EXTRACTED: Daily News Clips 8/15/23
PIPELINE NEWS
E&E News: Landowners fight to keep Mountain Valley lawsuit alive
E&E News: Feds Warn Of Safety Risks From Mountain Valley Pipeline
WVTF: Wild Virginia vows to fight on against the Mountain Valley Pipeline
Iowa Capital Dispatch: Pipeline opponents seek procedural halt in Iowa after North Dakota decision
E&E News: Can a CO2 pipeline developer change how farmers are treated?
Iowa PBS: Summit Carbon Solutions meets with local stakeholders
WQAD: Proposed CO2 pipeline faces protests, Illinois residents meeting to educate others on risks
Lansing State Journal: Why a natural gas pipeline is being built in mid-Michigan as companies aim for more green
WASHINGTON UPDATES
Associated Press: Judge rules in favor of Montana youths in landmark climate decision
E&E News: Montana youth victory could spur momentum on other climate cases
E&E News: Big Oil targets state judges in climate cases
Bloomberg: How Carbon Capture Is Getting New Life With US Help
Vox: An insidious form of climate denial is festering in the Republican Party
Bloomberg: Sacred Tribal Canyon Tests Limits of Potential Energy Bonanza
E&E News: NPS Board Gets Native American Member For First Time In 88 Years
STATE UPDATES
Bakersfield Californian: Feds set aside $20.6 million for carbon management work in Kern
EXTRACTION
InsideClimate News: Is Carbon Capture and Storage a Climate Solution?
National Observer: Enbridge relied on faulty study to pitch Ontario gas network expansion
Exposed: Anti-Woke and Fossil Fuel Industry Operatives Dominate ALEC’s Energy Task Force
OPINION
Teen Vogue: Joe Biden Approved Drilling Projects, Now Young Climate Voters Are Watching for 2024
Pagosa Daily Post: New Report Highlights Negative Impacts From Extractive Industries
Flathead Beacon: BLM Rule Will Protect Public Lands From Contamination And Neglect
Edmonton Journal: Canadians worse emissions culprits than Chinese
Wall Street Journal: Mike Pence’s Plan to Drill, Baby, Drill
Frontier Centre for Public Policy: TC Energy Dumping Keystone Pipeline
PIPELINE NEWS
E&E News: Landowners fight to keep Mountain Valley lawsuit alive
Niina H. Farah, 8/15/23
“Virginia landowners who sued to stop the Mountain Valley pipeline from crossing their property are fighting to keep their court challenge alive — even after Congress brokered a deal to ensure the natural gas project’s completion,” E&E News reports. “Cletus and Beverly Bohon, along with two other families, had struggled to gain legal footing in their constitutional battle against federal energy regulators’ methods for allowing natural gas pipeline developers to acquire private land for projects. Then the Supreme Court threw the Bohons a lifeline in the spring, telling a federal appeals court to take a second look at the landowners’ case. The outcome of the case — if a court allows it to proceed — could create a significant challenge to federal law on eminent domain… “But in court documents filed last week, a private attorney representing the Bohons claimed that the section of the Fiscal Responsibility Act that mandated completion of the Mountain Valley pipeline, sometimes referred to as MVP, violates both the Constitution’s equal protection clause and prohibitions on titles of nobility. “If the bill truly does what MVP claims, then it exempts MVP from the Constitution,” wrote Mia Yugo in an Aug. 7 filing with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. “Apparently, the separation of powers applies to everyone except Congress and its favored litigants.” “All other citizens whose land is taken can raise structural constitutional challenges,” she continued. “But Cletus cannot because, in MVP’s view, Congress has declared that Cletus suddenly has no constitutional rights and that Congress is above the Constitution.” “...Another Mountain Valley challenge is still pending in the D.C. Circuit. In that lawsuit — in which environmental groups are challenging a certificate extension granted by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission — the Biden administration recently filed briefs asking the court to dismiss the case in light of the Fiscal Responsibility Act. Yugo has said that the legislation “clearly targets” the 4th Circuit for its repeated smackdowns of Mountain Vally permits. She has distinguished the Bohons’ case from other lawsuits against the pipeline. The landowners’ case isn’t focused on a specific permit, she told E&E. Instead, the lawsuit targets the power of FERC to allow private companies to condemn land. Yugo described the Bohons’ lawsuit as alleging a “structural constitutional defect in FERC’s enabling legislation” — the Natural Gas Act — rather than a direct attack on the commission’s certificate authorizing pipeline construction.”
E&E News: Feds Warn Of Safety Risks From Mountain Valley Pipeline
Carlos Anchondo, 8/15/23
“Federal pipeline safety regulators are raising concerns about the safety of the controversial Mountain Valley pipeline, identifying potential issues with corrosion, installation and exposure to the weather,” E&E News reports. “In a notice of proposed safety order, the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration said an ongoing investigation indicates ‘conditions may exist’ along Mountain Valley’s route that ‘pose a pipeline integrity risk to public safety, property, or the environment.’ The conditions — which include issues around the pipe’s protective coating to pipe installation — require a ‘comprehensive evaluation’ to mitigate risk and protect public safety, said PHMSA, a Transportation Department agency. ‘The commissioning and operation of the [Mountain Valley] pipeline without appropriate inspection and corresponding corrective measures first being undertaken would pose a pipeline integrity risk to public safety, property, and the environment,’ the notice said. According to the agency, a notice of proposed safety order involves notifying an operator that a pipeline may require corrective action. The 13-page notice to Equitrans Midstream Corp. — Mountain Valley’s primary developer — said the company has 30 days to respond to the document, which proposed several corrective measures.”
