Preview Newsletter
ACC PM 28/8/17
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(ACC Mentioned) Energy Efficiency Soars At Chemical Sites
Aug 28, 2017 | Chemical Processing
By Sean Ottenwell
The drive by some chemical companIies to improve energy efficiency extends well beyond their production processes. For instance, Eastman Chemicals, BASF, AkzoNobel and Dow are working hard to find energy savings in all aspects of corporate life. -
Many Plants Closed as Hurricane Harvey Rain and Floods Swamp Texas Gulf Coast
Aug 28, 2017 | Chemical Week
By Natasha Alperowicz
In expectation of continued bad weather, several major producers have announced that they are beginning shutdowns. -
Dutch Study Analyses Bio-Based Chemicals and REACH
Aug 28, 2017 | Chemical Watch
The Dutch National Institute for Public Health and the Environment (RIVM) has published a study examining the relationship between the bio-based chemicals sector and REACH. -
Harvey's Aftermath Inundating Gulf Coast, with 1,000-Year Storm Overwhelming Houston Area
Aug 28, 2017 | Natural Gas Intelligence
Horrible Harvey, which stormed into South Texas as a Category 4 storm Friday night, was continuing to wreak havoc Monday along the Gulf Coast, with catastrophic rainfall disrupting lives and shuttering the energy breadbasket of the United States. -
Permian Boom Reinforces Texas' 'Energy Dominance' — Report
Aug 28, 2017 | E&E Energywire
By Nathanial Gronewold
The United States will be a net energy exporter in less than a decade, and Texas will dominate that trend. -
States Dare to Think Big on Climate Change
Aug 28, 2017 | The New York Times
By The Editorial Board
The one bright spot amid the generally gloomy news about climate change, and the Trump administration’s resistance to doing anything about it, is the determination of a number of state governments to take action on their own. -
Agency Dumps Climate Awards, Says 'Shouldn't Be a Surprise'
Aug 28, 2017 | E&E Greenwire
By Niina Heikkinen
U.S. EPA will no longer host awards recognizing voluntary efforts by local governments, businesses, organizations and individuals to cut greenhouse gas emissions. -
E.U. To Host Talk with Calif., Carbon-Trading Nations
Aug 28, 2017 | E&E Energywire
By Debra Kahn
The European Union is hosting a climate workshop next month with China, Canada, New Zealand and California ahead of this fall's U.N. talks to discuss their emissions trading systems. -
GOP Assembly Leader Loses Post over Cap-And-Trade Vote
Aug 28, 2017 | E&E Climatewire
By Debra Kahn
The leader of California's Assembly Republicans announced yesterday that he would step down after coming under fire from his own party for voting to extend the state's cap-and-trade system for greenhouse gases.
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(ACC Mentioned) Energy Efficiency Soars At Chemical Sites
Aug 28, 2017 | Chemical Processing
By Sean Ottenwell
The drive by some chemical companies to improve energy efficiency extends well beyond their production processes. For instance, Eastman Chemicals, BASF, AkzoNobel and Dow are working hard to find energy savings in all aspects of corporate life.
One of the main efforts of Kingsport, Tenn.-based Eastman Chemicals focuses on reliable supply of high-pressure steam for powering several large compressors for the cracker at the company’s Longview, Texas, plant. The steam comes from either an on-site cogeneration facility or less efficient boilers within the cracker operation itself. The reliability problem was highlighted one night last year when the limited turndown of the cogeneration facility forced the shutdown of one of its two combustion turbines. This reduced the reliability of the high-pressure steam supply, causing the cracker to produce the steam using its own boilers.
To solve this problem, the company has installed novel burner technology in the two cogeneration combustion turbines. This greatly increases their turndown, allowing both to remain online at all times.
“This improved steam reliability to the point that high-pressure steam production could be shifted from the cracker to the cogeneration plant. The two units worked together to reduce the cracker boilers use and increase the steam from the cogeneration plant. Controls were installed to control the steam header pressure while minimizing steam produced by the boilers. In all, the project will save 156,000 MMBTU/y,” explains Sharon Nolen, Eastman’s manager, global natural resources management.
Since 2012, Eastman has been collaborating with Purdue University, West Lafayette, Ind., and the Process Science and Technology Center at the University of Texas, Austin, in an ongoing effort to improve the energy efficiency of its energy-intensive distillation units using dividing-wall column technologies. To date, Eastman has committed over $1.5 million in funding to the project.
“Distillation accounts for roughly 40% of all energy consumed by industrial chemical processes. Our efforts thus far have shown that new distillation schemes/technology can reduce the energy consumption by up to 50% and the capital investment by over 30%,” notes Scott Owens, Eastman’s scale-up project leader.
The academic collaborators currently are evaluating system selection, column design/construction, process simulation and operation/control of new distillation technology.
“This work gave us a significant jumpstart on our internal efforts to add or upgrade experimental facilities and understand and apply the new technologies to our own proprietary processes. We have already identified several processes which would see large financial benefits from retrofitting to a more-advanced distillation technology. In many cases, the process would enable reduced energy intensity and line expansion with minimal capital investment,” he adds.
