Category

Climate

Climate, Energy, Government and Politics, Podcast, Policy

Columbia Energy Exchange: Minister Catherine McKenna

April 4, 2017

Host Bill Loveless sits down with Hon. Catherine McKenna, Canada’s Minister of Environment and Climate Change, to get an inside look at environmental policy in the nation. Catherine and Bill discuss: Canada’s approach to climate change and linkages between the environment and economic policy; different approaches to environmental and climate policy between the U.S. and Canada under President Trump and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau; and the realities of a national carbon pricing plan in Canada. (Listen)

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by Bill Loveless
Climate, Energy, Podcast, Policy

Columbia Energy Exchange: Steve Mufson, Amy Harder

March 20, 2017

New markets dynamics, technological innovation, and evolving climate and geopolitical issues have made the energy sector incredibly dynamic and increasingly complicated to understand for policymakers, business leaders, academia and the general public alike. To help decode and explain these issues and their significance within a greater global context, journalists covering the energy beat have never been more important. On this episode of the Columbia Energy Exchange host Bill Loveless sits down with veteran energy reporters Steve Mufson from the Washington Post and Amy Harder, who has recently moved from the Wall Street Journal to a new startup called Axios, to discuss the importance of energy literacy and how the energy beat has dramatically changed in the last decade. Among many topics Bill, Steve and Amy discussed, several include: The importance of energy literacy and key challenges journalists face when covering the energy beat;…

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by Bill Loveless
Climate, Energy, Government and Politics, Podcast, Policy, Regulations

Columbia Energy Exchange: Robert Powelson

March 6, 2017

Host Bill Loveless speaks with Robert Powelson, the new President of the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners (NARUC). Robert is a member of the Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission, he has chaired the NARUC Committee on Water and he formerly served as the President of the Chester County Chamber of Business & Industry. Bill and Robert discussed: what state utility regulators expect to see from the Trump Administration and how it will differ from regulation under President Obama; the future of the Clean Power Plan and state approaches to decarbonization; nuclear waste and the future of Yucca Mountain; the need for a renaissance in energy infrastructure; and energy innovation. (Listen)

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by Bill Loveless
Climate, Energy, Government and Politics, Podcast

Columbia Energy Exchange: Gina McCarthy

January 2, 2017

Bill Loveless sits down with the current Administrator of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Gina McCarthy, who has overseen major environmental initiatives in the Obama Administration. Gina, who was previously Commissioner of the Connecticut Department of Environmental Protection has also worked at both the state and local levels on critical environmental issues. They discuss: the legacy of the Obama Administration on climate change and other environmental issues; the endurance of the Clean Power Plan under the Trump Administration; the future of the Paris Agreement; reaching bipartisan consensus in a world where social media drives and exaggerates opposition; and reconciling demands to “keep it in the ground” with benefits of domestic energy production. (Listen)

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by Bill Loveless
Article, Climate, Energy, Government and Politics

Trump may be good for oil, trouble for renewables

January 1, 2017

U.S. energy producers of all kinds see reasons for optimism as they start 2017, though the incoming Trump administration may spell trouble for some of a greener hue. Among oil drillers, a recent uptick in prices suggests an end to a slump that has persisted since mid-2014, while natural gas, solar and wind energy companies aim to build on their gains in U.S. electric power markets in 2016. Even the struggling nuclear sector can point to victories in New York and Illinois, where unprofitable reactors were saved by state actions last year. That said, here’s a list of some of the most notable energy developments for the U.S. in 2016 — ones that may set the stage for how Americans produce and use energy in 2017. (Read More)

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by Bill Loveless
Article, Climate, Corporations, Government and Politics

Look to places like Mars (the company) for greenhouse-gas reform

November 27, 2016

Just where Donald Trump stands on climate change seems more uncertain than ever now that he’s acknowledged to The New York Times that he sees “some connectivity” between human activity and increasing global temperatures. Trump’s remarks last week followed his disregard of climate change during his election campaign, including his pledge to pull the U.S. out of a 2015 agreement with nearly 200 other nations to keep temperatures from rising to catastrophic levels. (Read More)

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by Bill Loveless
Article, Climate, Energy, Government and Politics

Coal’s decline may continue even under Trump

November 21, 2016

During his campaign for the White House, President-elect Donald Trump promised to eliminate regulations that target coal-fired power plants, one of the primary causes of carbon emissions responsible for climate change. For Trump, a climate-change skeptic, getting rid of the Obama administration’s Clean Power Plan, which would curb carbon emissions from power plants by 32% by 2030, would give a boost to the declining U.S. coal industry and its decimated workforce across Appalachia. Even if the next president were to succeed, he would probably not reverse a years-long movement away from coal in the U.S. electric power industry, the biggest consumer of the black rock, according to the head of one of the nation’s leading electric utilities. (Read more)

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by Bill Loveless
Climate, Government and Politics, Organizations, People, Podcast

Columbia Energy Exchange: Carl Pope

November 21, 2016

Following COP22 in Marrakech where global leaders were overcome with uncertainty about the United States’ commitment to greenhouse gas reduction under a new Trump Administration, host Bill Loveless speaks with Carl Pope, former executive director and chairman of The Sierra Club, about the path forward against climate change through both international and local initiatives. Pope is also a senior climate adviser to former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, the U.N. Secretary General’s special envoy for cities and climate change. They discuss: Reactions to Donald Trump’s election and other challenges and opportunities coming out of the Marrakech Climate Summit; The heightened roles for cities, states, investors and business in providing U.S. direction for climate initiatives; A sneak peek at the upcoming book by Carl and Michael Bloomberg called, “Overheated: How Cooler Heads Can Cool the World” that seeks to reset the conversation about…

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by Bill Loveless
Article, Climate, Corporations, Energy, Government and Politics

What Trump’s pro-drilling stance means for oil, gas industry

November 13, 2016

The election of Donald Trump as president raises the  hopes of oil and natural gas producers, thanks to his full-throated support for the removal of regulations that many say hamper the industry. Only time will tell if the Republican’s policies will provide much more of a boost to U.S. oil and gas, which has rallied in recent years thanks to technologies that enable production from previously untapped shale reserves. Moreover, it’s price, not government regulation, that really determines the extent of oil and gas exploration and production, as Thomas Watters, a managing director with S&P Global Ratings, observed the other day. (Read more)

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by Bill Loveless
Article, Climate, Government and Politics, Regulations

‘Just scrap’ Obama energy rules, Trump adviser says

November 9, 2016

The man that Donald Trump calls the “king of energy” in the U.S. predicts quick action by the next president to roll back Obama administration policies opposed by the oil and natural gas industry. “There are so many of them. You just scrap them,” Harold Hamm, the billionaire CEO of Continental Resources, said Wednesday, hours after Trump’s surprising win over Democrat Hillary Clinton. (Read more)

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by Bill Loveless