WVTF: Wild Virginia vows to fight on against the Mountain Valley Pipeline
Sandy Hausman, 8/14/23
“Building a pipeline is a messy business. It involves digging and blasting, moving soil and rocks, so erosion is inevitable. Crews have techniques for keeping sediment out of rivers and streams, but at Wild Virginia David Sligh says those methods are not effective when you’re building through mountains,” WVTF reports. “They really can’t meet the environmental requirements that they’re faced with, and that should still be a basis for this project never being finished.," he told WVTF. "Just by all the activity they’re going to do with clearing and trenching and moving the heavy equipment, we’re talking millions of tons of dirt that’s going to be excavated and moved around.” So he’s calling on opponents of the MVP to monitor construction crews in the field – to test water in streams and report any violations of environmental law. “Some of the most sensitive areas still haven’t even been cleared much less having the trenches dug or blasted through the ground,” Sligh told WVTF… “Over one four-month period, he says, citizen monitors documented 118 violations. Virginia’s DEQ did nothing, but courts have issued stop work orders against the pipeline.”
Iowa Capital Dispatch: Pipeline opponents seek procedural halt in Iowa after North Dakota decision
JARED STRONG, 8/14/23
“State regulators should postpone a final hearing for a proposed carbon dioxide pipeline in Iowa because North Dakota rejected the project route, opponents of the pipeline say,” the Iowa Capital Dispatch reports. “The Sierra Club of Iowa and landowners have asked the Iowa Utilities Board to pause the permit proceedings for Summit Carbon Solutions. Its evidentiary hearing is poised to start next week in Fort Dodge… “Without a North Dakota permit, Summit has no project,” wrote Wally Taylor, an attorney for the Sierra Club, in a Friday motion to suspend the permit proceedings in Iowa… “Summit will seek eminent domain for about a quarter of its route in Iowa, which totals more than 680 miles. Zenor told the Dispatch the company has voluntary easement agreements for about 75% of the route… “It’s unclear when the IUB will rule on the request to suspend the permit process. The board also has yet to decide whether Summit must reveal specific details of its financial agreements with ethanol plants in Iowa to verify its claims of economic benefits of the project. An administrative law judge said two weeks ago that the company should provide unredacted copies of its contracts to attorneys who represent the Sierra Club and the Iowa Farm Bureau Federation. Pipeline opponents have sought to delay Summit’s evidentiary hearing until next year. “...A recent IUB decision that denied a motion to dismiss Summit’s permit petition is also being challenged in state court. On Friday, landowner George Cummins and his attorney Brian Jorde sought judicial review of the July decision and a suspension of the company’s permit process while that review is pending, according to court records. Cummins argues that Summit’s project is not regulated by the IUB because it won’t transport “liquefied carbon dioxide,” which state law considers a hazardous liquid. The carbon dioxide that will flow through the pipeline system will be in a “supercritical” state that has characteristics of gases and liquids. A district court judge in Hardin County already rejected the argument in a land survey lawsuit, but the new petition is filed in Polk County. A judge has not yet taken action on the new petition.
E&E News: Can a CO2 pipeline developer change how farmers are treated?
Mike Soraghan, 8/14/23
“The executive in charge of building the world’s largest carbon dioxide pipeline, billed as a boon to ethanol and corn production, is promising to do better by farmers than previous pipeline developers,” E&E News reports. “We have committed to treat the landowner as fairly — more fairly — than the landowner has been treated in the past,” Lee Blank, CEO of Summit Carbon Solutions LLC, told E&E… “But the proposal has hit fierce opposition from farmers fuming about damage from past pipeline construction and wary of giving private companies the power to condemn land. A standoff in May between a South Dakota farmer and a crew surveying for Summit landed in court and became a rallying point for some opponents. In an interview here at his company’s headquarters, Blank touted the terms Summit is offering to farmers for easements across their property. That includes a promise to repair intricate drainage systems for the life of the pipeline and paying for any accidental damage farmers might cause to the pipeline. “There’s never been a more accommodating lease easement, I would say in the history of the infrastructure projects in the U.S.,” Blank told E&E. “We’ve been very, very focused on that.” “...Critics say Summit’s easement agreement is still bad for farmers, and that the company is offering landowners far less than what they would get for wind and solar installations. “There’s nothing good about this,” Jess Mazour, a program coordinator with the Sierra Club’s Iowa chapter who is organizing opposition to CO2 pipelines in the Midwest, told E&E… “Others say any benefits of the pipeline aren’t worth the damage to farmland and the risk of catastrophic leaks of CO2, which can be an asphyxiant. Some landowners say crop yields have still not recovered in areas trenched for the Dakota Access oil pipeline in 2016… “Other studies have documented losses in crop yields even 10 years after construction ends… “The Sierra Club’s Mazour, citing an unsigned copy of Summit’s agreement, which the Sierra Club obtained from a landowner, told E&E it contains language that would allow the company to fudge on its commitments. For example, it says landowners’ fences would be restored to their previous condition “as nearly as reasonably practicable.” “They have a lot of words that give them a lot of wiggle room,” Mazour told E&E.
