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Relevance | DateAWED Energy & Environmental Newsletter: July 13, 2015
By John Droz, Jr. -- July 13, 2015 1 CommentThe Alliance for Wise Energy Decisions (AWED) is an informal coalition of individuals and organizations interested in improving national, state, and local energy and environmental policies. Our premise is that technical matters like these should be addressed by using Real Science (please consult WiseEnergy.org for more information).
A key element of AWED’s efforts is public education. Towards that end, every three weeks we put together a newsletter to balance what is found in the mainstream media about energy and the environment. We appreciate MasterResource for their assistance in publishing this information.
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Some particularly good articles in this issue are:
Wind Energy More Expensive and Pointless Than You Thought
Electricity from New Wind is Four Times More Costly than Existing Nuclear
Bill Gates: Cost of switching to renewables is “beyond astronomical”
Radio interview: Living with Wind Turbines
German Energy Plan Based on Unexamined Green Movement Beliefs
Nobel Prize-Winning Scientist Says Obama Is ‘Dead Wrong’ On Global Warming
Whatever Happened to Common Sense Regarding Climate Change?…
Continue ReadingOil Export Regulation: 1970s History (Part II)
By Robert Bradley Jr. -- June 30, 2015 2 Comments“The time has come to end the long debate over national energy policy in the United States and to put ourselves solidly on the road to energy independence. … This bill is only the beginning.”
– President Gerald Ford, December 22, 1975, upon signing the Energy Policy and Conservation Act of 1975 into law.
With oil shortages in the 1970s, exports of domestic oil became of acute political interest. Regulation was accomplished under two laws: the Export Administration Act of 1973 and the Energy Policy and Conservation Act of 1975. The rise of Alaskan North Slope Oil, in addition, inspired specific export regulation that not only reflected concerns about domestic supply but special privilege for United States shipping interests. [1]
Export Administration Act
With first sales of crude and product transactions in U.S. …
Continue ReadingExport-Import Bank: A Brief Pre-Enron Energy History (Part I)
By Robert Bradley Jr. -- June 24, 2015 No Comments“Export-Import loans have been particularly controversial because of prior expropriations of U.S. oil company property by beneficiary governments. Mexico’s nationalization of U.S. oil properties in 1938 was followed by a loan of $30 million for roads in 1941, a $10 million refinery loan in 1943, and a $150 million loan for general development in 1950. A 1946 loan of $5.5 million to Bolivia for production, refining, and pipeline expenditure followed nationalization a decade before.”
The Export-Import Bank (Ex-Im) was created by Executive Order 658l (February 2, 1934) to “facilitate exports and imports and the exchange of commodities between the United States and other nations or the agencies or nationals thereof.” The bank could borrow, lend, guarantee debt, and “do a general banking business” with its $700 million budget. (See Appendix below for a description of the agency today.)…
Continue Reading‘Oil, Gas, and Government: the U.S. Experience’ (introduction to a 1996 classic)
By Robert Murphy -- June 17, 2015 8 CommentsIn 1979, Robert L. Bradley Jr. contracted with the Cato Institute to write a history of U.S. oil and gas regulation. Cato did not have an energy position yet in Washington, D.C. (that came a decade later) but was very interested in the subject. Indeed, with debilitating natural gas shortages in the winters of 1971/72 and 1976/77, and oil shortages during 1974 and 1979, the policy landscape was ripe for free-market energy analysis.
What began as an 18-month project turned into a four-year, six-months relentless research-and-writing effort. Finding a publisher for what would be a two volume, 2,000-page treatise proved difficult. Bradley revised the manuscript during the decade delay, although leaving the cut-off year at 1984. Rowman & Littlefield published the work in 1996 as Oil, Gas, and Government: The U.S.…
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