The U.S. Congress may be “out of gas” when it comes to drafting an energy policy, as the Washington Post edit page moans, but General Electric’s John Krenecki doesn’t mind giving legislators a push.

He only had to battle giants, not the Senate (Wikipedia)

The head of GE Energy, the conglomerate’s unit that makes everything from wind turbines to nuclear reactors, flew down to Washington again today to plead with senators to extend tax credits for renewable energy. The credits, still crucial to making clean energy competitive, are set to expire at the end of the year, despite at least eight tries so far to renew them. That threatens to slam the brakes on two gangbuster years for American wind and solar power.

“I’m prepared to come down every week to say the same thing,” he told us. “If the production tax credit expires in the U.S., the wind industry will collapse. As the clock ticks, you put jobs at risk.”

Mr. Krenecki’s testimony is part of a broader Senate look today at America’s energy future. Among the heavyweights also on parade: Rick Waggoner, CEO of General Motors; Marvin Odum, the president of Shell Oil; Gary Cohn, co-president of Goldman Sachs; Dan Yergin of Cambridge Energy Research Associates; and Dan Reicher, Google’s clean-energy guru.

Mr. Krenecki thinks his clean-energy arguments will find a more receptive audience in the Senate than when he made identical pleas more than a year ago. The real problem isn’t support for clean energy per se, he says, but the messy politics that makes it tough to renew the credits.

And he says the beauty of jumpstarting clean-tech with the tax credits is that it doesn’t require inventing a whole new energy policy—just renewing an existing one.

So what happens if Congress doesn’t renew clean-energy subsidies?

“If the U.S.government is not going to be reliable and predictable [on clean-energy policy], we’ll go to Germany and China,” he says, pointing to countries that have long-term, aggressive plans in place to promote clean energy. China could pass the U.S. next year to become the second-biggest wind-power country, after Germany.

Mr. Krenecki’s GE boss Jeff Immelt said something similar earlier this year, threatening to sell clean-tech equipment to countries like Turkey if the U.S. doesn’t fix its “hellish” energy policy. Still, foreign companies are still flocking to the U.S. market—GE rival Siemens just announced it will build a new wind-turbine factory in the U.S., even with the subsidy question still up in the air.

Will this Congress renew the tax credits at the buzzer? Or have two years of world-beating renewable-energy growth taken away any sense of urgency?

Hurricane Ike is bearing down on the Texas coast like an eerie reminder of the deadly 1900 storm that mauled Galveston, and represents a perfect-storm scenario of possible damage to vulnerable refining, chemical, and shipping industries.

As Ike’s Category-2 winds start pounding one-quarter of America’s oil-refining capacity, what’s the likely outcome in terms of gasoline prices and shortages? Reuters quotes one breathless meteorologist:

“Hurricane Ike is a gigantic Category 2 monster and is likely to generate a massive and particularly destructive storm surge at key refinery centers,” said Jim Rouiller, meteorologist with private weather forecaster Planalytics. “Close to 20 percent of the U.S. refining capability could be lost for a long period of time.”

But what’s a “long period of time”? The folks at The Oil Drum have been trying to divine how Ike’s storm surges and inland flooding could affect Texas’ refining capacity. In a nutshell, it doesn’t look good—with some outages potentially lasting the rest of the year:

The key question is refinery damage…Current models are showing that there will be at least 1 MMBBL offline for 30 days, with the potential for 5 MMBBL offline at 30 days and 4 MMBBL at 60 days, 1 to 2 MMBBL out through the end of the year. That would certainly cause
significant shortages of refined products (eg gasoline).

You don’t have to tell Houston drivers. On their way out of town, many have already run into long gasoline lines—and some service stations have already run out of fuel, thanks to the early refinery shutdowns prompted by Ike’s arrival.

If Americans thought $99 oil meant the end of $4 gasoline, Ike might just make them think again.