Iowa PBS: Summit Carbon Solutions meets with local stakeholders
David Miller, 8/11/23
“Late last week, the North Dakota Public Service Commission denied a permit application to build a section of the Midwest Carbon Express. Iowa-based Summit Carbon Solutions was told they had failed to “meet its burden of proof to show the project will produce minimal adverse effects on the environment and upon the welfare of the citizens of North Dakota,” Iowa PBS reports. “Summit said they will re-apply and kept appointments in Iowa to tell landowners about the multi-state effort… “Officials with Summit Carbon Solutions have begun requesting voluntary land leases along a new segment of its controversial Midwest Carbon Express pipeline. The main sticking point for landowners along the route is the potential use of eminent domain to get the project started… “Kathy Carter, Rockford, Iowa: “ Those voluntary easements that got mentioned, quite a few of those are not so voluntary because of this. We'll give you the money. You get to keep it no matter what happens if the pipeline doesn't happen, there's no null and void clause in those easements. Make sure you have legal team look over those easements if you're thinking about signing it, because there's a lot of things in there that are not something you like to end up with.” “...Unidentified participant: “You guys are all nice, the people that are out in the fields are kind a nasty.” “...Unidentified participant: "What's the life of the pipeline?" Jimmy Powell, COO Summit Carbon Solutions: “That's a great question. So, um, we design for 25 years, because the commercial guys have to base their economics on something. But, um, if you design it, construct it, and install it and maintain it properly…we're designing for 25. I mean, we, we hope we're here long after I'm gone, which may not be too much longer, but long after I'm gone.”
WQAD: Proposed CO2 pipeline faces protests, Illinois residents meeting to educate others on risks
Lindsey Voss, 8/14/23
“Discussions surrounding the ADM carbon dioxide pipeline are continuing to occur in the Quad Cities area,” WQAD reports. “...Some residents from communities around the Quad Cities have been against the construction of this pipeline, from Camanche, Iowa to Henry and Stark Counties in Illinois. Organizations have been holding forums to talk about the dangers of captured carbon dioxide and steps landowners can utilize to try to halt the construction. "People should think closely about the risks a CO2 pipeline brings," Holly Mirell, a Coalition to Stop CO2 Pipelines volunteer, said. "Gasoline and diesel-powered vehicles will not run if CO2 levels are high enough." Others have voiced concerns about the dangers if the pipe were to leak, due to the amount of pressure necessary to move carbon dioxide in a liquid form. The coalition cites a situation in Mississippi where the force inside the pipe burst through the ground, sending a concentrated amount of gaseous CO2 to nearby cities. The incident caused 45 people to receive medical attention for CO2 inhalation. The program is held at the River Valley District Library, and will begin at 6 p.m. Monday, Aug. 14. Community members are encouraged to come.”
Lansing State Journal: Why a natural gas pipeline is being built in mid-Michigan as companies aim for more green
Mike Ellis, 8/14/23
“Juliet Matko, who has spent a decade working on a $550 million Consumers Energy pipeline project, said she gets asked one question a lot: Why is a utility company investing in a natural gas pipeline, given all the talk of green energy goals?,” the Lansing State Journal reports. “Matko, who spoke to a State Journal reporter while driving between construction sites in M-52 in Ingham County Monday, said the answer is simple: natural gas is vital at the moment for Michigan residents who use it to heat their homes. Natural gas is the primary heating fuel in more than 75% of Michigan homes, and the state has over 50,000 miles of distribution pipelines and over 3 million service lines, according to the Michigan Public Service Commission… “The company is spending $550 million on the replacement pipeline. The construction site is unusual in part for its conservation work, David "Turtle Dave" Mifsud, who runs Herpetological Resource and Management, a Chelsea-based contractor for Consumers Energy, told the Journal He told the Journal on most of the construction sites he's worked, workers would typically not stop heavy equipment to avoid running over a snake. But at the pipeline, and other Consumers Energy projects he's been involved with, he has seen heavy equipment operators halt construction and use their buckets to retrieve snakes in difficult terrain where people couldn't walk. The animals are moved nearby but out of the way, some are allowed to grow larger before release. "You don't often see that," Mifsud told the Journal.
WASHINGTON UPDATES
Associated Press: Judge rules in favor of Montana youths in landmark climate decision
Kate Selig, 8/14/23
“In the first ruling of its kind nationwide, a Montana state court decided Monday in favor of young people who alleged the state violated their right to a “clean and healthful environment” by promoting the use of fossil fuels,” the Associated Press reports. “The court determined that a provision in the Montana Environmental Policy Act has harmed the state’s environment and the young plaintiffs by preventing Montana from considering the climate impacts of energy projects. The provision is accordingly unconstitutional, the court said. “This is a huge win for Montana, for youth, for democracy and for our climate,” Julia Olson, the executive director of Our Children’s Trust, which brought the case, told AP. “More rulings like this will certainly come.” The sweeping win, one of the strongest decisions on climate change ever issued by a court, could energize the environmental movement and usher in a wave of cases aimed at advancing action on climate change, experts say. The ruling — which invalidates the provision blocking climate considerations — also represents a rare victory for climate activists who have tried to use the courts to push back against government policies and industrial activities they say are harming the planet. In this case, it involved 16 young Montanans, ranging in age from 5 to 22, who brought the nation’s first constitutional and first youth-led climate lawsuit to go to trial. Those youths are elated by the decision, according to Our Children’s Trust… “The Montana case will face an appeal to the state Supreme Court, Emily Flower, a spokesperson for Montana Attorney General Austin Knudsen (R), confirmed Monday. She decried the ruling as “absurd” and said Montanans cannot be blamed for changing the climate… “Despite the track record of dismissals for youth-led climate cases in the United States, experts said the Montana youths had an advantage in the state’s constitution, which guarantees a right to a “clean and healthful environment.” “...If this decision stands, it will cause great economic harm to the state of Montana,” Alan Olson, the executive director of the Montana Petroleum Association, told AP… “Phil Gregory, an attorney for the plaintiffs, told AP the court’s verdict could empower youths everywhere to take to the courts to secure their futures. “There are political decisions being made without regard to the best scientific evidence and the effects they will have on our youngest generations,” he told AP. “This is a monumental decision.”