The company also is tackling non-process-related energy inefficiencies. For instance, a project to upgrade lighting is underway at various company sites, building on ongoing efforts at the Kingsport headquarters. “The majority of installations involve replacing less efficient lighting with LEDs [light-emitting diodes]. Energy savings for 2016 equate to more than $390,000,” says Lisa Lambert, Tennessee site energy coordinator.Broad Energy Certification
For its part, BASF, Ludwigshafen, Germany, is committed to achieving certification to the ISO-50001 energy management standard by 2020 for the sites that account for 90% of its total purchased energy. It also aims to increase energy efficiency in its production plants by 35% by the same year (2002 baseline).
In North America, this so far has involved the implementation of 14 energy efficiency projects at seven different production sites.
Among these is a project at its Wyandotte, Mich., complex. In 2014, site management learned that Wyandotte Municipal Services would stop providing steam to the site after 2016. After evaluating nine different options, the site decided to reactivate a large steam plant that had stood idle for more than a decade. Over the next two years, a project team converted the plant, which originally was coal-fired, to natural gas. This involved installing high-efficiency natural gas burners, a new control system and water-treatment system, enhancing the plant’s electrical infrastructure, and hiring a team of ten employees to run the unit. The steam plant began operating at the end of last year (Figure 1).
“The project at our Wyandotte site exemplifies our strategic approach to integrate energy management goals into our efforts to optimize our processes at BASF,” stresses Ty Geiger, vice president of energy management, BASF, Houston. “It is for these efforts that BASF has been recognized by the American Chemistry Council for its energy efficiency improvements for 20 consecutive years,” he adds.
Efforts, of course, are taking place worldwide. For instance, BASF has been implementing a “triple E” (excellence in energy efficiency) project at its Guaratinguetá complex in Brazil where 12 plants with a total capacity of over 260,000 t/y manufacture more than 750 different products (Figure 2).
One project focused on installing a new heat exchanger to recover heat from a sodium methylate product that is used as a catalyst in biodiesel production. This saved the company 730 t/y of steam and had a return on investment (ROI) of 18 months.
Another involved replacing old, largely sodium and mercury, lamps with 450 LED lamps. This increased lamp service life to 80,000 h from 10,000 h and reduced energy consumption by 75% or 620 MWh/y. The ROI here was 27 months.
A third project centered on replacing the water heating system for locker rooms. It had been consuming 840 t/y of steam to heat 12,000 m3/y of water. Switching to solar panels and introducing water flow reducers resulted in a 2,700 m3/y saving in water consumption, lower energy consumption and an ROI of 35 months.
With these and other initiatives, BASF has cut energy consumption by 7.098 MWh/y at the complex, saving R$ 6.46 million/y ($2.07 million/y) in energy costs and reducing carbon dioxide emissions by 705 t/y.Renewable Power Emphasis
AkzoNobel, Amsterdam, particularly is focusing its energy efficiency initiatives on developing renewable power options.
For example, a new contract with Swedish energy company Vattenfall will enable AkzoNobel to ramp up the supply of renewable electricity to its facilities in Sweden and Finland. Hydro and wind power already make up the majority of the electricity supplied by Vattenfall; the two companies have agreed to further increase the share of renewable energy to the facilities to 100% by 2020. The contract supplies AkzoNobel with 1.25 TWh/y of electricity to power six specialty chemicals sites and one performance coatings facility. In addition, the agreement allows the two companies to work together to balance swings in renewable power supply on the Swedish national grid.
Meanwhile at its chemical park in Delfzijl, the Netherlands, AkzoNobel is switching to sustainable steam use (Figure 3). The company, along with Eneco and Groningen Seaports jointly have invested around €40 million ($47 million) in a project to convert an existing biomass plant into a combineamerid heat and power plant. When fully commissioned, the project will help improve the long-term competitiveness of the Delfzijl plants and ensure that an additional 10% of the company’s energy consumption in the Netherlands comes from renewable sources — cutting 100,000 t/y of carbon dioxide emissions in the process.
AkzoNobel also is heading a consortium that includes Philips, Amsterdam; DSM, Heerlen, the Netherlands; and Google’s Amsterdam facility, to purchase green electricity from two new wind parks at Bouwdokken and Krammer, both in the Netherlands (Figure 4). These wind parks currently supply 140 MW of power; the consortium members now are investigating other opportunities for sustainable energy cooperation and working with banks and equity investors on novel funding processes for them.
Further afield, AkzoNobel has integrated its production facilities in Imperatriz, Brazil, directly with the neighboring Suzano Maranhão pulp mill. One benefit here is being able to source energy directly from waste wood left over after eucalyptus trees are processed.
“Our pathway to renewable energy means going beyond the immediate business, working with others to create a wider change in society. That’s the pathway we want to speed up. Partnerships will play a key role and we are at the forefront of working together with others to help the world move towards renewable energy quicker,” notes AkzoNobel’s corporate director of sustainability Andre Veneman.Water-Based Savings
For Dow, Midland, Mich., a major focus is on developing energy-efficiency-improving technologies that can be leveraged for use on multiple sites. Many of these center on water use.
