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‘THAT IS SO HYPOCRITICAL’: RICK PERRY VS. JAY INSLEE ON NATURAL GAS: Energy Secretary Rick Perry is calling Democratic presidential hopeful Jay Inslee’s climate stance hypocritical because of his opposition to natural gas exports.
“I am always intrigued with Jay Inslee, he likes to poke and make fun from time to time, but if you really care about the environment, stopping U.S. natural gas going through your state to be exported to Japan, who are using substantially dirtier types of fuel to power their country — on its face, that is so hypocritical,” Perry said in an interview with John on Friday.
Inslee often touts that he is “such a strong environmentalist,” while refusing to allow a fuel to transit his state that would make a “big difference” environmentally, Perry said.
Inslee, the governor of Washington, recently mocked the Energy Department’s effort to name U.S. natural gas exports “freedom gas.” The moniker is meant to underscore the potential of U.S. energy exports displacing Russian natural gas to benefit U.S. allies.
Inslee had tweeted that true freedom comes from saving the world from the disastrous effects of climate change, not exporting fossil fuels.
Perry brought up Inslee at the top of the interview in the unsolicited remark. Perry was discussing how states — Washington in particular — were setting hurdles for infrastructure for coal and natural gas.
“The state of Washington won’t let that [natural] gas transit through their state going to the West Coast,” Perry said, explaining that the subject of Washington’s intransigence has come up in recent meetings with the governor of North Dakota.
North Dakota is one of the largest oil producing states outside of the Gulf Coast. But the state is also producing a large amount of natural gas from an effort to stop burning it off and instead harvest it for export.
Perry said North Dakota has the same problem that the oil fields in Texas had faced from lacking the pipelines to move natural to market.
Perry said allowing the natural gas to flow easily will lead to positive effects environmentally.
“I know about it, because I saw it in my home state,” he said. He said the switch to more natural gas drove down his home state’s total carbon dioxide footprint by almost 20%.
The president issued an executive order in May that calls on members of his cabinet to look at ways to block states from using its permit authority to stop infrastructure projects from moving ahead.
Perry said the agency is developing a report slated to be released later this summer in the July-August time frame, which will offer recommendations on how to overcome the permitting hurdles presented by states when it comes to energy terminals and pipelines.
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REFINING INDUSTRY SOUNDS ALARM ON TRUMP’S PLANNED MEXICO TARIFFS: The U.S. refining industry says Trump’s threatened tariffs on Mexico could raise gasoline prices as summer driving season begins, while also complicating passage of a revamped NAFTA deal that would facilitate energy trade.
“Imposing tariffs on Mexican products, particularly crude oil, could raise energy prices for U.S. consumers, disadvantage the U.S. refining industry and jeopardize passage of USMCA — all bad outcomes,” said Chet Thompson, president and CEO of the refining trade group American Fuel & Petrochemical Manufacturers.
Free trade threatened: The oil and gas industry has been pressing Congress to pass Trump’s U.S.-Canada-Mexico Agreement. The original NAFTA deal has helped make Mexico the largest export market for U.S. oil, transportation fuel, and natural gas by allowing for the U.S., Mexico, and Canada to pay nothing on most goods that cross borders between them, including energy products. Now, Democrats already disinclined to do business with Trump have a new reason not to pass his trade deal.
Measuring the potential impact of tariffs: While U.S. imports of Mexican oil have been in decline in recent years, the U.S. still gets about 9% of its crude imports from Mexico, the third-highest source behind Canada and Saudi Arabia.
The U.S. refining industry returns the favor, turning Mexico’s heavy crude into gasoline and diesel which it sends back to Mexico. Those sales could be threatened if Mexico retaliates with its own tariffs on U.S. energy. In addition, though the U.S. is exporting more LNG via tanker, most of the total U.S. natural gas exports last were by pipeline, 67% of which went to Mexico, according to the Energy Information Administration.
