Posted in Campaign Finance, Good Government, tagged PACs, Texas on August 11, 2011 |
According to a new report by Texans for Public Justice (TPJ), a record 1,302 active Texas political action committees (PACs) spent $133 million in the two-year 2010 election cycle, a 12 percent increase from the 2008 cycle. Over the past decade Texas PACs increased their spending nearly three-fold and the number of active PACs grew by 50%.
Check out TPJ’s latest in-depth analysis of PAC activity – Texas PACs: 2010 Cycle Spending – available at TPJ.ORG.
Posted in Climate Change, Efficiency, Global Warming, tagged drought, La Niña, Rain, Texas on August 10, 2011 |
Texas is suffering from an historic drought and one question that looms large is – how much rain will we need to actually end the drought? And the answer is – A LOT!
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) indicates 12 to 15+ inches of rain (shades of purple and dark blue) is necessary for most of Texas to end the drought, as shown in the graphic below.
Even those small parts of the state not needing those massive amounts of rainfall to end this drought will require six to twelve inches of rain to recover. With the Climate Prediction Center now saying there is a 50/50 chance of a return to La Nina conditions this fall which almost always results in drier than normal conditions for Texas and most of the South, the potential for recovery any time soon is pretty slim.
It has taken months for the drought to get to the level it is at now and it will take months or even years to return to normal. But all indications are that there is no major relief coming soon and if you haven’t already done so, consider taking measures to reduce your water and electricity use for the long haul. For ideas on how consumers can do this, check out the Texas Is Hot website for tips on how to reduce your energy use, and TCEQ’s Take Care of Texas website for tips on conserving water.
Posted in Global Warming, tagged electric reliability council of texas, Rolling blackout, Texas on August 9, 2011 |
The Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) is expecting to keep rolling blackouts at bay this week. While we came perilously close to having statewide rolling blackouts last week, it turns out, coastal wind power proved helpful in averting an electric crisis then, according to ERCOT’s president.
Unlike wind farms in West Texas, which tend to generate more power at night, coastal wind generation has been better tracking peak daytime demands.
As demand ramps up in the late afternoon hours, coastal wind is also ramping up. ERCOT President H.B. Trip Doggett, who briefly occupied the hot seat following rolling blackouts that occurred in February due to an unusual cold weather event which took out several coal and gas plants (albeit, once again wind was in there helping to keep the lights on) has a renewed interest in what renewables can do to help stabilize the Texas electric grid during peak power demand under hot weather circumstances. In fact, he told reporters, “We would love to have more development of coastal wind. The diversity of coastal wind versus West Texas wind is an advantage to us in operating the grid.”
Last week, when the ERCOT grid came extremely close to initiating involuntary rolling blackouts across the state, wind generation kicked into higher production. While wind produced around 1,300 megawatts on Monday, it rose to about 2,000 megawatts on Wednesday with 70 percent of that coming from coastal rather than West Texas wind. During the February cold weather event, it was West Texas wind that helped keep the lights on, so let’s hear it for wind.
And consider that if we had solar deployed across the state, we could better handle these huge peak demand times without having to increase air pollution. When the demand rises this high, conventional coal-fired plants are allowed to turn their scrubbers off to increase the efficiency of the plants so they can generate more energy. Also, old higher polluting plants are sometimes fired up to put more electricity on the grid and you can imagine what they do to the air quality.
If ERCOT is beginning to see the value of wind and solar under these circumstances, perhaps it is time to remind our elected officials that renewables could make Texas’ energy future so bright, we gotta wear shades.
ERCOT officials forecast that triple-digit temperatures will continue at least 14 more days. While they believe this week looks good for meeting electric demands, we are not out of the woods yet, and ERCOT is saying next week remains to be seen.
Public Citizen applauds everyone who is doing their part to reduce electric usage and encourages everyone to continue their efforts.
Posted in Nuclear, Radioactive Waste, tagged Andrews County Texas, EnergySolutions, radioactive waste, Texas, waste control specialists on August 9, 2011 |
According to the Fox news station in Salt Lake City, UT, controversy has arisen about EnergySolutions’ plans to dispose of what they call blended radioactive waste at its Clive Facility in the west desert of Utah.
