AI Weekly: A weekly newsletter brought to you by American Infrastructure

ENERGY

Renewable energy standards: If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it
Think Progress
When your local utility buys more renewable energy to power your lights and computers, what more do you get besides the power? You get cleaner air, fewer respiratory health problems, and lower health-care costs.nYou get local jobs building and maintaining green power plants and a better foothold in the fast-growing, multi-billion dollar global renewable energy industry. If you use the power to charge the new plug-in electric vehicles now available, you reduce our imports of foreign oil and increase our energy security. And finally, you reduce the greenhouse gases that are leading to the severe, threatening weather events spurred by global climate change.

Consol Energy: less coal, more gas in 1st quarter

Market Watch
Consol Energy Inc., predicted lower first-quarter coal production from a year earlier but slightly higher gas production, as the energy producer continues to put more investment in its gas development projects. Though it still earns most of its income from coal mining, Consol has stepped up gas drilling through new investments and joint ventures. The company recently struck an agreement with Hess Corp. (HES) to jointly develop Consol's Utica Shale holdings in Ohio, touted as North America's next big energy field, and also sold a 50 percent stake in its Marcellus Shale fields in Pennsylvania and West Virginia to Noble Energy Inc. (NBL) for $3.4 billion. Earlier this month, Consol said it raised its capital budget by 21 percnt for 2012, pushing a large slice of the funds toward developing its Marcellus assets.

Electricity declines 50 percent as shale spurs natural gas glut
San Francisco Chronicle
A shale-driven glut of natural gas has cut electricity prices for the U.S. power industry by 50 percent and reduced investment in costlier sources of energy. With abundant new supplies of gas making it the cheapest option for new power generation, the largest U.S. wind-energy producer, NextEra Energy Inc., has shelved plans for new U.S. wind projects next year and Exelon Corp. called off plans to expand two nuclear plants.

ENVIRONMENTAL

DEP Reminds Pennsylvanians that January is National Radon Action Month

The Sacramento Bee
January is National Radon Action Month, marking a time of increased public awareness for this serious health hazard. Radon is a colorless, odorless, radioactive gas that occurs naturally through the breakdown of uranium in soil and rocks. It can seep into homes through cracks in basements and foundations, and can build up inside to concentrations many times the recommended level. "Radon is the second-leading cause of lung cancer in the United States," DEP Secretary Mike Krancer said.

Culpeper faces $160K fine for 2008 chlorine leak
Star Exponent
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency recently warned Culpeper of a potential $160,265 fine related to a chlorine gas leak at the town sewer plant in May 2008. In a Nov. 15 letter, the EPA outlined its case against Culpeper, saying the town: 1) failed to immediately notify the National Response Center and state emergency response commission of the chlorine leak, as required by law; 2) failed to provide written follow-up reports to the state and local emergency officials “as soon as practicable” after the gas release, as required by law and, 3) does not have proper risk management or written safety procedures in place in dealing with the potentially lethal gas.

State clears Land and Lakes landfill for development
The Chicago Sun Times
Buffalo Grove’s landfill may become Buffalo Grove’s next retail center. The Illinois Environmental Protection Agency announced Friday that investigators have cleared the Land and Lakes landfill at 1300 Milwaukee Ave. for future development. The site closed in 1995 and completed the state’s required post-closure monitoring period to the IEPA’s satisfaction. Village Hall annexed the landfill in 2008, and leaders have spoken about seeing the land developed into a retail center.

INFRASTRUCTURE

HP and Blue Shield of California sign five-year infrastructure and applications services agreement
Market Watch
Enterprise Services and Blue Shield of California today announced they have signed an agreement designed to enable Blue Shield to deliver new services that enhance efficiencies and improve affordability of health care for its customers. Under the five-year contract, HP will continue providing technology infrastructure and applications support to Blue Shield, extending a relationship that has spanned more than 43 years. Terms of the contract were not disclosed.