On Monday afternoon, “scores” of baseball fans will launch a protest outside the Washington Nationals’ glitzy new eco-friendly stadium. Will they be screaming at the Nats’ owners about suffering the worst record in Major League Baseball, or enduring one of the most anemic offenses in the country?

Nope—the protest Monday is aimed at ExxonMobil’s continued sponsorship of the Nats’ stadium. Red-and-white Exxon banners decorate parts of the outfield, and ocasionally other parts of Nationals Park, the first in the country to be LEED-certified as a “green” ballpark. Exxon also flashes its logo on the big scoreboard for the 7th-inning stretch.

That’s the disconnect that has environmenal baseball fans from groups like Greenpeace and the Chesapeake Climate Action Network riled up—especially since, as some protesters put it, the Nats’ stadium is the one place nearly all legislators are likely to take in a ball game during the year.

“Strike Out Exxon,” the campaign behind Monday’s protest, also wants the Nationals’ owners to guarantee the park will never take on that corporate moniker and become “ExxonMobil Stadium.”

If nothing else, environmentalists can take solace that ExxonMobil won’t be getting any playoff airtime from Nationals Park.

Crude futures finally rebounded as Hurricane Ike bore down on the Texas coast, prompting accelerated closures of Gulf coast refineries, both in Bloomberg. The big question is whether the refinery outage is just for a couple of weeks, or if it lasts for up to a month, the NYT notes.

Washington is worrying less about oil prices after a $40 fall since July, but that’s a mistake, The Economist says–$100 oil is hardly reason to cheer, and seriously threatens world economic growth. So what’s behind oil prices? A new CFTC report seems to suggest that it’s not speculators, who sold oil even as prices rose, in the NYT. Then again, the CFTC data is kind of sketchy and no one really knows for sure, the WSJ reports (sub reqd). Either way, Democrats aren’t satisfied with a report that lets speculators off the hook, in the WaPo.

Congress’ big energy plan is all set for next week’s vote, and as always Grist lays out the proposals on the table. Unfortunately for House speaker Nancy Pelosi, it’s a lose-lose situation, reports the NYT: Embracing drilling alienated environmentalists, but still didn’t go far enough to win over Republicans. Not by a long shot, argues the WSJ edit page, calling the compromise deal which could block future drilling a “surrender.” Isn’t anyone curious what the costs and benefits of more drilling would really be?, asks Michael Livermore at Grist. One report suggests Congress could get $2.6 trillion in new revenues if it opened up federal lands for drilling, the WSJ edit page says, and that if nothing else should get Democrats on board.

The WaPo edit page bemoans that Congress is “out of gas” when it comes to energy policy, but pleads for at least an extension of the renewable-energy tax credits this year. The Senate does have a $40 billion plan for that, the WSJ notes (sub reqd.)—but its funding provisions will likely scare off Republicans needed for passage. Either way, Siemens isn’t waiting: The German conglomerate says it is looking to build a new wind-turbine factory in the U.S. to boost local market share, in the WSJ (sub reqd.).

Sarah Palin’s first serious interview offered a couple of nuggets: She moves closer to John McCain on global warming (man may have had something to do with it, after all), and hopes to bring McCain closer to her stance on drilling in ANWR. Grist has the relevant transcript and the video. Oh yeah—and Gov. Palin asked California Gov. Schwarzenegger to nix a cargo tariff at West Coast ports she figures will hurt the economy, in the L.A. Times.

Over in the U.K., the Guardian wails about the government’s do-little plan for energy and climate, involving modest energy-efficiency steps, while the FT applauds the boring approach. Just as well London has some alternatives to meet energy demand: The Kingsnorth coal verdict likely will force the British government to rethink support for coal, the Guardian reports.

Sarah Palin ’s standing up to Big Oil in Alaska burnished her home-state reform credentials, and it may have been what landed her a place on the Republican ticket. But that stance could come back to haunt a McCain-Palin administration when it comes time to tackle the nitty gritty work of bolstering America’s energy security.