E&E News: Montana youth victory could spur momentum on other climate cases
Lesley Clark, 8/15/23
“A landmark court decision that Montana is violating its youngest residents’ rights to a clean and healthful climate could have legal repercussions well beyond the Treasure State,” E&E News reports. “Judge Kathy Seeley of the 1st Judicial District Court in Montana found Monday that youth in the state have a “fundamental constitutional right to a clean and healthful environment, which includes climate” as she struck down two laws that bar state agencies from considering the climate effects of fossil fuel projects. “This is what climate justice in the courts, and protecting the constitutional rights of our childrens’ right to a safe climate, looks like,” Nate Bellinger, senior staff attorney with Our Children’s Trust, the Oregon-based law firm that represented the 16 young Montanans, told E&E. The ruling is a major victory for the 16 young people behind the first U.S. youth-led climate trial. And it could help provide momentum for a burgeoning raft of climate litigation, including what is likely to be the second-ever kids’ climate case next year in Hawaii. “Because of their unique vulnerabilities, their stages of development as youth, and their average longevity on the planet in the future, plaintiffs face lifelong hardships resulting from climate change,” Seeley wrote, siding with youth witnesses who testified that children are more susceptible to climate-induced physical and psychological harms than adults. Those findings are likely to be raised in the youth-led Hawaii lawsuit, set to open in June 2024, nearly a year to the day since Seeley began hearing the Montana case. Youth plaintiffs in the Hawaii case argue that the state’s transportation system allows for high levels of greenhouse gas emissions, in violation of the young people’s constitutional rights… “Legal experts described the ruling as a landmark decision — one that could influence policy and litigation elsewhere around the country. “I think this is the strongest decision on climate change ever issued by any court,” Michael Gerrard, faculty director of Columbia University’s Sabin Center for Climate Change Law, which tracks climate litigation across the globe, said on X, formerly known as Twitter. In addition to finding that the young people have a right to a stable climate, Gerrard noted, Seeley found that fossil fuel use is the principal cause of climate change and that alternative fuels can provide an economically sustainable substitute. The Montana ruling represents the first time a court has found that a constitutional right to a clean and healthful environment includes the right to a safe climate, Maya van Rossum, an attorney who leads the Delaware Riverkeeper Network and works to enact environmental provisions in state constitutions, told E&E… “Montana and two other states — Pennsylvania and New York — affirm the right to a clean environment in their constitutions, and van Rossum told E&E the ruling will help other states that are considering similar provisions.”
E&E News: Big Oil targets state judges in climate cases
Lesley Clark, 8/14/23
“After stumbling at the Supreme Court, major oil companies and pro-industry groups are questioning the objectivity of state judges who will decide the fate of climate liability lawsuits that could cost the fossil fuel industry billions of dollars,” E&E News reports. “In Rhode Island, companies being sued by the state to pay up for the ravages of climate change say a judge hearing the case — one of about two dozen such challenges playing out nationwide — created the “appearance of bias” by citing two news stories that had not previously been entered into the record. And in another climate liability case in Hawaii, a conservative group has questioned the objectivity of a judge because of his involvement with an organization that provides legal education on a range of topics, including climate science. The moves come as an array of climate lawsuits by cities, counties and states are moving toward trial in state courts from Hoboken, N.J., to Honolulu, following the Supreme Court’s April rejection of an industry bid to quash the cases on procedural grounds. “They’ve lost round one, so they’re working the refs, trying to intimidate the judges,” Richard Wiles, president of the Center for Climate Integrity, which backs the lawsuits against the industry, told E&E. “If you don’t have much of an argument, you attack the judges.”
Bloomberg: How Carbon Capture Is Getting New Life With US Help
Eric Roston and Leslie Kaufman, 8/14/23
“The world’s top climate scientists have been alarmingly clear. If we’re to avoid the most calamitous consequences of warming our planet, they’ve said, we must radically cut greenhouse gas emissions and get as good at taking carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere as we’ve been at putting it in,” Bloomberg reports. “Even if solar panels and wind turbines sprout like mushrooms, reaching “net zero” will require capturing large amounts of emissions from activities that are hard to decarbonize, like making cement. Holding temperatures down will also require vacuuming huge amounts of carbon out of the air. Today, projects devoted to these tasks are too insignificant to come close to reaching these goals. The US is now leading a global push to change that. 1. How much more carbon capture is needed?.. “Twice as much carbon would need to be removed by that year on an annual basis using trees and soils, they said, and roughly 1,300 times as much would have to be sucked up using new technologies… “There are two main methods, known as carbon capture and storage (CCS), and direct air capture (DAC). Capture-and-storage has gotten most of the attention so far, largely because it’s been promoted by the fossil fuel industry as the thing that will solve its emissions problems. If you remember hearing the phrase “clean coal,” it was likely a reference to a CCS plant – or, more likely, an idea of one rather than something that actually existed… “CCS is also opposed by many climate activists. They say energy companies are using the prospect of CCS to slow the transition to an all-renewables economy. The group Friends of the Earth called the UK government’s support for two CCS projects “an attempt to put a green gloss” on a plan to grant hundreds of new licenses for oil and gas production in the North Sea.”
