Back in 1996, the Cato Institute published the above two-volume treatise. Oil, Gas, and Government was the first (and still only) classical-liberal history of intervention in a major U.S. industry. I subsequently lectured on the book at Cato in Washington, DC and at a few other locals.
I recently ran across the outline/major points of my presentation, which I share below for those interested in the historical sweep of oil and gas regulation, tax policy, government ownership, and public grants.
To understand the perils of interventionism (particularly price controls and wartime planning), I document the coordination and problem solving in exploration/production, transmission/transportation, refining, and distribution/marketing. (Electricity, a separate energy industry, was not covered in the book.)
“Government Intervention in U.S. Oil and Gas Markets: Searching for ‘Market Failure’” (Synopsis of Major Themes of Oil, Gas, and Government: The U.S.…
Continue ReadingThe Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (2005) is amending its interconnection regulations to require public utilities to follow special rules to interconnect wind energy facilities. Wind energy is allowed to behave differently, while other kinds of electricity generation continue to act according to the old rules designed to protect the reliability of the electrical grid.
– Tom Tanton, Distorting the Wealth of Nature, PERC, September 1, 2005.
Having only entered the fray over electricity system regulation and markets in 2007, I have little context or detail for the above quotation, which appears at the end of the first section of the referenced article.
But I know enough about regulation to know that “special rules” means propping up the wind energy relative to its more concentrated, dispatchable competitors on the electricity grid.…
Continue Reading“All economic pain and no environmental gain is bad politics coming and going. The Democrats do not seem to want to touch it, if their vote on the Green New Deal was any indication.”
” … history will judge the climate alarm as exaggerated, CO2 as the gas of life, and carbon-based energy and modern living as heaven on earth. Governor Abbott, thank you.”
During the day, Houston, Texas, bustles as the oil and gas capital of the world. The daily business fare as reported by the hometown Houston Chronicle is a new offshore project here, new refinery or petrochemical plant there, new onshore production plays elsewhere.
And then there is a whole new industry within an industry, LNG exports from Texas and Louisiana to distant ports–and even LNG tank cars crossing into Mexico.…
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