Governing’s going to be tougher (AP)

Gov. Palin likes to boast that she finally got Alaska’s big natural-gas pipeline project moving, after years of false starts. She did sign a contract with TransCanada, a pipeline company, to eventually build a pipeline that would carry gas from Alaska’s North Slope down the lower 48 states.

But the state’s agreement with TransCanada doesn’t include any guarantees the pipeline will actually be built. And Alaska hasn’t locked up the gas needed to fill the pipeline. In that sense, Gov. Palin’s barekknuckle approach to the diversified international oil giants–steps like raising the royalty fees oil companies pay the state–may make it tougher for her to fulfill her domestic-energy promises.

As the NYT notes today, the current Alaska pipeline project is entirely contingent on future agreements by oil and gas producers, such as Exxon, BP and ConocoPhilips, to ship gas through the TransCanada pipeline. BP and ConocoPhilips, though, have announced their own joint venture to build their own pipeline—and they have the gas. Bert Stedman, Republican co-chair of the state senate finance committee, told the NYT:

Ms. Palin’s bill seemed intentionally written to keep the three major Alaska oil producers from submitting proposals. Demonizing Big Oil, he added, could come back to haunt the state. “It’s a sad state of affairs, but it’s true: if you look at the politics of the state and you want to have a devil, you can point at Exxon, as well as at BP and Conoco,” Mr. Stedman said. “It is good politics.”

Republicans in St. Paul chanted “Drill, Baby, Drill,” even as their nominees have burned plenty of bridges to big oil. House speaker Nancy Pelosi yesterday pledged that Democrats are working to bring America closer to “energy independence,” but still attacks “profiteering” by Big Oil.

When the election’s over and it comes time to craft the next energy policy, it’ll be interesting to watch both parties sit down and try to actually work with the energy companies they’ve spent the campaign season railing against.

As Hurricane Ike barrels through the Gulf of Mexico, crude oil prices are still falling, closing in on the $100 mark—a big difference with the market’s jittery reaction to the arrival of Hurricane Gustav.
Why is that? Ike’s current projected path would take it to the Texas gulf coast by Friday—smack in the heart of the country’s refining patch. That’s why crude is falling even as wholesale gasoline prices are “going ballistic.”

Texas is home to a lot more refinery capacity than Louisiana—about 25% of the U.S. total—and yet Hurricane Katrina rattled refiners enough to cause gasoline prices to spike when it pounded New Orleans. Ike could do a lot worse, depending on where it hits and with what strength.

Just the threat of a hurricane’s landfall can crimp output at big refiners, which can require upwards of 48 hours to close up shop. And with a big chunk of U.S. refinery capacity potentially out of commission for the time being, there’s going to be a lot of excess crude oil sitting around, which puts downward pressure on crude prices.

The irony is that even as Congress wrestles with ways to achieve energy independence, the U.S. hasn’t managed to shake its own dependence on the Gulf Coast for oil and gasoline. Partly that’s due to geography and natural resources in the Gulf area; partly, as Geoff Styles pointed out, that’s because environmental opposition to new refineries made it easier for oil companies to keep building extensions to existing Gulf assets, deepening the country’s reliance on a thin stretch of hurricane-prone coastline.

If nothing else, the double whammy of Gustav and Ike could give fresh legs to natural-gas campaigners like T. Boone Pickens and Chesapeake Energy’s Aubrey McClendon. Natural gas production is a lot more diversified than oil, and there are no refineries needed.

Does the threat of future harm from climate change offer legal cover to environmental activists to damage property in the here and now?

That’s not an ad for gin (AP)

That’s the can of worms opened up by a British court case involving a half dozen Greenpeace protesters who defaced a coal plant, causing more than $50,000 in damage, but who were acquitted because they said they were acting to prevent even bigger damage from a warming planet. It was the first time climate change was used as a “legitimate defense” in a British court case, the Guardian says.