Toll-road woes show risk of loans lawmakers aim to expand
Delaware Online
Democratic and Republican leaders in Congress are united in pushing an eightfold boost to a loan program designed to attract private highway funding, even as revenue gaps in existing projects may cause taxpayer losses. Of the six open highways backed by the Transportation Infrastructure Finance and Innovation Act, one reorganized in bankruptcy at an upfront cost to taxpayers of $79.5 million; a second probably needs its debt restructured, and the rating on a third is six notches below investment grade, according to Fitch Ratings reports and government records.

Congress likely to debate national truck weight limits

The National League of Cities
The Congressional debate over transportation will likely include a discussion of national truck weight limits. Legislation to maintain the current maximum weight of 80,000 pounds for longer combination vehicles (LCVs) allowed on the 161,000-mile National Highway System has been introduced in the House and Senate for the last several years. Congress set the current limit of 80,000 pounds as the maximum weight at which a truck can operate on Interstate highways in 1991.

TRANSPORTATION

JDA recommends three key transportation strategies to support the latest retail trends
The Street
For retailers, each year brings new products, promotions, ways of doing business, and of course, new challenges. Today, retail change is being driven by the connected, “always-on” consumer who expects instant information, a multitude of choices, and flexible, real-time purchase and delivery options. In order to remain competitive, retailers must adapt and center their organizations around consumer-centric processes and organizational alignment. A focus on supply chain efficiencies through the years has helped some retailers keep pace.

$77 million in transportation grants to universities
Transportation Nation
U.S. Transportation Secretary LaHood Announces $77 Million in Transportation Research and Education Grant. U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood announced today $77 million in grants to 22 University Transportation Centers (UTCs) to advance research and education programs that address critical transportation challenges facing our nation. The UTCs, which are located throughout the United States, conduct research that directly supports the priorities of the U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT), and the participating universities are a critical part of our national transportation strategy.

High-speed rail in a coma

National Journal
Policymakers' appetite for high-speed rail seems to be dwindling to almost nothing. It is old news that congressional Republicans are not fans of President Obama's high-speed rail initiative. They view it as a waste of taxpayer dollars at a time when belt-tightening is of the highest order. The national conversation has not advanced much beyond that point, perhaps because the biggest fans of high-speed rail are distracted by other problems.

WATER / WASTEWATER

Florida's ports: A path to prosperity
American Infrastructure
Towards the end of the 19th century, the "Mother of Miami," Julia Tuttle, envisioned the soon-tobe- created city of Miami would become a center of trade in the United States and a "gateway to the Americas." That was just a few years before the Army Corps of Engineers cut a path through the mangrove swamps of a barrier island and allowed the first direct access from the mainland to the Atlantic. That early infrastructure project not only opened the way for larger ships to Miami, but it also opened the gates of opportunity to a world of economic prosperity and growth.

HyperSolar’s green gas makes fracking obsolete

Clean Technica
The California company, HyperSolar, is developing a way to produce renewable hydrogen and natural gas from wastewater using solar energy, and that could spell trouble for the fracking industry. In contrast to fracking, a method of natural gas drilling that can put communities and agricultural areas at risk for water contamination, HyperSolar’s new technology would do the reverse: it could provide communities with a financial offset to improve wastewater treatment operations that clean up polluted lands, and enable future growth without increased pollution. As a special bonus feature, the whole system is pretty much guaranteed to be earthquake-free.

Graham blasts water ‘privatization’

The Palm Beach Post
Former U.S. Sen. Bob Graham cautioned lawmakers and environmentalists this morning that “privatizing” state waters would cause “considerable damage” to the Everglades and cause Floridians to lose control of thousands of acres of wetlands. “There’s no project in Florida that would be more adversely affected,” said Graham, who was a member of the legislature more than four decades ago and then governor when some of the state’s water and conservation policies were first created. Graham was in town as environmentalists, government officials – including U.S. Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar and Gov. Rick Scott – and others gathered nearby for a day-long Everglades Water Supply Summit.