Vox: An insidious form of climate denial is festering in the Republican Party
Rebecca Leber, 8/11/23
“When Rep. Scott Perry (R-PA) questioned US climate envoy John Kerry at an oversight hearing in July — a month that became the hottest ever recorded — he sidestepped that the country was in the grip of repeated heat waves, fires, and a looming hurricane season,” Vox reports. “Over a six-minute interrogation, the House Freedom Caucus chair claimed Kerry wanted to charge taxpayers a “quadrillion dollars to fix a problem that doesn’t exist” and accused him, along with thousands of scientists and the 195 governments signed onto the Paris climate accord, of “grifting.” Kerry shook his head when Perry concluded. “That’s a pretty shocking statement,” he said, “that you believe all the scientists of the world are grifters.” The shock from the emotionally charged attack may have been the point. “There’s a longstanding history of climate deniers going after the messenger as well as the message,” Geoffrey Supran, a University of Miami associate professor who studies climate disinformation, told Vox… “Record heat? “Normal”: “It’s hot, hot, hot all right,” said Laura Ingraham on her Fox News show. “After all, we’re in the middle of a season called ‘summer.’” (Fact check: More than 3,000 temperature records were shattered in the US for the month of July alone, something scientists say would be “virtually impossible” without human-caused climate change.) Forest fires? “Nature naturally burns itself off every 11 years with natural disaster forest fires,” said Sen. Markwayne Mullin (R-OK). “This is a forest fire.” (Fact check: The severity of wildfires such as the historic blazes in Canada this year are fueled by complex conditions including forest management and drought primed by climate change.) “...Americans increasingly care about climate change, unless you’re asking the Republican voter base. The GOP’s obsession that liberal elites want to worsen the average person’s way of life through climate action has chipped away at their voters’ support for solutions and belief that the planet is warming. Party leaders and presidential candidates have insisted, wrongly, that Democrats’ climate solutions will mean bans on laundry machines, hamburgers, and gas stoves and that unabated “wokeism” has infiltrated the corporate world. It’s a useful scare tactic, employed to delay action. Supran, who has conducted research on historical oil industry ads, found those in the 1990s “trotting out the same rhetoric, with different wording: ‘No more SUVs, no more driving around freely,’” to stave off new energy efficiency standards. “It plays into this elitist narrative, that these are the elites and they aren’t like us and they’re trying to tell us all these cultural changes they’re trying to bring about,” Bob Inglis, a Republican and former South Carolina member of Congress who now runs the advocacy group RepublicEn to promote climate solutions among conservatives, told Vox. Inglis told Vox it’s helpful for the politicians who sell doubt on climate change to make it seem like people who support solutions “have their heads in the clouds trying to solve things the rest of us practical people don’t need.”
Bloomberg: Sacred Tribal Canyon Tests Limits of Potential Energy Bonanza
Kellie Lunney, 8/11/23
“A House Republican bill to nullify the Biden administration’s move to protect swaths of federal land from drilling is reigniting a dispute over energy development winners and losers,” Bloomberg reports. “The debate is dividing political allies and spotlighting the broader conflict between conservation, energy production and economic growth for impoverished areas that Democrats are struggling to navigate going into the 2024 election. At stake is roughly 336,000 acres of land in northwestern New Mexico sacred to multiple tribes and more than 20,000 individual Native Americans who stand to lose revenue from potential energy development. The area around the Chaco Culture National Historical Park in the oil-and-gas rich San Juan Basin already is the site of significant drilling. Interior Secretary Deb Haaland in June announced a 20-year ban on new oil, gas and mining leasing and development on federal lands within 10 miles of Chaco Canyon, the ancestral and cultural home to various tribes, including Pueblos and Navajos. “This place is really like ancient, other sacred places, like the city of Jerusalem,” Rep. Melanie Stansbury (D-N.M.), who supports the ban, told Bloomberg. “It is a place of prayer, of worship.” Rep. Eli Crane (R-Ariz.) is seeking to void Haaland’s public land order, and the Republican-led Natural Resources Committee advanced legislation (H.R. 4374) in July that would do so. Illustrating the complex tradeoffs at play, Crane is getting support from Navajo Nation President Buu Nygren. Interior’s decision to withdraw the federal lands within 10 miles of the park disrespected tribal sovereignty and would hurt tribal members, or allottees, who depend on oil and gas royalties, Nygren testified during a July hearing.” “...The Chaco region embodies the complexities of the West’s checkerboard landscape, where boundaries among federal, state, tribal, and private lands aren’t as clear-cut as they appear on a map. This configuration complicates any effort to drill or mine the land… “The opposition from some in the Navajo Nation to Haaland’s land withdrawal and the allottees’ potential loss of royalties puts progressive Democrats who support clean energy, tribal sovereignty, and economic prosperity for Native Americans in a tough political spot.”
E&E News: NPS Board Gets Native American Member For First Time In 88 Years
Rob Hotakainen, 8/11/23
“Aja DeCoteau will make history next week when she joins the National Park System Advisory Board for its first meeting in nearly three years,” E&E News reports. “When Interior Secretary Deb Haaland revived the 15-member board earlier this year, she also imposed a requirement that at least one new member had to belong to a federally recognized Native American tribe. Haaland, the first Native American to lead the Interior Department, then appointed DeCoteau, a citizen of the Confederated Tribes and Bands of the Yakama Nation who has tribal lineage with the Cayuse, Nez Perce and Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa Indians. Native American representation on the board is significant because of the history of this country’s national parks, as tribes were driven from their homelands to make way for some of the West’s most celebrated parks, including Yellowstone and the Grand Canyon. That’s something that DeCoteau feels a personal obligation to speak about. “We understand and know better than anybody to tell that story,” DeCoteau, 43, told E&E in an interview last week. “Many of these places that were taken away were the most bountiful lands, or they were the most sacred sites for some of the tribes nationally. And I think it’s incredibly important that that story is told from the first-person narrative.’”