For example, at its Terneuzen site in the Netherlands, the company at one point was using thermally desalinated water to balance the competing demands of the plant, agriculture and the neighboring community. Dow now relies on wastewater recycled from the local municipality to generate plant steam and process water and reuses condensate in cooling towers.
“So successful was the initiative that by 2020 Dow hopes to have expanded [the] amount we use from 10,000 m3/d to 30,000 m3/d. This 2020 initiative will lower the energy costs by 95% and has led to the expansion of other local municipal projects,” notes Denise Haukkala, technical service expert, Dow Water & Process Solutions North America, San Francisco.
One of these is at Dow’s complex in Tarragona, Spain, where the wastewater from three local cities now is being treated with a combination of Veolia and Dow Filmtec technologies.
“It’s led to a very real savings in the ethylene cracker cooling towers. Using up to 40% reused water has reduced blowdown by 49% and chemical usage by 23%. Using RO [reverse osmosis] processes means that the cooling makeup water can be used in 5–10 more cycles, with reduced need for chemical additives. So it’s a multiplier effect — adding extra cycles substantially reduces tower flow demand, together with the need for scale, corrosion and antimicrobial chemical additives,” she adds.
At Tarragona, Veolia technology serves for pre-treatment, with the water then going through Dow extra-fouling-resistant membranes in the system’s first pass and then its low-energy membranes in the second pass. The design of the second pass has helped the plant deliver higher salt rejection at 33% lower pressure, reducing overall energy usage.
Looking to the future, Haukkala believes that the next innovations in water-related energy efficiency are going to come in the areas of high-temperature RO and nanofiltration. “How about being able to treat condensate overhead water or various process waste waters at 50–80°C and reuse that product water back into the process without adding costly heat exchangers?” she asks.
http://www.chemicalprocessing.com/articles/2017/energy-efficiency-soars-at-chemical-sites/?show=all
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Many Plants Closed as Hurricane Harvey Rain and Floods Swamp Texas Gulf Coast
Aug 28, 2017 | Chemical Week
By Natasha Alperowicz
Widespread rain and flooding in the wake of Hurricane Harvey, now downgraded to a tropical storm, is causing major disruption to petrochemical production in the Texas Gulf area. In expectation of continued bad weather, several major producers have announced that they are beginning shutdowns. ExxonMobil said on Sunday it has begun a safe and systematic shutdown of its Baytown complex, including the US’s second largest refinery, because of flooding. “Safety is our first priority, and we are taking all precautions to minimize the impact to the community and employees throughout the shutdown process.” All other ExxonMobil Gulf Coast facilities are operating as normal.
Shell also said that it is closing its massive refining and petrochemical complex at Deer Park, the site of one of Texas' largest refineries, with a capacity of 340,000 barrels/day of crude oil. Ascend Performance Materials yesterday announced it has declared force majeure on products from its Chocolate Bayou facility at Alvin, Texas, including hydrogen cyanide, acrylonitrile and disodium iminodiacetate. The Chocolate Bayou complex has ceased operations as a result of equipment issues and the reduction in the supply of raw materials. The company says it will allocate existing products as prescribed in its contracts.
Chevron Phillips is undergoing a shutdown of its Cedar Bayou olefins and derivatives complex, according to a filing with the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality. The plant is currently undergoing a $6 billion expansion scheduled for completion by the end of 2017.The facility will to be closed through 6 September, according to the commission. Indorama Ventures said in a regulatory filing today that on Sunday it temporarily shut down its Clear Lake oxides and glycols plants as a precautionary measure. "There has been no damage to the company's assets and no impact on the safety of our employees," the company said, adding that it does not expect adverse material impact.
Other reported closures include American Acryl (acrylic acid) at Bayport, Celanese (methanol) at Pasadena, Dow (polyethylene, ethylene oxide/glycols and derivatives) at Seadrift, Braskem (polypropylene) at Seadrift, Formosa Plastics (olefins) at Point Comfort, Ineos (acrylonitrile) at Green Lake, Invista (nylon intermediates) at Victoria, Oxychem (ethylene and chloralkali) at Ingleside, Lyondell Basell at Matagorda, Chocolate Bayou and Corpus Christi. Many other refineries have also closed, including Petrobras at Pasadena, Phillips 66 at Sweeny, Citgo, Valero and Flint Hills at Corpus Christi, and Valero at Three Rivers. Some 15% of US refining capacity is reportedly shut down. The Gulf Coast produces more than 25% of the US's gasoline and the shutdowns are expected to lead to fuel price spikes and potential shortages.
As a result of Hurricane Harvey, the area from Houston to Galveston has been hit by some two feet of rain in 24 hours, and authorities have warned of catastrophic flooding of historic proportions. Reports say they are now expecting to receive a normal year’s rainfall in a week.
https://www.chemweek.com/CW/Carousel/Document/89546/Many-plants-closed-as-Hurricane-Harvey-rain-and-floods-swamp-Texas-Gulf-Coast/goBackToHome
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Dutch Study Analyses Bio-Based Chemicals and REACH
Aug 28, 2017 | Chemical Watch
The Dutch National Institute for Public Health and the Environment (RIVM) has published a study examining the relationship between the bio-based chemicals sector and REACH.