There are three classifications of waste: A, B and C, all radioactive. Only the lowest level, type A, is allowed in Utah, but Energy Solutions says it’s found a way to blend and store the waste safely by mixing higher-level class C waste with low-level waste and labeling it class A – are you buying this, cause I’m pretty skeptical and it just sounds like fiction to me. This magic would take place at a facility in Tennessee according to EnergySolutions.
EnergySolutions may have found a legal loophole that would allow them to store higher level radioactive waste at the Clive facility, but ultimately, the Utah Division of Radiation Control will decide whether the blended waste can be disposed in Utah.
In the meantime, William Dornsife, executive vice president of WCS, the Texas company building a radioactive waste disposal facility in Andrews County, Texas is telling Utah to bring it on. He wants the waste to go to Texas, not Utah.
Texas is licensed to take class A, B and C waste without the blending alchemy that EnergySolutions is proposing, and there is a lot of money at stake — potentially hundreds of millions of dollars. WCS and billionaire Harold Simmons are salivating at the opportunity to spend what they probably see as the political capital with which they walked away from the 82nd Texas legislative session earlier this year to rake in the profits at the expense and liability of the Texas taxpayer.
Face it Texas, we are now the radioactive waste capital of the country.
Posted in Good Government, tagged League of Conservation Voters, Legislative session, Texas on August 8, 2011 |
During the Legislative Session, the Texas League of Conservation Voters was at the capitol advancing an environmental conservation agenda on behalf of Texas Voters. They have now released their 2011 TLCV scorecard which covers a range of votes and issues, including: renewable energy, green technologies, recycling and waste disposal. Each vote scored presented a clear choice for Texas elected officials to uphold the conservation values that millions of Texans share. Click here to see TLCV’s scorecard.
Don’t know who your elected officials are? Find out who represents you here.
Posted in Global Warming, tagged Climate Prediction Center, drought, heat wave, La Niña, Texas on August 6, 2011 |
The Climate Prediction Center says there is now a 50/50 chance of a return to La Nina conditions this fall.
La Nina is an expansive area of cooler-than-normal water in the Pacific Ocean. This cooling alters weather patterns across the U.S., and almost always results in drier than normal conditions for Texas and most of the South. And, when we’re drier than normal, we tend to be hotter than normal.
This is very bad news for Texas, as the 2010-11 La Nina is the reason for our existing drought and heat wave. Think the drought and summer heat is bad now (the Mid-West and East had a heat wave, what we are having is a heat tsunami), if we have a 2011-12 La Nina, this drought could reach epic proportions by next summer.
Posted in Air Quality, Coal, Energy, Global Warming, Renewables, Texas Legislature, tagged deregulation, Energy, Public utilities commission, Rolling blackout, solar power, Texas, wind power on August 5, 2011 |
The PUC wants to have a meeting at the end of August to try to figure out how to fix Texas’s experiment of a deregulated generation market, as we look like we are going to run out of energy during what could be ever increasing hot summers.
It seems the current market based behavior doesn’t send proper signals to companies to build new generation.
In addition our grid was designed to be almost completely isolated from the rest of the country so we cannot get help if its needed and available.
Generators use old, outdated generation to reduce costs and even turn off environmental controls to further lower costs at the expense of citizens health and to maximize profits.
The “new” market is based on scarcity pricing but if generation is truly scarce we have rolling blackouts, which are devastating to the economy and kill people.
Before deregulation the Utility commission would request new generation be built in a certain time frame and capacity and pay a preset profit margin to the companies that participated. They did the same thing with transmission lines and retail costs.
These are critical infrastructure needs and were protected from the swings of the financial and other markets. The process was covered under the term Total Resource Planning.
Now with the current heat wave and over a decade of deregulated markets we face the possibility that there will not be enough generation to meet the needs of Texas. We have many old and highly polluting plants that resemble the old steam locomotives of the 1800’s carting around a bin of coal to burn rocks and boil water. A larger amount of our critical infrastructure also consists of ancient natural gas “steamer” plants that are only run around 400 hours a year and are also highly polluting and have proven not to be very reliable but highly profitable.
