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ENERGY

Benchmark price around $101 per barrel after government reports growing supplies of crude

The Washington Post
Oil prices dropped Wednesday, as weak U.S. energy demand pushed petroleum supplies sharply higher. Benchmark crude fell by 85 cents to $101.38 per barrel in New York. Brent crude, which is used to price foreign oil varieties that are imported by U.S. refineries, fell by 61 cents to $112.67 per barrel in London. The Energy Information Administration’s weekly report on petroleum supplies showed gasoline demand fell by 4.8 percent last week from a year ago, while demand for all petroleum products dropped by 6.5 percent. As consumers and businesses cut back, producers put more into storage than analysts expected.

Innovate or be overtaken, energy secretary tells automakers
Bloomberg
U.S. automakers must “innovate” and make more fuel-efficient vehicles to capitalize on the assistance provided by President Barack Obama's administration, Energy Secretary Steven Chu said. “We've weathered the storm,” Chu said in a speech to the Detroit Economic Club today. “But we can't rest. It's a very competitive world out there. Our choice is very clear. We have to continue to innovate or we'll be overtaken.” Automakers selling cars in the U.S. are operating under the first mandated fuel-economy increases in more than two decades. The Obama administration, which Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney has criticized for its auto bailout, is requiring fuel-economy increases of about 4 percent per year from 2012 to 2016.

Clean-energy investment rises to record $260 billion

Bloomberg
Renewable energy investment rose 5 percent to a record $260 billion last year driven by a surge in solar developments and increased spending in the U.S., Bloomberg New Energy Finance said. New spending on solar energy jumped 36 percent to $136.6 billion in 2011, outpacing the $74.9 billion put into wind power, the London-based research company said today in a statement. Spending in the U.S. rose by a third to $55.9 billion, surpassing the 1 percent gain in China to $47.4 billion. A jump in photovoltaic installations in the U.S. and Europe overcame a 50 percent decline the price of modules during 2011, said Michael Liebreich, chief executive of New Energy Finance.

ENVIRONMENTAL

Environmental statement and final decision on Spectra pipeline delayed by Federal Energy Regulatory Commission

NJ.com
The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) has postponed the release of the environment impact statement and its final ruling on the Spectra Energy gas pipeline that would pass through Bayonne, Jersey City and Hoboken. The federal agency said in documents that it needed more time to analyze the answers by Texas Eastern Transmission and Algonquin Gas Transmission, LLC, to more than 50 concerns and issues that were raised by residents and local officials, most of whom do not want the pipeline running through Hudson County.

EPA Web tool tracks major greenhouse gas sources

The Los Angeles Times
The Environmental Protection Agency unveiled a new interactive website Wednesday that allows users to track the total annual greenhouse gas emissions of power plants, oil refineries and other big industrial facilities that account for 80% of the country’s output of the gases that are the primary contributors to global climate change. The EPA’s Greenhouse Gas Emission Data tool is modeled on its 20-year-old toxins release inventory map that invites people to plug in their ZIP Codes to see what kinds of federally designated toxic substances are in their communities and who the polluters are.

Obama defends EPA, says agency work ‘vital’ and some environmental regulations necessary

The Washington Post
President Barack Obama defended the work of the Environmental Protection Agency on Tuesday, saying he would stand with the agency that has taken a beating from Republicans in Congress and on the presidential campaign trail for regulations that the GOP maintains will cripple the economy and kill jobs. Obama, making his first-ever visit to the EPA, took issue with those claims, saying he did not buy the notion that there is a choice between clean air and clean water and a growing economy. He said the mission of the agency was “vital.”

INFRASTRUCTURE

Governor pushes transportation investment
The Seattle Times
Gov. Chris Gregoire urged state lawmakers to raise $3.6 billion for highway maintenance in her State of the State address Tuesday morning, and passionately argued for additional investments in the state's transportation infrastructure. "We have got to step up to proper maintenance of our very valuable transportation system, from highways and bridges to ferries and city streets," she said. Ferries in particular are at risk, partly because of insufficient maintenance budgets in recent years, she said. "Without new funding our ferry system will not survive as we know it," Gregoire said, citing a $1.3 billion shortfall for ferries.