The study comes out of questions bio-based companies sent the national REACH helpdesk between 2013 and 2015. The "vast majority" of questions received, RIVM says, concern registration and possibilities for exemptions.
Certain registration exemptions may be specifically applicable to bio-based manufacturers, RIVM says. This means that if particular conditions are met, registration obligations will be "less of a burden" to some of them, the study says.
In addition, REACH offers opportunities for producers to provide safe bio-based alternatives for substances of very high concern (SVHCs), it says.
"REACH may actually be an opportunity rather than the administrative hurdle it is often perceived to be," the institute says.
The study includes recommendations for companies looking to register bio-based substances.
This week, RIVM also released a report on a study about hazardous substances in waste streams.
https://chemicalwatch.com/58379/dutch-study-analyses-bio-based-chemicals-and-reach
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Harvey's Aftermath Inundating Gulf Coast, with 1,000-Year Storm Overwhelming Houston Area
Aug 28, 2017 | Natural Gas Intelligence
Horrible Harvey, which stormed into South Texas as a Category 4 storm Friday night, was continuing to wreak havoc Monday along the Gulf Coast, with catastrophic rainfall disrupting lives and shuttering the energy breadbasket of the United States.
In its 10 a.m. CDT update Monday, the National Hurricane Center said the center of Harvey was near latitude 28.5 North, longitude 96.0 West. Harvey was moving toward the southeast near 5 mph, and a slow motion toward the southeast was expected through Monday night. A gradual turn toward the northeast and a continued slow forward speed were expected Tuesday and Tuesday night. On the forecast track, the center of Harvey is expected to be just offshore of the middle and upper coasts of Texas through Tuesday night.
Maximum sustained winds were near 40 mph at mid-morning Monday with higher gusts. Some slow intensification was possible during the next 48 hours. Tropical-storm-force winds extended outward up to 175 miles, mainly to the east of the center.
Harvey was expected to produce additional rainfall accumulations of 15-25 inches through Friday over the upper Texas coast and into southwestern Louisiana. Isolated storm totals may reach 50 inches over the upper Texas coast, including the Houston/Galveston metropolitan area. These rains are currently producing catastrophic and life-threatening flooding over large portions of southeastern Texas.
Elsewhere, Harvey was expected to produce total rain accumulations of 5-15 inches farther south into the middle Texas coast and farther east across south-central Louisiana. Rainfall amounts of 5-10 inches were expected in southeast Louisiana. A tropical storm warning had been issued east of High Island, near Galveston, to Intracoastal City, LA. A tropical storm watch has been issued east of Cameron, LA, to Intracoastal City, LA.
ENERGY INDUSTRY STILL ASSESSING DAMAGES
As of Sunday afternoon, workers had been evacuated from 105 (14.25%) Gulf of Mexico (GOM) production platforms and four of the GOM’s 10 non-dynamically positioned (DP) rigs, the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement (BSEE) said. A total of 378,633 b/d (21.64%) of crude oil had been shut in along with 827 MMcf/d (25.71%) of natural gas.
After carving a path of destruction as it roared onshore, destroying the fishing villages of Port Aransas and Rockport, Harvey mowed down homes and carried his rain inland, flooding the Houston area beginning Saturday afternoon. The National Weather Service said it is a 1,000-year storm, a deluge that has not only drowned the fourth largest city in the nation but also flooded out neighboring counties far north and east.
The extent of damages incurred by the oil and gas sector remained unknown Monday morning, but signs were evident that the refinery and petrochemical sector would take a major hit, in turn disrupting nationwide operations and potentially raise commodity prices.
“Information on the extent of the damages incurred by the oil and gas infrastructure remains limited at this point,” said Goldman Sachs analysts Damien Courvalin, Huan Wei and Callum Bruce. “Nonetheless, data available so far point to sizably larger refining than production disruptions…”
On the natural gas side, data and analytics company Genscape Inc. said its Spring Rock production team was estimating Texas production for Monday at just under 15.83 Bcf/d, about 0.98 Bcf/d below pre-storm levels. South Texas was off about 0.7 Bcf/d.
As of Evening Cycle for gas day Monday (Aug. 28), pipeline scheduled nominations showed that onshore production (defined by processing plant and gathering system interconnects) in East Texas was down roughly 510 MMcf/d since Thursday (Aug. 24). During the two weeks leading up to Harvey’s initial impacts, pipe nominations showed onshore production in East Texas averaged 1,911 MMcf/d.
Demand is down roughly 0.7 Bcf/d. Scheduled nominations show that demand (at citygates, end-users and power plants) in East Texas was down 474 MMcf/d since pre-Harvey levels of 1,188 MMcf/d (calculated as the 14-day span prior to Aug. 24).
Using average daily gas demand from Monday through Wednesday (Aug. 28-30) as a baseline for the south-central region leading into Hurricane Harvey, Monday’s gas demand impact, estimate based largely upon early cycle gas nominations, is 4.9 Bcfd, Genscape said. That is a net impact adjusted for 0.7 Bcf/d typical decrease in south-central demand on Saturdays and Sundays. The cumulative impact using this approach is 14.4 Bcf/d.