Greenpeace targeted the Kingsnorth coal-fired power plant because coal plants produce more emissions of greenhouse gases than other kinds of power; Kingsnorth alone produces more emissions than many poor countries, the protesters say. The campaign is part of a wider battle in Britain over the future of coal, as the country’s medium-term needs for electricity collide with environmental concerns like greenhouse-gas emissions.

The court heard testimony from U.S. climate-change scientist James Hansen, an outspoken opponent of traditional coal, who warned that adding more coal-fired plants would just bring the planet closer to catastrophic “tipping points.” He told the court that “Coal, specifically prompt phase-out of coal emissions, is the one critical element in solution of the global warming problem, in preservation of a planet resembling the one on which civilization developed.” He later asked if “the right people are on trial.”

The U.S. should take note—about half the electricity in the U.S. is generated by coal. Environmentalists, led by the Sierra Club, have waged a campaign for years to slow down or stop construction of new coal plants in the U.S., arguing that new coal-plant emissions will wipe out any environmental progress the country may make on other fronts. That’s also led some states—notably Kansas and Georgia—to shelve new coal-plant construction as well.

So far, for all the strident nature of the debate over energy, the environment, and global warming, it’s largely been a battle of words (and books, and documentaries). Does the British court ruling open the door to a new phase of confrontation, just as the U.S. and the rest of the world is trying to square environmental concerns with the need for more energy?

Crude oil fell to about $101 thanks to a stronger dollar and sluggish demand, despite OPEC’s call for a production cut, Bloomberg reports. Not that that will happen: Saudi Arabia makes clear it will pump as much oil as the market needs, not what the cartel decides, in the NYT.

Still, the supply-side picture is murky. Iraq cancelled six no-bid oil service contracts with foreign firms that would have meant an extra 500,000 barrels of oil per day, in the NYT. And Brazil’s increasing oil nationalism means oil majors—including local favorite Petrobras—could be elbowed out of lucrative deep-water fields, in the FT. At least the gas boys are happy: Businessweek looks at the U.S. “shale sweepstakes” revitalizing the domestic natural-gas industry.

It’s energy crunch time on the Hill, and Grist gives a rundown on where energy policy stands in the House and the Senate. Democratic embrace of limited drilling could spell the end of the Congressional moratorium, California Rep. Harry Waxman tells the WSJ (sub reqd.): “I don’t think I can stop” the expiration of the drilling ban. While it may not be nearly as interesting as porcine lipstick, the NYT looks at the reality of Gov. Palin’s Alaska natural-gas pipeline, and says it exists “only on paper.”

Men and women behaving badly at the U.S. Minerals Management Service, in a cash, sex, and drugs scandal over drilling rights—stories in the NYT, the WaPo, and the WSJ (sub reqd.). The full report is here. The whole Interior Department scandal should be enough to derail any more talk of expanded domestic drilling, argues NRDC’s Switchboard blog—focusing on more drilling just rewards that kind of malfeasance.

The Wonk Room notes a new study showing the government could create 2 million green jobs with just a $100 billion investment over two years—or about $50,000 a head. Why not spend some money on basic scientific research to get the energy mojo back?, asks the head of MIT in the WaPo. Or accept some money to get the automotive mojo working again—Detroit says it would welcome $25 billion in federal support to make alternative-fuel vehicles, in the NYT. Speaking of price tags, Bloomberg reports that Sen. John McCain’s nuclear power plan would cost at least $315 billion.

Earth2Tech dives into the debate over the “bubble” nature of wind power—and concludes that as an energy pure play, wind power isn’t as messy an investment arena as biofuels. But more wind power doesn’t mean energy security, not in Europe at least—it just increases reliance on imported natural gas, in a WSJ oped.

The debate over drilling in the U.S. keeps getting shriller. The latest? One key to defeating Osama bin Laden and Islamic terrorists could be to open up the Outer Continental Shelf for more domestic oil exploration.

