Until recently, most of us in Texas and throughout the country (unless you had an oil and gas lease) struggled with high gasoline prices. However, a new study entitled, “Are the Energy States Still Energy States?” by Mark Snead, an economist and Vice President of the Federal Reserve Bank of…
Finally a piece of good news and an intelligent decision has come from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)! It has taken them more than a year, but in the end even the EPA had to accept scientific fact. Recently, the EPA vacated an emergency order from December 2010 prohibiting Fort…
Earlier this month, a study by the New York-based World Economic Forum (WEF) found that the energy industry was responsible for 9% of all new job growth in the United States in 2011. In the US, the oil and gas industry grew at 4.5% last year, compared to a 1.7%…
In a suit with implications for Texas gasoline consumers, the American Petroleum Institute filed a petition for review in the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia last week against the Environmental Protection Agency over what it deems unachievable bio-fuels use requirements. These latest requirements are in the…
Recently both the U S House of Representatives and the Senate passed by unanimous vote new federal pipeline legislation. The legislation would both reauthorize and strengthen existing pipelines safety programs through 2015, improve enforcement of existing laws, address National Transportation Safety Board recommendations, and fill in any gaps in the…
Hydraulic fracturing has often been criticized for its possible effect on groundwater, but the early results of a study by the Energy Institute at The University of Texas at Austin indicates that the concern is largely unfounded. Early results of the study, entitled “Separating Fact from Fiction in Shale Gas…
For some years now, the conventional wisdom has held that wind power is the kinder, gentler energy source, the source that allows the energy producer to be at one with the environment. Instead, it turns out that wind power is a bigger threat to wildlife than any oil well. More…
Washington has been telling Texas small business, including Texas oil and gas companies, how they should be run for a long time. For a few moments, Texas businesses had a chance to tell Washington what to do, and the overriding message was: stop meddling.Over 30 small Texas business owners met…
Last fall, the Texas Railroad Commission held a hearing to consider a new rule for disclosure of hydraulic fracturing chemicals. At the hearing, Chemistry Professor Andrew Barron from Rice University claimed that the rule would serve to demystify the chemicals used and help assure the public that the chemicals were…
Contrary to the Obama administration’s expectations, it sounds as though states are doing a fine job regulating the oil and gas industry, according to members of a shale gas subcommittee in the U.S. Senate. In the Shale Gas Subcommittee 90-day Report subcommittee members reported to the Senate Committee on Energy…