STATE UPDATES
Bakersfield Californian: Feds set aside $20.6 million for carbon management work in Kern
JOHN COX, 8/11/23
“The Biden administration stoked Kern’s grandest economic ambitions Friday by announcing up to $20.6 million in taxpayer money toward possibly establishing a carbon management hub near the county’s western edge — but stopped short of naming the region one of four national centers for such work,” the Bakersfield Californian reports. “Pending negotiations with the U.S. Department of Energy, three local oil producers will receive Inflation Reduction Act grants to either design or study the feasibility of building facilities for removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and injecting it into depleted oil wells. The projects would not aid or inhibit local petroleum production. Cal State Bakersfield, Kern Community College District and the University of California were also tapped to get federal money, which would have to be paired with large sums from other sources such as private investment. Although the local awards were far less than what some had hoped — $1.2 billion was set aside for a pair of projects in Louisiana and Texas to establish the nation’s first “direct air capture” hubs — Friday’s awards nevertheless sustain Kern’s bid for future federal investment in a somewhat controversial technology for staving off climate change while helping communities transition their economies away from petroleum dependence… “The largest of the grants awarded for DAC work in western Kern was headed by Long Beach-based oil producer California Resources Corp., which formed a coalition including representatives from industry, technology, academia, community organizations, local government and labor groups… “A grant of almost $2.8 million was set aside for studying the feasibility of a DAC project proposed by a subsidiary of Bakersfield-based oil producer Aera Energy LLC… “Separately, a Chevron Corp. subsidiary tentatively received a $3 million grant for producing a $5 million feasibility study of its DAC proposal, which like the CRC and Aera initiatives would be located in western Kern.”
EXTRACTION
InsideClimate News: Is Carbon Capture and Storage a Climate Solution?
Nicholas Kusnetz, 8/12/23
“Carbon capture and storage refers to a suite of technologies that remove carbon dioxide from smokestack emissions and then compress the climate-warming gas for injection underground,” InsideClimate News reports. “...The problem is that building and running carbon capture operations is expensive, involves complex engineering challenges and presents environmental risks. One CO2 pipeline ruptured in Mississippi in 2020, sending dozens who were exposed to the gas to the hospital. Carbon dioxide that is injected underground can also leak into groundwater or the atmosphere if storage sites are not properly screened or maintained. Despite decades of research and billions in public and private investment, there were only a few dozen CCS plants operating worldwide as of March 2023, with the ability to remove only about 46 million metric tons of carbon dioxide per year, according to the International Energy Agency. That’s equal to about 0.1 percent of global CO2 emissions… “Some of the biggest supporters of CCS have been fossil fuel producers. Oil companies lobbied hard to secure billions in federal loans, grants and tax incentives that were included in the 2021 infrastructure bill and Inflation Reduction Act of 2022. Many environmental groups have said this money would be better spent on efforts to phase out fossil fuels and have criticized CCS as little more than “greenwashing” for oil companies looking to burnish their image… “The biggest and boldest carbon capture proposal has come from ExxonMobil, which announced in 2021 that it wanted to join with the Houston area’s biggest polluters to capture carbon dioxide from the area’s refineries, power plants and petrochemical complexes. The $100 billion proposal could work only with substantial government support, the company said, though Exxon has begun to assemble much of that in the form of tax incentives, grants and new regulations… “But critics point to the high costs and high energy demands of the process, saying the projects either won’t reach a meaningful scale or would demand too much electricity if they did.”
National Observer: Enbridge relied on faulty study to pitch Ontario gas network expansion
John Woodside, 8/15/23
“A key study used by Enbridge in its application to expand its Ontario gas network erroneously inflated the cost of switching from gas to electricity to heat buildings by billions of dollars,” the National Observer reports. “Enbridge is currently in hearings before the Ontario Energy Board (OEB) seeking approval for a customer rate hike to fund a massive gas network of new pipes across the province. Evidence filed with the regulator includes a report from consulting firm Guidehouse commissioned by the Calgary-based fossil fuel company. It examined two paths to net-zero emissions by 2050 and concluded a heating grid with further gas investments is a far cheaper option than electric for home heating… “Enbridge used the study to claim electrification would be too expensive in the pages of the Toronto Star and has relied on it to justify further investments in natural gas infrastructure in Ontario. The company also referred to the Guidehouse study in a PowerPoint presentation as one of the “inputs” used to develop its “vision of Ontario’s energy sector,” which includes significant investments in gas infrastructure and renewable natural gas –– a fuel that some experts believe is greenwashing. The study surprised experts from the Industrial Gas Users Association and advocacy group Environmental Defence, who are intervening in Enbridge’s rate hike application. Conclusions reached in the report contradicted other studies that state as the carbon price increases and the cost of wind and solar energy come down, renewable energy is the clear winner from a cost perspective. Kent Elson, a lawyer representing Environmental Defence, wanted to see the assumptions the Guidehouse study relied on to reach its conclusion. Enbridge balked at releasing that information, and it took an order from the OEB to make the figures available for cross-examination. “When they had to disclose what was underneath the hood, it became clear that it was just full of errors, so much so, they were forced to do a correction and that swung the results by $140 billion,” Elson told Canada’s National Observer. “It's an enormous set of mistakes.” Despite the $140-billion swing, Enbridge defends the Guidehouse study. The analysis Guidehouse has since updated “reduced the differential between the two [scenarios] from $181B to $41B,” with the gas system still remaining as the lower cost pathway, an Enbridge spokesperson told the Observer.
