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This administration seems hell bent on getting new and alternative energies a preference going forward.
Obama plans on removing tax breaks for producers but opening up drilling. Seems like a move toward a free market. But the one problem is, we are still paying taxpayers money to defend oil overseas. Might be looked upon poorly if we favor overseas energy over our own. \ TERMINATION: OIL AND GAS COMPANY TAX PREFERENCE For a better look at the chart click on the link and go to page 39 http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/budget...assets/trs.pdf TERMINATION: OIL AND GAS COMPANY TAX PREFERENCES (8 TERMINATIONS) Department of Energy To foster the clean energy economy of the future and reduce our reliance on fossil fuels that contribute to climate change, the Administration proposes to repeal tax provisions that preferentially benefit fossil fuel production. Oil and gas subsidies are costly to the American taxpayer and do little to incentivize production or reduce energy prices. Removing these subsidies would reduce greenhouse gas emissions and generate $36.5 billion of additional revenue over the next 10 years, an amount that represents only a small percentage of domestic oil and gas revenues -- about one percent over the coming decade. Funding Summary (In millions of dollars) . 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2011-2015 2011-2020 Total, Proposed Changes from Current Law............................................... .................... -2,644 -4,140 -3,855 -3,790 -3,800 -18,229 -36,536 Repeal Enhanced Oil Recovery Credit............................................ ................................ 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 Repeal Credit for Oil and Gas Produced from Marginal Wells........................................ 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 Repeal Expensing of Intangible Drilling Costs............................................. .................... -1,202 -1,582 -1,089 -914 -848 -5,635 -7,839 Repeal Deduction for Tertiary Injectants........................................ ................................. -5 -9 -9 -8 -7 -38 -67 Repeal Exception to Passive Loss Limitations for Working Interests in Oil and Natural -20 -24 -19 -18 -17 -98 -180 Gas Properties........................................ .................................................. ...................... Repeal Percentage Depletion for Oil and Natural Gas Wells.......................................... -522 -895 -933 -969 -1,009 -4,328 -10,026 Repeal Domestic Manufacturing Tax Deduction for Oil and Natural Gas Companies...... -851 -1,470 -1,559 -1,650 -1,742 -7,272 -17,314 Increase Geological and Geophysical Amortization Period for Independent Producers -44 -160 -246 -231 -177 -858 -1,110 to Seven Years............................................. .................................................. .................. Justification Repealing fossil fuel tax preferences helps eliminate market distortions, strengthening incentives for investments in clean, renewable, and more energy efficient technologies. This proposal would take effect beginning January 1, 2011. In 2009, member states at the G-20 summit committed to phase-out fossil fuel subsidies in the medium term.1 A recent Organization for Economic Co-Operation and Development analysis indicates that commitment from all G-20 member states to phase-out fossil fuel subsidies could reduce global greenhouse gas emissions by 10 percent.2 In addition, removal of market distortions created by fossil fuel subsidies will lead to a more efficient allocation within the energy sector as well as across sectors, likely with positive impacts on National output and gross domestic product. Citations 1 G-20. 2009. Group Statement on Pittsburgh G-20 Summit. Leaders’ Statement. The Pittsburgh Summit. September 24–25, 2009. Leaders' Statement: The Pittsburgh Summit (Accessed January 2010). 2 OECD. 2009. The Economics of Climate Change Mitigation: Policies and Options for Global Action beyond 2012. Paris, France: Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development. |
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White House Budget Proposal Gives Ax to Fossil Fuel Tax Breaks, Some Interior Programs
Allison Winter and Darren Samuelsohn, The New York Times President Obama will roll out a sweeping federal budget proposal today that would eliminate subsidies for fossil fuels, invest more money in clean energy projects and cut funding for 120 federal programs, including some at the Interior Department. The fiscal 2011 budget blueprint also includes a placeholder for revenue from a cap-and-trade climate bill -- recognizing efforts in Congress to advance the legislation without assuming any of its funds would go into the general treasury. The $3.8 trillion budget includes "tough choices" to cut some federal programs, White House communications director Dan Pfeiffer said yesterday. The budget seeks to reduce or eliminate 120 different programs for a total savings of $20 billion. The cuts would include two grant programs at the National Park Service and an abandoned mines payment program at the Interior Department. Some of the proposed cuts repeat suggestions that Congress has rejected in previous budgets. Pfeiffer said the administration would continue to push for them this year... |
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I agree, there is no way this will pass in the current form.
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more......