Houston-based Cheniere Energy Inc. said liquefied natural gas (LNG) production operations at its Sabine Pass, TX, facility continued through the storm and "early assessments" showed "only minor cosmetic impacts" at its Corpus Christi LNG construction site.
"Our thoughts and prayers are with all of our neighbors and communities here in Texas and Louisiana that have been impacted by this devastating and continuing storm," said Cheniere CEO Jack Fusco. "While Cheniere has been lucky to avoid any major impacts from Harvey, many in our communities have a long road ahead to assess the damage and recover from this storm. To help in the relief efforts, Cheniere will donate $1 million to the Red Cross Harvey relief effort."
With the storm expected to continue impacting the Houston area, Cheniere said it "has activated its emergency office location in Dallas to support its gas supply and trading division and other essential functions to ensure obligations are met to continue producing LNG at Sabine Pass."
TransCanada said Sunday operations were stable across all of its footprint.
"Our gas control and scheduling teams are operating normally and have not experienced any service interruptions in any of our facilities, data centers and transportation systems," the company said in a notice to customers.
Texas Eastern had evacuated some pipeline facilities but said its operations were also stable on Sunday.
Harvey and the mandatory evacuations that came with it forced Natural Gas Pipeline Co. Sunday to declare a force majeure event on its Louisiana Line upstream of Compressor Station 342 in Cameron Parish, LA, and flooding made Station 343 in Liberty County, TX unavailable until the force majeure is lifted.
Meanwhile, the ports of Houston, Galveston, Corpus Christi, Texas City, Freeport and Galena Park remained closed as of Monday morning.
The Goldman analysts estimated nearly 3 million b/d of refinery capacity was offline as of Sunday, or around 16.5% of the 18.2 million b/d of U.S. capacity. Those closures combined with an estimated shut-in of 1 million b/d of crude production (11% of 9.3 million b/d current production) and 2 Bcf/d of gas production (3% of 72 Bcf/d current production).
“Should these levels of outages remain in place, and using past hurricanes as proxies for the impact on oil demand, we roughly estimate that the impact of Harvey on the U.S. oil market would be to increase domestic crude availability by 1.4 million b/d while removing 615,000-785,000 b/d of gasoline and 700,000 b/d of distillate supplies,” Courvalin and his team said. “Larger refinery outages would increase these long crude and short product impacts.”
Under that scenario, Harvey is “likely to lead to further strengthening in product cracks given the loss in domestic refined product supply.”Harvey should lead to a weakness in domestic crude prices “given the lack of refining outlet,” said the Goldman team. “From a global oil supply-demand perspective, the storm is likely to lead to higher crude and product inventories over the next couple of months given the likely larger hit on U.S. demand than supply.”
At this stage, most of the refining outages reported have been preventive, with only a few reporting minor flooding.
“However, the slow moving nature of the storm will likely lead to these shutdowns continuing in coming days and may generate persistent damage as well. Should the storm continue to head East toward Houston, as forecasts project, it risks creating further refinery outages with 850,000 b/d of capacity in Houston not yet reported offline.”
September CME Group RBOB gasoline futures were up 4.91 cents to $1.7157 per gallon early Monday morning.
The storm’s impact has led to a bigger loss of onshore supply -- from the Eagle Ford Shale -- than historically had been the case, analysts said. It’s the first GOM storm to have a major impact on onshore oil and gas production, as operators in the Eagle Ford Shale began removing workers and shutting in output late last week.
“Gulf of Mexico production was instead spared by the path of the hurricane,” said the Goldman team. “Historically, onshore production has rebounded faster than offshore production and this would be consistent with producer commentary that loss of production is due to preventive shut-ins for now.”
Plano, TX-based Denbury Resources Inc., like many of its peers, suspended operations and temporarily shut-in all production because of the storm, affecting around 16,000 boe/d net. The Hastings, Oyster Bayou, Conroe, Thompson, Webster and Manvel fields were all affected.
"While no significant damage outside of localized flooding has been reported at any of these fields, the full impact of the storm may not be determined for several days as we have evacuated our employees and contractors as a precautionary measure," management said.
CEO Chris Kendall said the company is prioritizing safety above all else. Denbury "will continue to monitor conditions at each of the impacted fields, and will resume operations to restore production when conditions allow and we are able to ensure the safe return of our personnel."
Overall, the impact of Harvey on the oil market, total demand versus total supply, likely will be higher oil inventories over the next couple of months, according to Goldman.
“First, onshore U.S. production typically normalizes in the month after a hurricane (as most wells are preventatively shut-in), while historically the impact on demand lasts several months. Second, the historical declines in demand observed during strong hurricanes Rita-Katrina (1.0 million b/d the first month) and Ike-Gustav (1.4 million b/d) are larger than the onshore (and currently observed) declines in oil production.”
There are two caveats to the historical template, said analysts. The proximity of the pairs of hurricanes overstate the demand impact, “while the magnitude of the onshore production impact of Harvey is unprecedented.”
Harvey could put a dent in crude production and refinery demand, according to Evercore ISI’s James West.