Exposed: Anti-Woke and Fossil Fuel Industry Operatives Dominate ALEC’s Energy Task Force
David Armiak, 8/10/23
“A senior operative in Leonard Leo’s influence network now holds a seat on the Energy, Environment and Agriculture (EEA) task force of the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC)—a task force that is increasingly dominated by anti-woke warriors and leaders in the fossil fuel industry,” according to Exposed. “Mike Thompson, a senior vice president at CRC Advisors, is now a private-sector member of the EEA task force, according to a list obtained by the Center for Media and Democracy (CMD) showing task force members who attended ALEC’s 2023 annual meeting last month. The EEA task force has been the primary conduit for the fossil fuel industry to work with climate change deniers to promote model policies that weaken environmental protections and obstruct efforts to address the climate crisis. This includes advancing model legislation to protect the offending industry from boycotts and a bill designed to punish protestors with stiff penalties and discourage sustained, large-scale demonstrations like those used to fight the Dakota Access Pipeline project… “Despite the words “environment” and “agriculture” in its name, ALEC’s EEA task force primarily includes corporate members representing the fossil fuel industry. For instance, Alliance Resource Partners, Arizona Public Service Company, Battle Group, C & C Shorelands, DCI Group, Koch Companies Public Sector, Omaha Public Power District, Pinnacle West Capital Corporation, and Salt River Project are all on the attendance list for the meeting… “Many lobbyists from trade associations also attended the latest EEA task force meeting. Except for the Advanced Medical Technology Association (AdvaMed), all of them—the American Chemistry Council, American Fuel & Petrochemical Manufacturers (AFPM), the American Gas Association, and Edison Electric Institute—represent fossil fuel interests… “Next month the EEA task force will host an “Energy Academy” from September 21–23 in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, according to a pamphlet distributed at the meeting and obtained by CMD. It states that only 15–20 state lawmakers will participate in the training from “a selection of priority states… well positioned to advance critical resource acquisition, development for America’s energy needs, and ensure the country remains fed at a reasonable cost.”
OPINION
Teen Vogue: Joe Biden Approved Drilling Projects, Now Young Climate Voters Are Watching for 2024
NOA GREENE-HOUVRAS, 8/10/23
“In March I will turn 18 and become eligible to vote. Like thousands of other young people, I will narrowly make the cut to vote in the 2024 presidential election. As is the case for many, the issue at the forefront of my mind is the climate crisis,” Noa Greene-Houvras writes for Teen Vogue. “After school was canceled due to wildfire smoke, and the intense heat that is defining my summer, it’s clear that dangerous, extreme weather is already here — and that it will only get worse if we fail to meet this urgent threat. I stand with those around the world who are calling for action and leadership on the climate crisis, and for the first time I will be able to support this call through my vote. But I am outraged by the prospect of sacrificing my future — and my vote — to a president who continues to bow to the fossil fuel industry. In the 2020 election, Joe Biden ran as a self-proclaimed climate president… “Above all, President Biden has revealed his lack of commitment to environmental justice through his acceptance and expansion of the production of fossil fuels… “Environmental justice entails more than just halting the climate crisis; it demands uplifting marginalized communities in that process. The fossil fuel industry — which does not exist in a vacuum for our economic growth — disproportionately harms people of color. Major pipelines, like the ones Biden has approved, displace and harm Indigenous communities that work to protect Alaskan land. By continuing to approve massive fossil fuel infrastructure projects, Biden perpetuates our reliance on those fuels for decades to come, while supporting a system that exacerbates environmental racism and causes immense harm to local communities. No fresh promises or newly created councils will be able to offset this harm. The differences between Biden's goals and his actions reveal climate hypocrisy. By making progress in some domains while supporting the fossil fuel industry — an approach that is getting us nowhere — President Biden is taking a “two steps forward, two steps back” approach to try to get support from as many people as possible. This way he can call himself a climate president without angering the fossil fuel giants. But the back-and-forth is angering environmentalists, confusing Democrats, and pushing youth voters away, alienating many people who voted for him in 2020… “President Biden has missed the mark for what it means to be a climate leader, but he still has the opportunity to make history, get reelected, and turn around our country's reliance on fossil fuels. Until he does, though, we will march, chant, write, read, and vote like our future depends on it — because it does.”
Pagosa Daily Post: New Report Highlights Negative Impacts From Extractive Industries
Kate Groetzinger is Communications Manager at the Center for Western Priorities, 8/14/23
“Across the West, mining companies as well as oil and gas producers have left toxic messes that have yet to be cleaned up—as well as sources of pollution that may never be fully eliminated,” Kate Groetzinger writes for the Pagosa Daily Post. “A new report from the Center for Western Priorities, Backyard Problems, looks at a number of these sites to highlight the risks involved with mining and drilling in the West, making a strong case for strengthening environmental safeguards and reforming outdated laws in order to better protect Western communities and the environment. These outdated laws include the General Mining Act of 1872 and the Mineral Leasing Act of 1920. The Biden administration is currently updating federal rules that govern how drilling occurs on public lands, as well as creating a federal rule to better balance conservation with extraction on public lands. The Backyard Problems report shows that these efforts are necessary and urgent. But they are not enough. The Backyard Problems report also highlights the fact that modern environmental laws, like the Clean Water and Clean Air acts, are only as good as their enforcement. Finally, the Backyard Problems report makes the case for increasing bonding requirements for both drilling and mining projects so that taxpayers are not stuck with the cleanup costs.”
Flathead Beacon: BLM Rule Will Protect Public Lands From Contamination And Neglect
Aubrey Bertram is a staff attorney at Wild Montana and director of the organization’s climate and energy program, 8/11/23
“For decades, the Bureau of Land Management has considered 90% of the 8 million acres it manages in Montana suitable for oil and gas leasing,” Aubrey Bertram writes for the Flathead Beacon. “It doesn’t matter if the lands offer any real production potential or if leasing and drilling harm the wildlife habitat, water quality, cultural riches, recreational opportunities, and everything else on these lands that Montanans cherish. The amount of public lands available for oil and gas leasing is just one glaring indication among many that the Department of the Interior has, for far too long, favored private interests over the American public. It’s no wonder the Government Accountability Office (an independent, nonpartisan watchdog agency) often cites the department’s oil and gas leasing program as ‘vulnerable to waste, fraud, abuse, and mismanagement.’ Thankfully, Congress acted on cleaning up the program when it passed the Inflation Reduction Act last year. The bill includes numerous reforms to the federal oil and gas leasing program, helping ensure the program works for everyone, not just special interests. But before those reforms can be implemented, the Interior Department and BLM must codify them in their administrative rulemaking. They took the first step in doing just that when they issued a long-awaited proposed oil and gas rule on July 20.”
