Reports: Energy firms upping investment
WASHINGTON, May 13 (UPI) -- The national energy plan President Bush is
expected to unveil this week includes measures to relax government
regulations on the oil, coal, natural gas and nuclear industries, even while
it calls on Americans to conserve power, newspapers reported Sunday.
A day after Bush said in his weekly radio address that investment in
energy-efficient technologies would be part of the plan and that
conservation and economic growth could coexist, a Senate Democrat called for
bipartisanship in addressing the nation's energy needs.
"In the long run ... it's pretty simple: We have to both decrease demand
and increase supply, and a balanced energy package will do both," Sen.
Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., a member of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources
Committee, said Sunday on CBS' "Face the Nation."
"In the past, Washington has been deadlocked," he added. "Democrats say,
'conserve only;' Republicans say, 'increase supply only.' And we've been
deadlocked; we're each going to have to meet each other part of the way."
The president, other White House officials and some Republicans in
Congress have repeatedly labeled as an "energy crisis" the ongoing rise in
fuel prices and a supposed lack of investment in various parts of the
industry. They also have insisted that conservation alone will not improve
the situation significantly.
"We can raise our standard of living wisely and in harmony with our
environment," Bush said in his radio address Saturday. "Some think that
conservation means doing without. That does not have to be the case."
Vice President Dick Cheney has been heading a task force on energy policy
whose recommendations are at the core of the plan that Bush is to release
Thursday. During the several weeks the task force has been meeting -- behind
closed doors -- Cheney has said repeatedly that massive spending on new
power plants and pipelines is needed, but that current government
regulations are excessive and discourage the private sector from investing
in projects that would increase the energy supply.
But, according to reports published Sunday, energy companies and outside
investors have taken a signal from the market and begun sinking money into a
sector they had considered unprofitable.
The New York Times reported that oil companies this year plan to invest
about $41 billion to increase the U.S. supply of natural gas, and that new
rigs drilling for oil in the nation now number 955, an all-time high.
The newspaper also cited an estimate from an the industry that power
companies plan to add 90,000 megawatts of electricity-generating capacity
over the next year and a half, which is one-quarter of what the federal
Department of Energy says is needed to meet an expected increase in demand
through 2020.
As for natural gas, the Times noted that the government's Energy
Information Administration has reported that 1,895 miles (3,030 kilometers)
in pipelines were built last year, while another 4,300 miles (6,880
kilometers) are expected this year and 4,650 (7,440 kilometers) in 2002.
The Bush energy plan, according to a report in Sunday's Washington Post,
will provide assurances to owners of nuclear power plants that licenses on
safe and efficient reactors will be renewed, and will propose the
continuation of a law that limits the liability of reactor owners in the
event of an accident.
Democrats and environmental groups say the administration's energy
priorities are too focused on increasing supplies through drilling and other
ecologically risky -- and politically unpopular -- activities, but do little
to push for reductions in demand.
In California, deregulation of the electricity-generating industry has
been widely blamed for causing sharp increases in prices and shortages in
electricity, though disagreements are rife as to whether the problems are a
matter of form or degree. Consumer groups say relief can come only with a
return to government-controlled price structures, while power companies
argue that more thorough deregulation would encourage competition at the
retail level and drive down prices.
California Gov. Gray Davis, a Democrat, said Sunday that accusations from
Washington that his state has only itself to blame for the ongoing price
hikes and power shortages are unfair.
"All I can tell you is we're doing our part to correct the situation,"
Davis said in an interview on the ABC program "This Week."
"We're building power plants at a record rate. I've approved 14, nine are
under construction, and four will be up this summer.
"In conservation, we're second only to Rhode Island," he added. "We're
doing even more. The people that have dropped the ball are the federal
government. They need to re-impose a price cap because we're being obscenely
gouged by price gouges out of Texas and the Southwest."
Asked about the Bush administration's stated refusal to cap energy prices,
in California or anywhere else, because doing so would only encourage power
companies to hoard supplies, Davis said: "That's total nonsense. We had a
price cap in 2000 and it was lifted on December 15, and most of the plants
I'm talking about that we have coming on line in California were under
construction at that time.
"You can make plenty of money in California building a new power plant.
You don't need to allow companies to charge $1,900 a megawatt hour, as was
the case on Wednesday of this week."
He said a price cap would, in fact, "keep companies from withholding
power" and accused the out-of-state wholesalers, such as Houston-based
Reliant Energy Inc., that sell much of the electricity to California's two
largest utilities of "playing a game to squeeze every last penny out of
California, and there's a massive transfer of wealth going on from ordinary
citizens in California to Texas."
Bush has said that the purpose of the plan coming this week is to set U.S.
policy on energy for the long term. He has acknowledged that it will do
little to reduce the price of gasoline this summer. Some analysts have
suggested that prices at the pump could reach as high as $3 per gallon over
the next few months.
Bush and Cheney, both former oil company executives, have been criticized
by many Democrats, environmentalists and consumer advocates as pursuing
policies that favor energy industries over other concerns.
vny.com ... original report
Excerpt from GLE's quarterly report ...
... With respect to automotive applications, Global's fuel cell stacks were integrated with Delphi
Automotive Systems' Auxiliary Power Unit (APU) and demonstrated in a car in
February 2001. It is expected that activities under the purchase order
announced in August 1999 will be completed during the second quarter of 2001. ...
newswire.ca ... GLE 1st quarter report |