TRUMP CELEBRATES FIRST LNG EXPORTS FROM CAMERON FACILITY IN LOUISIANA: Trump celebrated the first shipment of LNG Monday from the Cameron LNG natural gas export terminal in Louisiana.
“BIG NEWS! As I promised two weeks ago, the first shipment of LNG has just left the Cameron LNG Export Facility in Louisiana. Not only have thousands of JOBS been created in USA, we’re shipping freedom and opportunity abroad!” Trump said, adopting the Energy Department’s notable “freedom” language to describe increasing U.S. energy exports.
Trump last month toured the Cameron facility, where he overstated his role in developing it.
Cameron was approved by the Obama administration, with the plant in the works for eight years — long before Trump came along.
RESEARCHERS TELL CONGRESS TO PASS ‘NEXT GENERATION’ OF CLEAN ENERGY TAX CREDITS: As existing tax credits for renewables near expiration, researchers are asking Congress to pass the “next generation” of tax subsidies for clean energy technologies.
A paper released Monday by Columbia University’s Center on Global Energy Policy recommends federal policymakers tailor new electricity sector credits to use applications rather than specific energy sources.
Rather than extending existing subsidies for wind and solar — credited with lowering their cost — lawmakers should direct credits to applications such as long-duration storage, carbon capture, and advanced nuclear.
“Successor policies to expiring tax credits are needed to bring a diverse range of emerging technology options to commercial scale,” write the authors of the paper, Columbia economist Noah Kaufman and Varun Sivaram, fellow for science and technology at the Council on Foreign Relations.
The authors say those application-specific credits should be coordinated with federal spending on research, development, and demonstration directed at emerging clean energy technologies such as carbon capture and energy storage so they can be commercialized with the help of tax subsidies.
And, third, the paper recommends policymakers set conditions for ramping down the tax subsidies, to keep costs from spiking.
While the authors say tax incentives aren’t ideal because of their inefficiency and distortion of the marketplace, it is the rare clean energy policy with bipartisan support.
DEMOCRATIC SENATOR TO INTRODUCE BILL STOPPING TRUMP FROM LEAVING PARIS DEAL: Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, D-N.H., said Friday she plans to introduce legislation barring Trump from using federal funds to withdraw the U.S. from the Paris Climate Accord.
“The president’s intention to withdraw the U.S. from the Paris Climate Agreement is highly reckless and unravels significant progress made to mitigate the effects of climate change,” Shaheen said.
The legislation would be a companion to a bill passed by the Democratically-controlled House last month. It likely won’t advance in the GOP-led Senate.
OFFSHORE INDUSTRY TRADE GROUP LEADER TO DEPART: National Ocean Industries Association President Randall Luthi announced Monday he will leave the offshore energy industry trade group after nearly 10 years on the job.
Luthi will return to his home state of Wyoming to be chief energy advisor to the state’s new Republican Gov. Mark Gordon.
The Rundown
Politico Labor anger over Green New Deal greets 2020 contenders in California
Reuters Can a derivative turn Europe’s green energy dream into virtual reality?
Washington Post Costco, Walmart and other big retailers try to break Dominion Energy’s grip in Virginia
Axios Carbon capture, illustrated
Calendar
MONDAY | June 3
9 a.m., Omni Shoreham Hotel. The Nuclear Energy Institute holds the Nuclear Energy Assembly in Washington, June 3-5.
TUESDAY | June 4
10 a.m., 366 Dirksen. Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee holds a hearing to examine opportunities for the expanded deployment of grid-scale energy storage in the United States.
MONDAY | June 10
9 a.m., Philadelphia. The Edison Electric Institute, representing the investor-owned utility industry, holds its 2019 annual convention in Philadelphia, June 10-11.
TUESDAY | June 11
The House Energy and Commerce Committee’s Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee holds a hearing with former EPA administrators Lee Thomas, William Reilly, Christine Todd Whitman, and Gina McCarthy testifying.