Edmonton Journal: Canadians worse emissions culprits than Chinese
Anthony Chow, Edmonton, 8/15/23
“David Staples’ article, “Smith has little choice but to take hard line against Trudeau and Co,” published in the Edmonton Journal on Aug. 11, indicated that in 2021, China emitted 11.5 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide while Canada only emitted 550 million tonnes. He implied that Canada’s emissions were very small in comparison to China’s,” Anthony Chow writes for the Edmonton Journal. “However, he forgot to mention that there was a population of 1.412 billion Chinese citizens and only 38.25 million Canadians in 2021. If we calculate these numbers under a per-capita basis, each Canadian emitted 75 per cent more carbon than each Chinese. Since each one of us is a member of this planet, we are all responsible to save it by reducing our carbon footprint.”
Wall Street Journal: Mike Pence’s Plan to Drill, Baby, Drill
The Editorial Board, 8/10/23
“Former Vice President Mike Pence has hit 40,000 donors and qualified for the first Republican debate on Aug. 23, and perhaps he’ll tell the audience in Milwaukee about his new plan to drill, baby, drill,” the Wall Street Journal Editorial Board writes. “Mr. Pence published an outline of an energy policy Tuesday, and it’s both a standard GOP package and a reminder of the political stakes in 2024. “Democratic energy policy under the Biden Administration has been based on the deception that fossil fuels are not a part of the world’s energy future,” the plan says… “Calling out President Biden’s unrealistic assumptions about green energy is a good start. From there, Mr. Pence promises to: “Take advantage of the shale revolution by opening federal lands for leasing; Reform the National Environmental Policy Act “to cut permitting times in half and get domestic energy online; Review and remove Mr. Biden’s executive orders that stand in the way, such as regulations on the “social cost of carbon” that “give federal agencies extraordinary new power to regulate every type of energy; Repeal “the host of refinery regulations put in place in recent years and establish goals to increase refinery capacity; Deregulate liquefied natural gas infrastructure to “build more pipeline capacity and export terminal facilities; Provide long-term regulatory certainty, regardless of which party controls Washington, by passing “laws that statutorily guarantee access to energy development and extraction while setting specific timetables for government leases and approvals; “Eliminate the Department of Justice’s ‘Office of Environmental Justice,’ and stop policies that help extremists use the courts to stop domestic energy production.” These ideas unite Republicans, but give Mr. Pence credit for joining the policy debate and putting himself on record. Americans care about gasoline and energy prices, so this is favorable political terrain, if GOP voters choose to fight Mr. Biden on it. The risk of nominating former President Trump is that everything else will be drowned out by arguments about whether he should go to prison for trying to overturn the 2020 election or delete Mar-a-Lago’s security tapes to hide documents. Do Republicans want to be talking about that in November 2024? Or do they want to make the case to voters, whether through Mr. Pence or a fresh face, that Mr. Biden is wrong in trying to throttle U.S. energy production?”
Frontier Centre for Public Policy: TC Energy Dumping Keystone Pipeline
Brian Zinchuk, 8/14/23
“After 18 years of heartbreak and misery, TC Energy is dumping its foray into oil pipelines,” Brian Zinchuk writes for the Frontier Centre for Public Policy. “TC Energy announced on July 27 it is spinning off a new liquids pipelines company from its natural gas pipelines and power generation business. The new, unnamed company will operate two shorter oil and condensate pipelines in northern Alberta. But those are chicken feed. This is all about the half-continent spanning 30 and 36 inch Keystone System/Marketlink which runs 4,324 kilometres from Hardisty, Alberta, to the U.S. Gulf Coast. And it’s also about the projects that weren’t built – the Keystone XL expansion and the Energy East pipeline, from Hardisty to St. John, New Brunswick. Each resulted in charges exceeding a billion dollars… “But it was the Keystone XL project, by far, that was TransCanada’s worst setback imaginable… “In May, 2016, I was the reporter who asked Donald Trump if he would approve Keystone XL and invite TransCanada to build it. He said, “Yes, I would. Totally. It should be approved.” “...While Obama slow-walked it for seven years before finally saying no, the pipe sat in fields across Saskatchewan, Montana, South Dakota, and Nebraska. They sat so long it became essentially worthless junk. Would you trust pipe that sat in the open for the better part of a decade to not be corroded, then pressure it up and hope it doesn’t leak like a sieve? And that became a major problem for the original Keystone pipeline that was actually built and put into service in 2012, just as the anti-pipeline movement was rising to a fever pitch. The most recent leak, in Kansas, resulted in the pipeline being derated, reducing its capacity. That Dec. 29 spill was likely the final straw for the TC Energy board, which apparently has been considering this move for two years now. The Keystone name, itself, has come to symbolize the anti-pipeline, anti-oil movements. The project became so toxic that TransCanada changed its name to TC Energy. And that toxicity was evident in the July 27 announcement. In the entire press release, “Keystone” is only mentioned twice – once in the list of assets, and once in the legalese. It is abundantly clear Keystone is now the word that shall not be uttered. Indeed, the anti-pipeline movement, which found its strength fighting Keystone XL is one of the main reasons the costs of the natural gas Coastal GasLink project have more than doubled for TC Energy. If Energy East had been built, if Keystone XL hadn’t been such a dragged out, painful experience, Canadians, as a whole, would be much better off. But only a fool would try to build a pipeline in this country now.”