Clean Energy increases fueling station infrastructure significantly in 2011

Market Watch
Accelerating its development program to support growing natural gas vehicle fueling demand, Clean Energy Fuels Corp. , North America's leading provider of natural gas fuel for transportation, significantly increased its fueling station project completions during 2011. During 2011, Clean Energy completed 68 fueling station projects in 16 states, including five LNG truck fueling stations on America's Natural Gas Highway. "We increased the number of station projects completed during the year by 50 percent over 2010," said Andrew J. Littlefair, President and CEO of Clean Energy.

'Green energy' is the best route to profitable public investment
Miami Herald
The Obama administration's investments in the green energy economy have already produced a great number of jobs in a sector with significant potential for additional growth. It would be a serious mistake to undercut the initiative just as it's contributing to the recovery. While estimates vary on exactly how many jobs the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act created, several experts have put the number at 2 million or more.

Taking air flight innovative
American Infrastructure magazine
The southern part of the San Francisco Bay area in California was nicknamed Silicon Valley, originally, as a result of the region's large number of silicon chip innovators and manufacturers that called the area home. Now, the nickname is used as a metonym for the area's world leadership in technological advancements and development. So, it comes as no surprise that when Silicon Valley's airport, Mineta San Jose International Airport (SJC), decided to modernize their facilities, it would be with the most updated tech-savvy upgrades and sustainable improvements.

TRANSPORTATION

Federal transportation video highlights Utah's I-15 project

Standard Examiner
A new Transportation TV video released today by the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials, Innovation in Motion, Utah DOT's I-15 CORE Project, showcases the Utah Department of Transportation's cutting-edge solutions to deliver a 24-mile, $1.725 billion interstate improvement faster, safer, and cheaper. The video highlights four key innovative solutions being used by UDOT beginning with Fixed-Price, Best-Design, Procurement, a method of conducting the competitive bid process for a highway construction project based on a fixed price and other requirements.

California high-speed rail critics worry approval process will be fast-tracked
The Huffington Post
Since the recession began, the state Legislature has put some big-ticket construction projects on the environmental fast track in the name of creating jobs. At the behest of then-Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, lawmakers agreed in 2009 to exempt 10 multimillion-dollar highway construction projects from environmental review, including the $400 million expansion of the Caldecott Tunnel, the freeway link between the Bay Area and Contra Costa suburbs. Last year, they gave a similar environmental green light to a proposed $800 million, 75,000-seat professional football stadium in Los Angeles.

Amtrak outlines infrastructure renewal, fleet and other priorities for 2012
Progressive Railroading
Yesterday, Amtrak officials announced what they term an “aggressive” agenda for 2012 that calls for service growth and operational improvements. Among the highlights: manufacturing the first electric locomotives and single-level cars under contracts with Siemens and CAF, respectively; advancing Northeast Corridor (NEC) planning efforts; upgrading NEC infrastructure; and rolling out electronic ticketing to all trains. Following another year of ridership gains in fiscal year 2011, Amtrak will proceed with investments “that yield a more efficient and reliable Amtrak” despite the uncertainty of future federal funding, said Amtrak President and Chief Executive Officer Joseph Boardman during a press conference held yesterday.

WATER / WASTEWATER

Wastewater preferable to wasting water
USA Today
Drinking wastewater? The idea may sound distasteful, but new federally funded research says more Americans are doing so — whether they know it or not — and this reuse will be increasingly necessary as the U.S. population expands. Treated wastewater poses no greater health risks than existing water supplies and, in some cases, may be even safer to drink, according to a report released Tuesday by the National Research Council, a science advisory group chartered by Congress.

Report backs more use of reclaimed water
Mercury News
The U.S. can safely increase its drinking water supply by reusing some of the 12 billion gallons of wastewater that pours down sewers and into the ocean each day, a panel of experts concludes in a new report. The health risks from using reclaimed wastewater in aquifers is the same or even lower than from using existing drinking water supplies that already contain a small percentage of treated sewage, according to the report released Tuesday by the National Research Council. Derided by critics as "toilet to tap" water, treated wastewater could play a growing role in expanding drinking supplies in areas with surging populations, especially in the parched Southwest.