By Karen Uhlenhuth

December 18, 2013

Midwest Energy News

Iowa is well established as a national leader in wind energy and biofuels. And now the state is poised for serious growth in solar as well.

“The market is exploding in Iowa,” says Tim Dwight, a former Iowa Hawkeye and NFL star who has become one of his home state’s most visible solar energy advocates.

Homeowners, farmers, businesses and at least one school district in Iowa are going solar. Also, over the past year, several municipal utilities and rural electric co-ops have put up solar arrays, inviting customers to buy a share of the power generated.

CNBC

By Reuters

December 10, 2013

Predisdent Vladimir Putin ordered Russia's Military to increase its focus on the Arctic and finish plans by the end of the year to upgrade military bases in the resource-rich region where world powers jostle for control.

Speaking to Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu, Putin praised the military's work in the Arctic, where Canada said on Monday it was claiming the North Pole as part of an broader claim on the region.

West Coast Wood Exports Undercut Economy and Environment

- by Samantha Chirillo, Energy Justice Network

[[{"type":"media","view_mode":"media_large","fid":"154","attributes":{"alt":"","class":"media-image","height":"365","style":"width: 333px; height: 253px; margin-left: 7px; margin-right: 7px; float: left;","width":"480"}}]]Since the European Union (EU) countries set high carbon reduction standards and counted biomass energy as carbon neutral and renewable, biomass exports from the southeastern U.S. have skyrocketed.

Now, as Japan looks for an alternative to nuclear energy, as U.S. corporations get tax breaks to relocate facilities to the countries of least regulation, as trans-Pacific trade agreements give these corporations power over governments, and as Oregon’s Congressional delegation plans to log more public forest, west coast ports are preparing for log and biomass export expansion. In 2013 alone, log and chip exports from the northwestern U.S. already doubled, according to Public Interest Forester Roy Keene. Exports are the surest path to forest decline, as history has shown, says Keene.  

Anti-Biomass Incineration Campaign - National Conference Call 

Thursday, December 5, 2013

TOPIC: "Exporting Our Forests and Economy"

[[{"type":"media","view_mode":"media_large","fid":"142","attributes":{"alt":"","class":"media-image","height":"265","style":"width: 300px; height: 199px; float: left; margin-left: 7px; margin-right: 7px;","width":"400"}}]]RECORDING: Biomass Incinerator Noise – December 2013

We discuss the economic and environmental impacts of shipping logs, wood pellets, and other forest products overseas from the West and East coasts in the U.S.

Guest speakers:

-Roy Keene, Public Interest Forester
-Greg Pallesen, Association of Western Pulp and Paper Workers
- Rachel Smolker, Biofuelwatch

Facilitator: Josh Schlossberg, Energy Justice Network

Notes: Samantha Chirillo, Energy Justice Network

 

Conway Irwin
December 7, 2013

GreenTechMedia

Morgan Stanley is seeing “vicious competition” between coal plants and wind farms in resource-rich regions.

More efficient technologies, combined with low costs and strong wind resources, are making wind cost-competitive with some of the cheapest forms of fossil energy in the Midwest.

“In the Midwest, we’re now seeing power agreements being signed with wind farms at as low as $25 per megawatt-hour,” said Stephen Byrd, Morgan Stanley’s Head of North American Equity Research for Power & Utilities and Clean Energy, at the Columbia Energy Symposium in late November. “Compare that to the variable cost of a gas plant at $30 per megawatt-hour. The all-in cost to justify the construction of a new gas plant would be above $60 per megawatt-hour.”

By JIM MALEWITZ

Published: December 5, 2013

The New York Times

A case involving the disposal of industrial wastewater pits two interests that are dear to many Texans against each other: oil and gas resources versus private property rights.

A decision by the state’s highest civil court could have major implications for both. The Texas Supreme Court is scheduled to hear arguments on Jan. 7 in a dispute between a company that operates injection wells in Liberty County and a nearby rice farm that says wastewater from those wells has migrated into a saltwater aquifer below its land. It calls the migration trespassing, for which it should be compensated. Among several smaller questions, the court will weigh a broad one: Just how far below the earth’s surface do property lines extend?

By Ralph Cavanagh

November 26th, 2013

Switchboard NRDC Blog

In the global competition for appealing clean energy solutions, a leading entry is the new West Village at the University of California at Davis (UC Davis), which today celebrated significant progress toward its goal of becoming the largest planned “zero-net energy” community in the United States.

Seven years ago, I was one of nine jurors who selected the winner in a competition to establish the nation’s first university-based center on energy efficiency (and yes, it’s hard to believe that this didn’t happen until 2006!). UC Davis finished first in a distinguished field, and it has more than justified expectations in the years since. 

U.S. Solar Power Testing Site to Be Built in Vt.