It takes positive steps toward environmental regulation and nuclear waste management. But the draft legislation largely misses the mark by continuing wasteful, taxpayer-funded energy subsidies and boosting spending for conventional energy such as oil, gas, coal, and nuclear energy technologies. The subcommittee should…
    Nicolas Loris
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    • Opinion

    How the EPA Got Heritage’s Energy Analysis All Wrong

    Officials at the Environmental Protection Agency said a Heritage Foundation  analysis of the agency’s war on affordable and reliable energy bore little resemblance to reality. But a quick look at the facts and the EPA response reveals it is the agency that needs a reality check. The response comes after EPA announced a rule to…
    Nicolas Loris
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    • Opinion

    Student Lunches Soon Could Be Influenced By Climate Change Concerns

    The Dietary Guidelines may soon be based on global warming as much as human nutrition. Currently, the Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committee (DGAC) is working on recommendations for the 2015 Guidelines. The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) and the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) will use the Committee’s recommendations to modify the Guidelines, which…
    Daren Bakst
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