“While the U.S. oilfield hardly gets respite from the 24/7 hustle and bustle of drilling and completions, Hurricane Harvey has introduced enough uncertainty to compel many of the land rigs to prepare for a temporary laydown,” he said.
“Our sources on the ground have confirmed that many of the rigs are running drill pipe on a special packer to hang the drill string and lay down the derrick. Hands/specialists will be sent home to their families, and the service companies (many of which would have kept crews in-base for safety reasons, anyway) will likely shut down until the storm passes.”
Seasonality always has been a point of concern for service providers in the Gulf Coast region, “but we note several Harvey-specific operational challenges that may affect rigs operating from the Eagle Ford to South Louisiana (circulation, damage to equipment, damage to roads, and a short-term labor squeeze).”
Tudor, Pickering, Holt & Co. (TPH) said the production impact “should be days and not weeks.” The onshore impact from rain in South Texas is estimated now at 300,000 b/d from the Eagle Ford, which “should be short-lived.” But the weekly Department of Energy data over the next couple of weeks “will be volatile with impacts on GOM/Eagle Ford production, Texas refining utilization, oil and refined product imports/exports.
The TPH team is expecting every Houston area refinery to shut or at least significantly curb operating rates by Tuesday because of “catastrophic flooding, lack of personnel and crude delivery delays...
“If Harvey loops and begins moving up the Texas coast toward Louisiana as forecasted, additional shutdowns could occur in the Port Arthur/Beaumont/Lake Charles refining center, which holds another 2.2 million b/d of capacity (12% of U.S. capacity), thus worst-case suggests that upwards of 25-30% of domestic refining capacity could be shuttered near-term.”
http://www.naturalgasintel.com/articles/111533-harveys-aftermath-inundating-gulf-coast-with-1000-year-storm-overwhelming-houston-area
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Permian Boom Reinforces Texas' 'Energy Dominance' — Report
Aug 28, 2017 | E&E Energywire
By Nathanial Gronewold
The United States will be a net energy exporter in less than a decade, and Texas will dominate that trend.
That's the message delivered in a new industry report by the Texas Oil & Gas Association (TXOGA), which represents the state's upstream oil and gas companies and lobbies on their behalf in Austin.
TXOGA President Todd Staples told reporters during a call that the Permian Basin is far and away leading Texas' oil and gas surge, which is showing surprising strength even with weak natural gas prices and crude oil prices less than half what they were a few years ago. He said this state's oil and gas industry is demonstrating "impressive job growth" and boasting statistics that underlie how Texas is at the leading edge of North American energy production.
"Our nation's leaders have made energy dominance a priority, and we know there's been a flurry of activity in the oil and gas sector as prices have readjusted," Staples said. "We commissioned this report to demonstrate even with the realignment in the industry how oil and natural gas investment and activity in Texas is helping to make America more energy secure than ever."
Figures compiled by TXOGA show that the Permian Basin alone attracted 41 percent of all merger and acquisition dollars last year, some $25.6 billion. Roughly half of all active onshore oil rigs are drilling in the Permian. TXOGA reports that some 45 percent of all U.S. onshore crude oil production is now originating from the Permian Basin, which also extends into portions of southeastern New Mexico. Factoring in offshore oil production, the Permian may account for nearly one-third of U.S. crude output by some estimates.
And though the Port of Houston garners attention for its rising energy exports, TXOGA says it's actually the Port of Corpus Christi that has emerged as the nation's largest oil exporting port. The association reported that some 30 percent of the nation's crude exports are shipping from Corpus Christi.
Citing data from the Texas Workforce Commission, Staples said the recent surge in jobs growth in oil and gas underscores just how quickly the industry is recovering from the oil price crash. Nearly 5,000 jobs were added to the industry in June, he said, "the highest monthly gain in at least five years," according to the new report. TXOGA believes more than 300,000 jobs in the state are directly involved in the oil and gas extraction business.
Weak commodity prices don't seem to be slowing the industry down, Staples argued. "The 'lower for longer' I think is the new reality that we've had to live with for the past couple or three years now, and I think you've seen amazing capabilities of the industry to drive down costs," he said. "Part of that has been done through efficiencies, part of it's been done through innovation and technology."
https://www.eenews.net/energywire/2017/08/25/stories/1060059179
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States Dare to Think Big on Climate Change
Aug 28, 2017 | The New York Times
By The Editorial Board
The one bright spot amid the generally gloomy news about climate change, and the Trump administration’s resistance to doing anything about it, is the determination of a number of state governments to take action on their own.
California, as usual, has commanded the headlines on this score, having just strengthened its commitment to reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Now the nine Northeastern states that form the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative have done much the same, in a further rebuke to the know-littles and do-nothings like Scott Pruitt, the administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, who are now calling the shots on climate policy in Washington.
The nine states, including Connecticut, Massachusetts and New York, last week agreed to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from power plants an additional 30 percent by 2030, on top of the 40 percent cut they have already achieved since the program began in 2009. R.G.G.I., as the initiative is known, was the nation’s first multistate greenhouse gas initiative. From the beginning (and despite the defection of New Jersey’s Gov. Chris Christie), it has had the backing of governors from both parties. More important, it has quietly achieved substantial emissions reductions at little cost to the states’ economies or to their consumers.
