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LABOR DAY WEEKEND’S GRIZZLY BEAR HUNT IS OFF AND GAS PRICES ARE SOARING:  The end of summer is being marked by a judge blocking the first trophy hunts of grizzly bears in 40 years, while the cost of fuel to go to the beach is the highest it’s been in 4 years.

Welcome to Labor Day weekend 2018: First off, a federal judge in Montana issued a restraining order barring Idaho and Wyoming from moving ahead with scheduled hunts this weekend.

Environmentalists and tribal groups saw this as a victory in moving to undo the Trump administration’s decision to take the Yellowstone grizzly off the list of protected species, which gave the states the authority to hold the limited hunts.

U.S. District Judge Dana Christensen issued the 14-day restraining order, while he ponders the merits of the case to reimpose protective status on the animals.

And they are likely to win: After hearing both sides of the argument and granting the restraining order on Thursday, the judge said the environmental and tribal groups had shown they were “likely to succeed on the merits” of their lawsuits.

HIGHER PRICES FOR THE HOLIDAY: Gasoline prices have hit a four-year high going into the Labor Day holiday weekend, according to the Energy Department.

The Energy Information Administration’s weekly oil and fuel data survey showed that the average price of regular gasoline for the nation was the highest it’s been since Labor Day 2014.

“The U.S. average retail price for regular gasoline on August 27, 2018, was $2.83 per gallon, the highest price on the Monday before Labor Day since 2014, when it was $3.45/gal, and 43 cents/gal higher than the same time last year,” the energy analysis agency said in its Week in Petroleum report issued this week.

High oil prices are the reason: The agency said the “main driver” of the higher gasoline prices is the price of oil, particularly the North Sea Brent crude oil price, which is the benchmark for foreign oil imports into the United States.

Welcome to Daily on Energy, compiled by Washington Examiner Energy and Environment Writers John Siciliano (@JohnDSiciliano) and Josh Siegel (@SiegelScribe). Email [email protected] for tips, suggestions, calendar items and anything else. If a friend sent this to you and you’d like to sign up, click here. If signing up doesn’t work, shoot us an email and we’ll add you to our list.

OPPONENT OF TRUMP’S BAILOUT MAKES A POINT ABOUT FIRST ENERGY: First Energy’s bid to goad the Trump administration into action to save its coal plants is a “red herring,” said John Shelk in an email to John.

Shelk is head of the Electric Power Supply Association, representing merchant utilities. He is also part of a broad coalition opposing all efforts by the Trump administration to use subsidies to save uneconomic coal and nuclear plants.

The latest effort to pull Trump toward such a bailout came on Wednesday, when the Ohio-based utility firm First Energy — a chief proponent of Trump taking action — announced coal plant closures. It said it would consider reversing its decision if the federal government acted soon to enact measures to save the power plants.

The company said that the 13-state federally-overseen PJM market it functions in “isn’t paying for attributes like fuel security and resiliency,” which Shelk calls a “red herring” at best.  

It’s a ‘red herring on multiple levels’: First, older, inefficient coal plants are also closing outside PJM and other federally-sanctioned markets “because of basic economics not poor market design,” Shelk said.

Also, the arguments for “fuel security” and “resilience” — meaning “on site fuel” — “are branding efforts by old coal plants with no basis in fact,” he added, citing the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission’s “unanimous rejection” of the Energy Department’s resiliency rule earlier this year that made that clear.

Trump could do more harm than good: As for Trump’s idea of issuing tariffs to keep the plant’s running on national security grounds, Shelk said would be a bad idea for consumers. “A bail out of failed and failing coal and nukes on ‘national security’ grounds will hurt consumers and other employers through higher costs, much of the burden ending up on the very people in Trump Country that the President is understandably concerned about (e.g., WV, OH, PA),” he added.

ENERGY INDUSTRY APPEARS TO HAVE DODGED A BULLET WITH TRUMP’S MEXICO DEAL: The energy industry is relieved that a new Trump administration trade deal with Mexico appears to keep alive booming exports of oil and natural gas to America’s southern neighbor.

All signs say breathe easy, for now: While details are sparse about the new deal – which is absent Canada for now – energy stakeholders have seen enough to breathe easy, after some feared President Trump could tear up the North American Free Trade Agreement that has helped make Mexico the largest export market for U.S. oil, transportation fuel, and natural gas.

Holding back the bad stuff: “For the energy sector, there was never really a huge amount of positive stuff that could come out of this,” said Sarah Ladislaw, senior vice president and director of the Energy and National Security program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. “This was about making sure a whole lot of bad things didn’t happen. Protecting that free trade status with Mexico given how much we are trading is a win and a benefit for the Trump administration.”

NAFTA, implemented in 1993, contains few energy-specific provisions. NAFTA allowed for the U.S., Mexico, and Canada to pay nothing on most goods that cross borders between them, including energy products.

Zero tariffs for energy: Energy experts told the Washington Examiner the new trade deal appeared to maintain the “zero tariff” status for energy products, although the countries have not released final language as they continue negotiating with Canada to make a trilateral deal.

Continue reading Josh’s article here.

EPA, RICK PERRY HIT WITH ETHANOL INDUSTRY LAWSUITS: The ethanol industry hit both the Environmental Protection Agency and Energy Secretary Rick Perry with lawsuits on Thursday over the dozens of waivers granted to oil refiners allowing them not to blend ethanol in the nation’s gasoline supply.