US Navy to halve fossil fuels by 2020 carbonpositive The US Navy is to halve its use of fossil fuels by 2020 among a number of clean energy measures across the armed forces flagged in a major defence review paper released this week. On the way to the 2020 target, the Navy plans to deploy a “green” strike group by 2016 which will operate entirely without fossil fuels. It has already commissioned an electric-drive aircraft carrier, the USS Makin Island, and last year tested an F/A-18 fighter aircraft on a camelina-based biofuel blend. The Quadrennial Defense Review lays out an extensive list of priorities that for the first time identifies the threats climate change and conventional energy pose for national security and the operational effectiveness of the Army, Navy, Air Force and Marines. An ambitious set of goals will see the US Department of Defense heavily involved in research and development of green fuel alternatives and energy efficiency. The review says that “climate change will shape the operating environment, roles, and missions” the military will have to undertake, and may act as an accelerant of instability, conflict and natural disaster around the world to which it will have to respond. It acknowledges energy security as well as environmental adaptation and emissions mitigation as primary motivations for the switch to cleaner fuels and practices. (2 Feb 2010) Oil, trucking interests sue over 2011 fuel law Wyatt Buchanan, sfgate A coalition of oil companies, the trucking industry and others have filed a lawsuit in federal court in an attempt to block the implementation of a first-in-the-world limit on the amount of carbon allowed in fuel approved by California regulators last year. The suit, filed in federal court in Fresno, seeks an injunction to stop the implementation of the regulation, which is set to take effect next year. The so-called low-carbon fuel standard requires fuel manufacturers to cut the carbon intensity of fuels sold in the state 10 percent by 2020 - lowering the amount of greenhouse gases released for every unit of energy produced. If the regulation's goal is reached, it will account for 10 percent of the state's overall goal for reducing greenhouse gases by 2020. The suit claims that the standard violates the commerce clause of the U.S. Constitution in several ways, including interfering with interstate commerce and discriminating against fuels produced outside of California. The standard has been controversial, especially among ethanol producers, because it accounts for the indirect carbon impact of making fuel. In other words, for corn ethanol producers, that means accounting for the loss of land that is converted to grow corn for fuel instead of food or other changes in habitat to grow corn. (3 Feb 2010) |
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THE ENERGY TRANSITION IS ALREADY UNDERWAY
Energy Outlook Lately I’ve been struck by the number of new groups and proposals calling for America to begin the transition to cleaner energy. We even heard this call from the Oval Office several weeks ago. Yet while there’s clearly much more to be done to wean ourselves from our reliance on oil and other high-carbon fuels, I’m baffled by the suggestion that this process didn’t actually begin long ago–not just in the last year and a half–with policies and R&D initiatives put in place by at least the previous two administrations. Perhaps it’s fashionable to ignore our progress to date, because acknowledging it serves as a reminder that the process will require decades to complete, and that the end-point might not resemble the one we imagined when we began. Let’s start by recognizing that a massive energy transition is already well under way on many fronts, including the development of advanced biofuels, nearly-mature wind power, highly fuel-efficient vehicles, electric vehicles, solar power that’s not just a science fair project, and a range of other technologies and policies for reducing oil consumption and greenhouse gas emissions. These didn’t just appear spontaneously; most required literally decades of effort to get to this point. So if we’re already headed down this path, rather than arguing about starting out should we rather be asking how much we can do now to accelerate this shift? Take fuel economy, which seems simple, because we all understand miles per gallon, or think we do. But how many people realize that the incremental fuel savings from higher mpg shrink as mpg increases? The chart below shows the annual fuel consumption for a car driving 12,000 miles per year, about the national average, versus fuel economy in mpg. The improvement in Corporate Average Fuel Economy of new cars between 1978 and 2008, from about 20 mpg to 27 mpg, has already saved a very substantial 160 gal/yr per car, while the increase to 34 mpg by 2016, the new CAFE target, will save another 90 gal/yr. However, advancing from there to 44 mpg, roughly equivalent to the 2012 EU target of 130 grams of CO2 per kilometer, would save only an extra 80 gal/yr. That’s no reason not to move ahead with more efficient cars, but we must recognize that we’ve already captured the steep part of a curve that is now flattening out, as the cost/benefit of each successively-harder increment diminishes, unless they burn no oil at all. That’s where biofuels and EVs come in. The Renewable Fuels Standard established by Congress in 2007 calls for a quantity of advanced and cellulosic biofuels by 2022 that exceeds what we currently get from corn ethanol. The problem is that at this point, after many years of hard work developing these technologies, there is not a single commercial-scale cellulosic biofuel facility design that has been built, tested and certified for profitable replication on the scale required, despite a special production tax credit of $1.01/gal. Nor do I conclude that’s for lack of the government, private investors and big companies like ExxonMobil, Chevron, Shell, and BP throwing plenty of R&D dollars at the challenge. Within a few years we might be at the point at which billions of extra dollars for advanced biofuels would result in hundreds of such facilities actually being built, but then plenty of experts thought we would already be at that point by now, including the EPA, which had to ratchet back its cellulosic ethanol quota for this year from a level equal to the annual output of one corn ethanol plant to the quantity that a corn ethanol plant produces every three weeks or so. The prospect for EVs looks more immediate–though still on a relatively small scale–with GM and Nissan launching flagship models later this year. However, as I noted in a recent webinar, every million EVs running entirely on electricity would save 31,000 barrels per day of gasoline, or about 0.3% of our current usage, and that’s assuming they would replace cars getting today’s average mpg, rather than Prius-type non-plug-in hybrids, as seems likelier to me. It’s going to take a whale of a lot of EVs to make a real difference, and it’s not yet obvious that offering more than the current $7,500 in consumer tax credits to buy them, or handing out more than the billions that have already been given to car companies–including some that have never built a mass-produced car–is going to put a lot more of these vehicles on the road in the next few years than would happen under existing policies that are still playing out. However attractive energy visions such as the President’s might be, even to me, there are practical limits to additional activism at a point when so many wheels have already been set in motion. I do understand that the nation is riveted by the oil spill, and that transforming this interest into support for a broader energy agenda could be a once-in-a-generation opportunity. At the same time, I worry about an approach that relies on expanding already-unsustainable financial incentives for clean energy deployment at a time when the deficit has taken on the aspect of a black hole threatening to devour our future, energy and otherwise. To see the energy transition really take off, we must reach the point at which the alternatives are unambiguously better/faster/cheaper than oil, or can at least match its cost and convenience in its primary transportation energy uses, and are not merely better for the environment–as important as that is. We’re not there yet, but we’ve clearly already begun the journey. |
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Hello !
I am also a new member. Would a newcomer be warmly welcome here? Good day you guy ! __________________ Watch Dinner For Schmucks Online Free |
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