The nine states require power plants to buy permits to pollute. Over time, these permits decline in quantity. The idea of such cap-and-trade systems is to put a price on emissions, giving utilities an incentive to figure out ways to reduce emissions. Utilities can trade permits with one another. Since it began, the initiative has raised $2.7 billion, which the states have invested in energy efficiency, in helping low-income people pay electricity bills and in renewable sources of power like wind and solar. (The other R.G.G.I. states are Delaware, Maine, Maryland, New Hampshire, Rhode Island and Vermont.)
Even as emissions have come down, electricity rates have fallen by an average of 3.4 percent in the nine states, according to the Acadia Center, an energy research and advocacy organization. And the economies of the nine states have grown faster than the economy of the rest of the country. The program has had the added benefit of reducing ground-level pollution that causes respiratory illnesses and other diseases, providing nearly $6 billion in public health benefits, according to Abt Associates, a research company.
All this serves to chastise Mr. Christie, who pulled New Jersey out of the program in 2011, complaining about its costs and saying it had “no discernible or measurable impact upon our environment.” Mr. Christie’s tenure will soon be history, and the Republican and Democratic candidates to replace him say they want New Jersey to rejoin the initiative. Virginia may also decide to participate if the Democratic candidate for governor wins this November.
Other states in the area, like Pennsylvania, ought to consider joining, as well. And given the potential for interstate trading of permits, R.G.G.I. might over time connect to California’s recently strengthened cap-and-trade program. The R.G.G.I. agreement will be the subject of a public meeting in Baltimore on Sept. 25, after which states will incorporate it into their laws and regulations.
As important as it is, R.G.G.I., which applies only to power plants, is but one of several steps states can take to achieve even more dramatic reductions. New York, Massachusetts and several other R.G.G.I. states have laws (or have issued executive orders) that commit them, on paper, to reducing all greenhouse gas emissions 80 percent from 1990 levels by 2050. To meet ambitious targets like these, the states will need to reduce emissions from cars and trucks while ramping up solar and wind power to produce the electricity required by hybrid and electric vehicles and new mass transit fleets. (Nationally, the transportation sector is now a bigger source of climate pollution than power plants, according to the Energy Information Administration.)
Many of these targets are, at the moment, aspirational. But that does not mean they are unachievable, and in any case their ambition and that of the governors behind them, people like Andrew Cuomo of New York, Charlie Baker of Massachusetts and Jerry Brown of California, shame President Trump and his appointees.
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/28/opinion/climate-change-states-trump.html
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Agency Dumps Climate Awards, Says 'Shouldn't Be a Surprise'
Aug 28, 2017 | E&E Greenwire
By Niina Heikkinen
U.S. EPA will no longer host awards recognizing voluntary efforts by local governments, businesses, organizations and individuals to cut greenhouse gas emissions.
The agency has sponsored the Climate Leadership Awards and the Climate Leadership Conference for the past seven years, along with the Center for Climate and Energy Solutions, also known as C2ES, and the Climate Registry.
EPA stated late last week in an internal email that it would no longer hold the awards or provide funding for the conference.
"We understand this news comes in the middle of the 2018 Awards application period and we apologize for any inconvenience to those preparing applications. We would like to thank you for your support for our mission to protect human health and the environment," the email read.
C2ES is currently led by Bob Perciasepe, a former EPA deputy administrator in the Obama administration. The Climate Registry is a climate action group backed by U.S. states and Canadian provinces and territories. Both groups say next year's planned events will continue without administration support.
The conference attracts hundreds of sustainability-focused professionals. And its central focus, said Perciasepe, has been EPA's leadership awards. He called the agency's decision to stop holding them "disappointing."
"It's important for an agency with the gravitas that EPA has to recognize when people are doing things," he said. "We would wish they would continue to do it, but we will find a way to do it."
Perciasepe added that while funding for the conference was important, the main change will be losing the imprimatur of the agency marking the achievements of business, state and local efforts to cut greenhouse gases.
EPA had provided $24,950 in funding for the awards each year, along with travel and staff time. The groups are still working out how the awards will take shape.
The canceled sponsorship comes as Administrator Scott Pruitt has publicly cast doubt on the degree of human contribution to climate change.
He has also spearheaded efforts to roll back regulations aimed at controlling emissions, including the Clean Power Plan and regulations on methane from landfills and the oil and gas industry.
"It shouldn't be a surprise to anyone that we don't plan to fund an awards ceremony on climate change," EPA spokesman Jahan Wilcox said in a statement.
This year's winners included Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport, Lockheed Martin Corp. and the U.S. Postal Service. California state Assemblymember Eduardo Garcia (D) received an individual award for his work to make sure climate policies address the needs of low-income and minority residents.
Next year's meeting and awards are scheduled for Feb. 28 through March 2 in Denver.
https://www.eenews.net/greenwire/2017/08/28/stories/1060059269
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E.U. To Host Talk with Calif., Carbon-Trading Nations
Aug 28, 2017 | E&E Energywire
By Debra Kahn
The European Union is hosting a climate workshop next month with China, Canada, New Zealand and California ahead of this fall's U.N. talks to discuss their emissions trading systems.