Compare that to the newer generation of combined cycle gas turbines that resemble a jet engine and have several additional generators attached to it to recover the excess heat to generate even more energy with low stack emissions.
We have harvested significant amounts of non-polluting wind energy (coastal wind is over-performing expectations during the current crises) but the majority is located in just one region (West Texas) leading to problems of transmission congestion and generation variability. Some progress has been made on building wind projects in the areas along the Texas coast that provide energy much closer to the time that its needed, but more needs to be done.
Texas has made very little progress on adding an solar generation (that would provide energy when its needed most) because of a lack of policy leadership at the legislature and the PUC.
Now the PUC wants to tinker with the market to see if it can artificially raise the price of energy by using a “proxy” price as in “we will pay you more because our market system isn’t working, so pretty please build some new generators”.
This is a hell of a way to provide the resources that Texans need. Its time to get rid of the old smoking wreaks of generation plants that are carrying the load, sucking up our ever shrinking water supplies and fouling our air, and go to a controlled “regulated” modernized generation plan that uses all our resources with the least impact to our health, environment and wallets.
We used to pay a fair price for services delivered, now we just pay and hope the lights stay on.
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By promoting cleaner energy, cleaner government, and cleaner air for all Texans, we hope to provide for a healthy place to live and prosper. We are Public Citizen Texas
Posted in Energy, tagged Energy, energy conservation, ercot, power grid, Texas on August 5, 2011 |
As temperatures soared yesterday, ERCOT estimates that electricity usage reached an all-time peak high (breaking Wednesday’s record) with Texans using 60,157 MW of power – flying past the official record set on August 31, 2000 when 57,606 MW of power was consumed by Texans in the ERCOT service region.
“Texas is experiencing a very serious energy emergency,” said David Power, Deputy Director of the Texas office of Public Citizen, “and we are urging everyone to shut off any unnecessary appliances to conserve energy.”
Tom “Smitty” Smith, the Director of the Texas office of Public Citizen applauds the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT)’s heroic efforts in keeping the lights on under enormous stress. “They are doing a great job, however without the assistance of all Texans in conserving energy during this unusual heat event they may not be able to do so for long.”
Posted in Energy, tagged electric reliability council of texas, heat wave, Rolling blackout, Texas on August 4, 2011 |
This is a reprint of a post by Jake Dyer from the RechargeTexas.com blog
The rolling blackouts that swept through Texas last February have been blamed on the unexpected failure of generation plants. The temperature dropped during a cold snap, the plants froze up, and then — before anybody really knew what hit them — the lights went out.
And now we’re in the middle of another weather event – this time a heat wave – and just as before a large number of generation plants have failed. The loss of capacity during the February event sent wholesale electricity prices soaring to $3,000 per megawatt/hour, or more than 50 times higher than typical. The same occurred this week as well.
Clearly somebody is making money off the bad weather. One expert, Oregon-based economist Robert McCullough, raised the possibility that there was “artificially-created scarcity” last February. That’s regulatory lingo for market manipulation. Although not leveling any specific accusations, McCullough concluded that the cold weather alone could not explain the failure of the state’s power grid to operate reliably.
However, another expert, the state’s independent monitor of the wholesale energy market, concluded the punishingly high price spikes in February were understandable, given the circumstances. He found no evidence of hanky-panky by electric companies. Likewise, a federal report largely blamed the inclement weather, although it said plant operators could have done a better job.
This week’s event has not drawn such scrutiny. What’s clear, however, is that more than 20 generating plants unexpectedly failed during the middle of a heat wave. In February, 80 plants went down during a cold snap. Although the ERCOT grid operator hasn’t again ordered blackouts, the organization has taken other emergency steps this week. And if the situation gets worse, some businesses could have their power cut or there could even be more forced outages.
