The Obama administration’s response to the Deepwater Horizon accident has set U.S. energy development back years and has needlessly cost jobs in the offshore industry, said Jack Gerard, president of the American Petroleum Institute. “We believe the moratorium was an overreaction,” he told the  Chronicle’s editorial board this morning. “You didn’t need to put everybody [...]  More »

The death of terrorist leader Osama bin Laden is being cheered in the markets. European stocks rose to a two-month high and U.S. futures indexes indicated a boost for the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index as well. The dollar inched upward and oil prices dipped. Commodities, particularly precious metals, fell. It’s likely to be a [...]  More »

That’s the question that lurks behind a bill currently winding its way through the Legislature, Loren Steffy writes. If the bill becomes law, companies like CenterPoint could adjust their rates with just a cursory review by the Public Utility Commission as many as four times before they had to submit to a full-scale rate review.  More »

That’s the question that lurks behind a bill currently winding its way through the Legislature. Sponsored by Rep. Senfronia Thompson, D-Houston, House Bill 3610 and its companion, Senate Bill 1693, would allow streamlined rate cases for the one piece of the Texas electricity market that hasn’t been deregulated – transmission. The idea is that those [...]  More »

AP The Beard: Gasoline prices don’t affect inflation until they do. That was one of the key points from Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke’s historic news conference this afternoon. Asked if the Fed could do anything about rising gasoline prices, Bernanke replied: There’s not much the Federal Reserve can do about gas prices per se. [...]  More »

AP BP appears to have shaken off the brunt of the financial effects from last year’s Deepwater Horizon disaster, reporting first-quarter net income rose 16 percent, to $7.2 billion from $6.2 billion a year earlier. The problem, though, is that net income really doesn’t tell the story. BP has sold $24 billion in assets to [...]  More »

Last week the Tennessee Valley Authority settled with the EPA, and several states (most notably North Carolina) over charges of Clean Air Act violations and dangerous emissions from many of its coal fired power plants.   The settlement agreement requires the TVA to install several billion dollars worth of pollution control equipment or shut down eleven [...]  More »

There’s one key difference in electric deregulation compared with deregulation of airlines, Loren Steffy writes. In those industries, competition drove prices lower. In Texas, electricity markets were deregulated with the goal of benefiting the companies involved.  More »

The offshore energy industry has been awash in conspiracy theories that the Obama administration is trying to destroy the oil business by withholding drilling permits in the Gulf of Mexico. But Loren Steffy writes that there’s one area where the administration seems to be giving its support: antitrust clearance for mergers.  More »

The Tesla Roadster is quiet, sleek, fast and fun to drive– perfect for a spring day in Texas, Loren Steffy writes. Make that almost perfect: The electric sportscars aren’t going to get much market traction until they lose the Ferrari pricing.  More »

Marcy ZlotnikIf you didn’t have a chance to enjoy the weather a little yesterday, that’s too bad because it was a perfect day to put the top down and tool around town. I got a chance to do that without making a sound. I was speaking on a panel about e…  More »

For all the goals and mandates thrown out by Congress and the administration, there’s no roadmap to develop viable alternative energy sources, Loren Steffy writes. The Gulf drilling ban and slowdown in drilling permits raise the question of how we’re going to meet our energy needs if we shun fossil fuels.  More »