The meeting is being organized by the European Commission's director-general for climate action, Jos Delbeke, and will involve discussion of the potential to link carbon markets, according to the head of California's main air and climate agency.
"Jos Delbeke has invited all the countries and California that have cap-and-trade programs to come to a meeting in Europe in late September to talk about what possibilities there might be for linking our programs," California Air Resources Board Chairwoman Mary Nichols said in an interview in June in Beijing.
The meeting in Florence, Italy, on Sept. 25-26 will include policymakers from California, Canada, China, the European Union and New Zealand. It will take place ahead of another meeting on carbon market platforms being organized by Italy, which chairs the Group of Seven this year.
Canada, China and the European Union have been taking steps to cooperate on climate policy since President Trump began raising the possibility of withdrawing the United States from the U.N. climate agreement signed in Paris in 2015. In May, top climate officials from the three jurisdictions met in Berlin and agreed to meet in September to advance the Paris goals.
The European Union, California and two Canadian provinces have active carbon cap-and-trade programs, and China is planning to launch its nationwide program in November. New Zealand has a trading program covering about half its emissions, and Canada is also working to introduce a national carbon price via emissions trading or carbon taxes. Trading programs will cover 15 percent of global carbon emissions once China's system begins, up from 9 percent currently, the European Union noted.
The workshop is by invitation only and its purpose is to discuss "the experiences on implementation of emissions trading systems to date, and to further promote emissions trading as a cost-effective climate policy tool," according to the workshop's website.
https://www.eenews.net/climatewire/2017/08/25/stories/1060059198
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GOP Assembly Leader Loses Post over Cap-And-Trade Vote
Aug 28, 2017 | E&E Climatewire
By Debra Kahn
The leader of California's Assembly Republicans announced yesterday that he would step down after coming under fire from his own party for voting to extend the state's cap-and-trade system for greenhouse gases.
Assemblymember Chad Mayes (R) said he would abandon his leadership post on Sept. 15, the last day of the state's legislative session, and that Assemblymember Brian Dahle (R) would replace him.
"Brian Dahle will be an effective leader for the caucus and will continue our work to move the Republican Party toward greater relevance and viability in California," Mayes said in a statement. "I am proud to support him."
The leadership change came after several weeks of growing turmoil within the caucus, including a vote Monday to oust Mayes that fell three votes short of a majority. Another vote had been scheduled for next week, and several other Republicans had expressed interest in being leader, but Dahle emerged as a clear favorite yesterday morning.
"As soon as someone has the votes, then usually all those plans go out the window, and they move as quickly as possible," said Mayes' spokesman, Matt Mahon.
The state's 25 Republican assemblymembers hold less than one-third of the lower chamber's 79 seats. Their dwindling numbers have allowed Democrats to reach supermajority votes this year on raising the state gas tax and extending California's cap-and-trade system through 2030, a priority for Gov. Jerry Brown (D).
Mayes and seven other Republicans crossed the aisle last month to support Brown's bill on cap and trade, A.B. 398, raising the ire of fellow Republicans who opposed action on climate change. They also argued that the vote enabled Democrats in vulnerable seats to avoid casting a vote for the bill, hurting Republicans' chances in next year's elections.
Brown put in a good word for Mayes on Twitter after his ouster.
"Sad day when the Grand Old Party punishes a leader whose only flaw was believing in science & cutting regs, costs & taxes for Californians," he wrote.
Mayes had argued that Republicans are becoming increasingly irrelevant in California and should engage on climate and other issues in order to broaden their appeal and extract concessions. He delivered a presentation to the California Republican Party last week that cited a January poll showing Republicans could lose 353,000 party members due to their opposition to climate policies. Such a loss would put them below "No Party Preference" registrants, who currently make up 24.5 percent of registered voters to Republicans' 25.9 percent (Climatewire, Aug. 23).
Dahle, a farmer who represents the northeasternmost corner of the state, signaled he would also seek to broaden the GOP's platform.
"For far too long, the majority party has ignored millions of Californians who want greater economic opportunities in a state where the cost of living is simply too high," Dahle said in a statement. "We will continue fighting for them every day. In order to do so, we have to stay focused on building a relevant party that can win more elections so that Republicans have more influence on public policy."
A Democratic climate activist, though, predicted more political polarization as a result of the leadership scuffle.
"Once again, elected Republican legislators have shown that they can't abide heresy — in this case, acknowledgement that climate change is real and requires real solutions," RL Miller, chairwoman of the state Democratic Party's environmental caucus and president of the Climate Hawks Vote political action committee, said in a statement. "This vote only reinforces our belief that there's no reasoning with Republicans on climate solutions. The only real solution is to vote them out."
Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon (D) praised both Mayes and Dahle. "Chad Mayes is a good man who worked hard to balance doing what was right for California and meeting the needs of his caucus," he said in a statement. "Personally, I will miss working with Chad as Republican Leader. But make no mistake, the bromance will endure."
"Since we were elected to the Assembly in 2012, Brian Dahle and I have had a strong working relationship. I know that will continue in his new role."
https://www.eenews.net/climatewire/2017/08/25/stories/1060059199
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