The fact that the lights went out in February prompted a statewide demand for answers. If ERCOT is able to stave off rolling blackouts during this heat wave, it is unlikely that there will be a widespread outcry for a market manipulation investigation but Texans should be aware, that in a deregulated, market driven energy market, the potential for market manipulation is always there.
Posted in Global Warming, tagged electric reliability council of texas, Rolling blackout, Texas on August 2, 2011 |
Posted in Consumers, tagged Electric bill assistance, heat wave, Texas on August 1, 2011 |
The leading cause of weather related deaths in the U.S. is due to heat, yet during one of worst heat waves in state history, Texas is holding onto millions of dollars intended to help hundreds of thousands of elderly and low-income residents pay their electric bills.
The Dallas Morning News reported that the state has collected $130 million this fiscal year to help financially strapped Texas residents pay for the cost of electricity used for cooling, but has spent only $28 million so far, half as much as it did to help the poor and elderly get through the summer a decade ago.
The reason: State lawmakers have diverted the money to deal with the budget shortfall. Saturday was the 29th consecutive day that it reached at least 100 degrees in the Dallas-Fort Worth area and Austin had seen 46 days of triple digit days so far this summer. The much hoped for relief that tropical storm Don was predicted to bring to parts of South and Central Texas fizzled as the storm came ashore and the National Weather Service forecast called for the oppressive heat to continue this week as the ridge of high pressure settles once more over the Lone Star state.
Texas leaders have said that until the economy recovers and lawmakers overhaul the state tax code, they have no choice but to use the dedicated-fee money elsewhere. Chief Senate budget writer Steve Ogden, R-Bryan, said the only alternative to providing all the funds to help elderly and low-income citizens pay their electricity bills in this record breaking heat, would have been to cut more out of education, public safety and other key programs.
The money for the energy bill assistance is paid by fees collected from more than 6 million households and businesses. It is attached to utility bills and for the average residential ratepayer, it is about $1 a month.
Gov. Rick Perry proposed ending the assessment four years ago because the money was being diverted, but it was left in and is once again being diverted.
Posted in Global Warming, tagged Corporate Average Fuel Economy, Fuel economy in automobiles, Texas on July 30, 2011 |
With the backing of major carmakers, President Obama announced a plan to increase the fleet average fuel economy of new cars and trucks to 54.5 miles per gallon by 2025, nearly double the current levels.
The new standards are the result of a compromise with the industry after the White House initially proposed raising the Corporate Average Fuel Economy, or CAFE, standard to 62 mpg.
The compromise was a bit of a surprise and looked unlikely even a few days ago,and key parties didn’t sign off on the final language until nearly midnight Thursday.
Posted in Air Quality, tagged air pollution, Texas, Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, United States Environmental Protection Agency on July 29, 2011 |
Seems like everyone is jumping onto the “Fracking” bandwagon.
In an earlier blog we talked about the US Department of Energy’s entrance into the “Fracking” fray with Secretary Steven Chu appointing an Energy Advisory Board subcommittee on natural gas, led by former CIA director John Deutch, who plan to have recommendations on the table in the next few weeks.
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is the other federal agency looking at the environmental impact of drilling for huge volumes of shale gas, but EPA doesn’t plan to release its initial findings until 2012 at the earliest. Nevertheless, this week they unveiled proposals to regulate air pollution from oil and gas operations, taking aim for the first time at the fast-growing practice of hydraulic fracturing.
Environmental activists say the regulations would mark the first significant steps taken by the EPA since 1985 to control harmful emissions released during production and transport of oil and gas, and the Texas Oil and Gas Association is already characterizing the proposed rules as an “overreach.”
The EPA’s suggested regulations fit into four categories, including new emissions standards for (1) volatile organic compounds (VOCs), (2) sulfur dioxide, (3) air toxics during oil and gas production, and (4) air toxics for natural gas transmission and storage.
The EPA expects the following emissions reductions would result if the new standards were fully implemented:
Now Texas Railroad Commissioner David Porter has put together the Eagle Ford Task Force, whose top concerns include:
Individuals named to the task force include:
It will be interesting to see what kind of a production this cast of thousands puts on.
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