Sailed

President Obama’s nominee for administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) easily sailed through her confirmation hearing Thursday, fielding softball questions from Democrats. The issues raised by Republicans were more pointed, but not by much. Gina McCarthy was not pressed on hydraulic fracturing (fracturing).

President Obama’s nominee for administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) sailed through her confirmation hearing Thursday, fielding softball questions from Democrats. The issues raised by Republicans were more pointed, but not by much.

The Energy Department secretary nominee, eminent physicist Steven Chu, sailed unscathed last week through an extensive round of questions from Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee members, who generally indicated their respect and support for the Nobel laureate and director of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. Members then launched into their pet projects, spanning a wide range of energy options for the new administration to pursue.

The Energy Department secretary nominee, eminent physicist Steven Chu, sailed unscathed Tuesday through an extensive round of questions from Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee members, who generally indicated their respect and support for the Nobel laureate and director of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. Members then launched into their pet projects, spanning a wide range of energy options for the new administration to pursue.

While the energy market sailed on past foundering Enron with barely a ripple, that would not have been the case if the major marketer’s implosion had occurred a year earlier during a time of rising energy prices, the chairman of the Maine Public Utilities Commission told a congressional committee Wednesday.

California sailed through the last week of June free of blackouts and power alerts as the projections of controlled outages were on the decline as state officials focused on possible refunds through the federal settlement negotiations now ongoing and new power supply projects coming on line in the nick of time.