Can offshore drilling help smoke him out? (AP)

That’s the rallying cry from Americans for American Energy, a grass-roots organization based in Colorado that promotes across-the-board energy independence, with a strong emphasis on oil, gas, and nuclear power. The latest campaign:

Terrorists like Osama bin Laden don’t want us to drill for our own energy.He wants us to stay dependent on Middle East oil. That way he gets his hands on our petro dollars and can plan attacks against America.

Sure, the link between oil dependency, the Middle East, and terrorism has worried Beltway types for years. Just protecting oil trade routes costs the U.S. Navy a lot of money each year. Saudi Arabia actively finances the construction of Wahabbi mosques and Islamic schools around the world, in part using oil proceeds. Other oil-rich states, from Iran to Venezuela, have channeled oil money into terrorist operations like Hezbollah and Colombian narco-terror group FARC.

No one has a firm handle on just how much oil the U.S. is sitting on, because so much of the land is off-limits to exploration. But it seems doubtful U.S. reserves are enough to meaningfully reduce the 10-plus million barrels per day of crude the country imports—including 1.7 million barrels from the Middle East. And that new production would still take a long time to come on line, even if Congress lifts the moratorium this year (though hunting bin Laden is taking a long time, too.)

So is it really fair to say that more offshore drilling would help “de-fund” Osama bin Laden and Al Qaeda?

“We think that’s a legitimate argument,” says Greg Schnacke, the president and CEO of Americans for American Energy, a former staffer to Sen. Bob Dole, and former executive vice-president of the Colorado Oil and Gas Association.

Of the hundreds of billions of dollars the U.S. spends on imported oil each year, part of it goes to countries “hostile to us, and a fraction of that goes to terrorists,” Mr. Schnacke said.

Who funds Mr. Schnacke’s group? He isn’t saying, beyond “individuals.” As a not-for-profit, the group isn’t required to disclose its funders, he said, “exactly the same as the Sierra Club.”

Doing their part (Wikipedia)

There’s a good reason the famous “White Towns” of Andalusia, in southern Spain, are all white-washed. The sun is hot in Andalusia, and white paint reflects the heat, keeping interiors cool.

Could that age-old Mediterranean remedy help fight global warming? Increasingly, a lot of scientists think it could, if big chunks of the earth’s urban rooftops and paved surfaces were covered with light colors that reflected—rather than absorbed—the sun’s rays.

Researchers at the Lawrence Berkely National Laboratory in California just presented new work showing that the heat savings from having reflective roofs and pavements could offset huge amounts of greenhouse-gas emissions. In addition to cutting air-conditioning bills, that could help buy time for the rest of the economy to retool to cleaner forms of energy. From the L.A. Times:

Globally, roofs account for 25% of the surface of most cities, and pavement accounts for about 35%. If all were switched to reflective material in 100 major urban areas, it would offset 44 metric gigatons of greenhouse gases, which have been trapping heat in the atmosphere and altering the climate on a potentially dangerous scale. That is more than all the countries on Earth emit in a single year. And, with global climate negotiators focused on limiting a rapid increase in emissions, installing cool roofs and pavements would offset more than 10 years of emissions growth, even without slashing industrial pollution.

Dr. Hashem Akbari, the LBNL researcher who’s worked for years on the effects of urban “heat islands,” figures at current carbon prices those offsets would be worth $1.1 trillion. He wants to get the United Nations onboard to drive change in the world’s 100 biggest cities.

But like with most grand plans, the devil is in the details. In many places, local zoning regulations strictly dictate architectural styles, including roof colors. Where white roofs are allowed or even required, progress comes piecemeal. Since 2005, California’s had a building code that mandated white roofs for commercial buildings, and is currently beefing that code up to include other kind of roofs.

But even the Golden State’s environmental enthusiasm has limits—it can’t make black-topped roads white overnight. The scale and cost of any program that would re-top all the roofs and paved surfaces in cities the size of Los Angeles, Mexico City, New Delhi, and Tokyo simultaneously makes Al Gore’s plan to power America with 100% renewable energy in ten years seem cheap and doable by comparison.