We recently reported on bugs in the nation’s electric grid, but it seems the folks responsible for Texas’ power network are getting ready for that other bug. The Electric Reliability Council of Texas activated its own “Pandemic Preparedness Plan” this week, warning all workers and contractors to take precautions. This matters particularly since ERCOT has [...]  More »

Organizers of the 2009 Offshore Technology Conference said they are “closely monitoring” warnings about the swine flu outbreak but are still planning to go forward as planned with the massive event next week at Reliant Park. “We will take precautions to protect public health, and encourage attendees to practice healthy habits, including frequent hand-washing,” event [...]  More »

Eagle Energy Partners, the independent energy trading shop that is now part of EDF Trading (by way of Lehman Brothers) says that founder Chuck Watson will be leaving the firm effective May 1. In a release the firm said Watson’s “close association with Eagle will assure his continued interest with its future business endeavours.” “I [...]  More »

Plans for the $1.8 billion Texas Offshore Port System may have hit a snag with two of the three partners pulling out, but this wouldn’t be the first time a large offshore oil terminal has had challenges. As early as 1972 (at least one reader says even in 1962) a similar port was proposed for [...]  More »

Facing the threat of bans in some cities and consumer backlash in others, the plastic bag industry announced a broad effort to clean up its image Tuesday. Under the Full Scale Recycling Initiative, the industry has committed to using 40 percent recycled content in plastic bags by 2015 — a change it says will reduce [...]  More »

U.S. oil and natural gas drilling activity dropped to 2004 levels in the first quarter, the American Petroleum Institute said today. The U.S. rig count has been falling from last fall’s high of 2031 rigs, and Houston’s Baker Hughes’ most recent count is now less than half that at 1,005. Many analysts expect the rig [...]  More »

Earnings season is fast approaching for Big Oil and independents. ConocoPhillips will kick it off April 23, followed by BP on April 28, Royal Dutch Shell and Hess on the 29th, Exxon Mobil, Marathon Oil and Apache on the 30th. Chevron will release May 1, followed by Anadarko Petroleum and Devon Energy on May 6. [...]  More »

Marathon Oil took a lighter tone than Chevron or ConocoPhillips in its interim quarterly update issued today. Chevron and ConocoPhillips, the second- and third-largest integrated U.S. oil companies behind Exxon Mobil, earlier this month issued updates that noted the obvious: first quarter earnings will be down despite slight upticks in production because oil and natural [...]  More »

The novelty of the home of “Big Oil” also being Ground Zero for “Big Wind” has worn off a bit since Texas overtook California as the top wind producing state waaaay back in 2007. But just to prove the state is no flash in the pan on renewables Texas continues to widen it’s lead: The [...]  More »

The notion of a “green bank” to fund renewable energy projects (as we wrote over the weekend) is hardly new. As Paul Dickerson, an attorney with Haynes and Boone and former Chief Operating Officer of the DOE’s Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy told us, the idea has been kicked around Washington, D.C. for [...]  More »

The world of Facebook has no shortage of groups one can join, some serious, some less-than-serious. Squarely in the second category is “You might be a geologist if…” run by Chris Klug, a Texas A&M graduate student (along with some others). So, the list of the top 15 indicators (which many Houstonians in the oil [...]  More »

Cyber-snooping of the U.S. power grid by foreign powers is old news to the security industry (as we report today) and according for former Federal Energy Regulatory Commission Chairman Pat Wood has been on the federal government’s agenda for some time. “It was one of my top 3 issues in my last 18 months in [...]  More »