Groups were denied documents: Growth Energy and The Renewable Fuels Association, two groups that represent the ethanol industry, sued the agencies to get access to records detailing how the administration decided to grant refineries “hardship” waivers, exempting them from EPA’s Renewable Fuel Standard program.

What’s the RFS? The EPA program requires refiners to blend an increasing amount of ethanol and other biofuels in the nation’s fuel supply each year.

What are they arguing? The ethanol industry argues that the waivers were done in secret, without the knowledge of stakeholders, and have resulted in billions of gallons of ethanol unblended, which they call “demand destruction.”

Perry in ethanol’s crosshairs: Thursday’s lawsuit also targeted Energy Secretary Rick Perry because EPA must consult with the Energy Department to grant a refinery waiver under the Renewable Fuel Standard. The hardship waivers were issued to help refiners reduce the cost of blending ethanol, which requires most refines to purchase expensive ethanol credits.

OIL REFINERY SUPPORTER SAYS ITS A ‘GIMMICK’: Refinery supporters fired back, calling the ethanol lawsuit the “latest gimmick” from the ethanol lobby. Frank Maisano, a principal with the Bracewall law firm that represents refiners, wrote in an email to John that the lawsuit is a distraction meant to keep the focus on the small refiners exemption “and off of the fact that two federal courts have rule in favor of small refiners.”

Maisano was referring in part to the Sinclair Wyoming Refining v. EPA case where the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that EPA had violated the Clean Air Act by not granting waivers to refiner Sinclair, after saying its facilities had appeared to be able to weather the cost of the ethanol program. The ruling has been taken to mean that EPA has wider discretion in determining whether a refiner has been harmed by the renewable fuel program and needs a waiver.  

MANUFACTURERS SAY FEDS ARE MISSING THE MARK ON PIPELINE SECURITY: The Industrial Energy Consumers of America, representing big energy users, want Congress to step up oversight of natural gas pipelines with mandatory security standards.

TSA is not enough: “So much is resting on the reliability of natural gas pipelines, we cannot help but be concerned that the cyber and physical security requirements under the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) are voluntary, not mandatory,” said the group’s CEO Paul Cicio in letter to House and Senate leaders earlier this week.

He argues that the electric grid is getting the attention it deserves on protecting it from attacks, but pipelines remain the “weak link in U.S. national energy security,” Cicio wrote.

Cicio’s group represents some of the largest consumers of energy and natural gas in the country, including big chemical companies like Dow.

Congress needs to up the pressure: He wants Congress to put pressure on the TSA to develop mandatory security regulations, similar to what the electric industry has under the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission and the congressionally-chartered North American Electric Reliability Corporation.

“TSA has the authority to promulgate mandatory security regulations and has not done so, and the voluntary standards are not enforced,” Cicio added. “News reports cite that the TSA has only six full-time people assigned to oversee over 300,000 miles of natural gas pipeline. These statistics do not give us confidence that there is adequate security.”

He wants the House and Senate energy committees to conduct a round of oversight hearings on the matter, “and, if necessary, take appropriate action to ensure that Congress has done all that is reasonable and cost-effective to ensure the security of natural gas pipelines.”  

U.S. TRIBES APPLAUD COURT FOR VICTORY OVER TRANS MOUNTAIN PIPELINE PROJECT: The tribes said the landmark court decision casts doubt on whether Kinder Morgan’s “troubled and controversial” pipeline project will ever go forward, according to a statement by a tribal coalition fighting the project that sought to link Canadian crude oil to the U.S. market.

The Canadian appeals court’s decision found the the permits for the pipeline were issued illegally.

“Over the last 100 years, our most sacred site, the Salish Sea, has been deeply impacted by our pollution-based economy,” said Swinomish Tribal Chair Brian Cladoosby. “The place that we’re living now is where we have been since time immemorial. All of our roots go deep and our bloodlines are woven throughout the Salish Sea.”

The tribes have been fighting the project for four years. “They joined their Canadian First Nation partners in vigorously opposing the project due to its impacts on treaty rights, livelihoods, and culture,” a statement read.

The project would have moved nearly 900,000 barrels of tar sands crude oil adjacent to the sensitive waters of the Salish Sea, where much of it would be shipped through shared U.S. and Canadian marine waters, according to the tribes.

FREEDOMWORKS, MEET FREEDOMWORKS LLC: A clean energy firm from West Virginia seems to have borrowed the name of the conservative free-market group FreedomWorks.

John came across FreedomWorks LLC in perusing through the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission’s e-library Thursday evening (Don’t judge).

The company needs a permit from FERC to operate its proposed Mount Storm Pump Storage Hydro Project in the Mountaineer State.

The facility offers a form of energy storage by pumping water, usually up a hill, when electricity prices are low. And then letting the water flow to generate electricity when needed.

Coming from a coal state: Pump storage is typically considered a way to make up for the lulls in wind and solar electricity generation, since renewables are dependent on the weather. So, Mount Storm is an interesting project coming from a coal state.

But there is still the matter of the name: With the exception of the LLC at the end, the company’s spelling and placement of the uppercase “W” in “Works” is the same as the well-known conservative group’s monicker.

Tim Williamson, managing member  of FreedomWorks LLC, has no affiliation with the conservative group.

RUNDOWN

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