Renewable

Customer fuel-switching, growing gas-fired generation needs tied to more reliance on renewable power and pipeline infrastructure expansions in the western parts of the state have Wisconsin’s major combination utility anticipating a growing role for natural gas, according to the CEO of Wisconsin Energy (WE).

To reduce the amount of drilling waste that has to be transported to landfills and to provide a renewable solution, Chesapeake Energy Corp. has begun an innovative recycling project with TWMA Ltd. in the Eagle Ford Shale.

Presumptive Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney on Thursday unveiled an energy plan that he said would open more federal lands to oil and gas drilling and would make North America energy independent by 2020 — the final year of his second term in office — if he is elected this November.

Meritage Midstream Services LLC and private equity power broker Riverstone Holdings LLC on Wednesday said they were teaming up once again, with Riverstone providing $500 million to pursue new natural gas liquids (NGL) midstream opportunities in some of North America’s emerging resource plays.

California has a mandate to have one-third of its electricity from renewable energy resources by 2020, but energy planners and providers are hoping milder weather prevails this summer in the face of prospects of a permanent shutdown of one of the state’s two major nuclear generating plants.

While the state has a mandate to have one-third of its electricity come from renewable energy resources by 2020, energy planners and providers alike are hoping milder weather prevails this summer in the face of prospects for perhaps a permanent shut down of one of the state’s two major nuclear generating plants.

Historically dependent on water and coal for its sources of energy, Idaho now is looking for more balance that includes natural gas and renewable resources, according to a recent opinion poll of the Pacific Northwest and the hopes of the fledgling Idaho Petroleum Council (IPC).

With natural gas the cheapest backup for intermittent renewable-based electricity, combined with growing U.S. abundance of shale-based supplies, gas is not just a bridge fuel, it is the nation’s fuel for the future, said Calpine CEO Jack Fusco, speaking at the Barclays Capital CEO Energy-Power Conference in New York City.

Hydraulic fracturing (fracking) has been around for decades with little or no environmental problems, and it is a key to the nation’s energy independence through stepped up use of plentiful natural gas supplies in transportation, oilman-turned-clean transportation advocate T. Boone Pickens told a National Press Club luncheon Tuesday in which he tackled a wide-ranging set of energy, environmental and political issues with fellow billionaire and CNN founder Ted Turner.