Hill Heat

Nominations include:

• Ms. Sherburne B. Abbott of Texas, to be Associate Director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy at the Executive Office of the President
• Mr. Peter Appel to be the Administrator of the Research and Innovative Technology Administration at the U.S. Department of Transportation
• Ms. April S. Boyd to be Assistant Secretary for Legislative and Intergovernmental Affairs at the U.S. Department of Commerce
• Mr. Dana G. Gresham to be the Assistant Secretary of the Office of Government Affairs, at the U.S. Department of Transportation
• Mr. Cameron Kerry to be General Counsel at the U.S. Department of Commerce
• Mr. Roy W. Kienitz to be the Under Secretary of Transportation for Policy at the U.S. Department of Transportation
• Mr. Robert Rivkin to be the General Counsel at the U.S. Department of Transportation
• Mr. Joseph C. Szabo to be Administrator of the Federal Railroad Administration

04/21/2009 at 02:30PM

On April 21, the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) will release the results of a two-year study that found that the United States can significantly reduce carbon emissions and lower energy bills by implementing an emissions cap in conjunction with a suite of energy and transportation policies. UCS’s recommended approach is similar to the one proposed recently by Reps. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) and Edward Markey (D-Mass.) in a draft discussion climate bill.

The UCS analysis, “Climate 2030: A National Blueprint for a Clean Energy Economy,” uses a modified version of the Department of Energy’s National Energy Modeling System (NEMS) and projects how UCS recommendations would reduce emissions and lower energy costs over the next 20 years. The analysis also provides projections of net business savings on energy and net consumer savings by household and region.

WHO

• Kevin Knobloch, UCS president
• Rachel Cleetus, UCS climate economist
• Steve Clemmer, UCS Clean Energy Program research director
• David Friedman, UCS Clean Vehicles Program research director

For the visual portion of UCS’s “webinar,” go to: cc.readytalk.com/r/i6a7q64a5vtw (please log in early to avoid any bottlenecks)

For the audio portion, call: 866-740-1260, access code: 3018025

04/21/2009 at 11:00AM

“This committee hearing will examine how the administration plans to help prepare workers for these jobs and what the missing policy and resource tools to support that agenda are,” said Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.), chairwoman of the Employment and Workplace Safety Subcommittee, in a statement.

A bill introduced earlier this month by Murray and Sens. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) and Olympia Snowe (R-Maine) would authorize grants for partnerships among two-year colleges, industry and organized labor in an effort to develop customized regional work forces.

Witnesses

Panel I

• Hilda Solis, Secretary of Labor

Panel II

• Lee D. Lambert, President, Shoreline Community College
• Phillip C.L. Lou, Former Student in the Shoreline Community College Solar Design and Installation Program
• Dean Allen, Chief Executive Officer, McKinstry Company
• Mark H. Ayers, President, Building and Construction Trades Department, AFL-CIO
• Joan Evans, Director, Wyoming Department of Workforce Services

04/21/2009 at 10:30AM

Witnesses

Panel 1

• J. Charles Fox, Director, Chesapeake Bay Program, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency

Panel 2

• Congressman Gerry Connolly (D-Virginia 11th), Former Chairman, Fairfax County Board of Supervisors
• Will Baker, President and CEO, Chesapeake Bay Foundation
• Robert Hutchison, Partner, Hutchison Brothers (Grain Operation)

The Chesapeake Bay Foundation released a report last week that found phosphorus loads, water quality, dissolved oxygen and toxin levels in the bay had either remained static or worsened over the last year.

And in a report issued last month, the Chesapeake Bay Program found that the continued flow of nutrients and sediment from sewage treatment plants, farms, air pollution and urban and suburban runoff have prevented the bay from progressing toward a full recovery. The Bay Program consists of Maryland, Pennsylvania, Virginia and the District of Columbia; the Chesapeake Bay Commission, a federal, state and local body; U.S. EPA; and citizen advisory groups.

04/20/2009 at 10:00AM

Speaker: Steven J. Milloy

Host: Becky Norton Dunlop, Vice President, External Relations, The Heritage Foundation

Behind the smiley-face rhetoric of “sustainability” and “conservation” – that warm and fuzzy public image that the environmental movement has cultivated for itself – resides a dark agenda. In Green Hell, Steve Milloy examines how the Greens aim to regulate your behavior, downsize your lifestyle, and invade the most intimate aspects of your personal life. He reflects on the authoritarian impulse underlying the Green crusade. Whether they’re demanding that you turn down your thermostat, stop driving your car, or engage in some other senseless act of self-denial, he argues that the Greens are envisioning a grim future for you marked by endless privation.

With apocalyptic predictions of environmental doom, the Green movement has gained influence throughout American society – from schools and local planning boards to the biggest corporations in the country. And their plans are much more ambitious than you think, says Milloy. What the Greens really seek, with increasing success, is to dictate the very parameters of your daily life – where you can live, what transportation you can use, what you can eat, and even how many children you can have.

Steven J. Milloy is Founder and Publisher of JunkScience.com, a columnist for FoxNews.com, the Co-Founder of the Free Enterprise Action Fund, an Adjunct Scholar at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, and Co-Director of the Free Enterprise Project at the National Center for Public Policy Research. An outspoken defender of the free market against the junk science and false claims disseminated by the Greens, his columns and op-ed pieces have appeared in the Wall Street Journal, USA Today, Financial Times, and Los Angeles Times.

Location: The Heritage Foundation’s Lehrman Auditorium

04/13/2009 at 12:00PM

Chairman Edward J. Markey will host President Obama’s top climate, energy and science advisers along with other energy experts at a forum at MIT on Monday, April 13 to discuss the future of clean energy in national policy and in the Massachusetts economy. They will discuss clean energy solutions for creating jobs, improving our national security and protecting our planet from global warming. Last week, Rep. Markey released draft legislation that will be the main congressional vehicle to push clean energy technologies and create millions of new jobs.

Speakers

• Chairman Edward J. Markey (D-Malden), Chairman of the Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming and Energy and Environment Subcommittee
• Carol Browner, Assistant to the President for Energy and Climate Change
• John Holdren, Assistant to the President for Science and Technology
• Ernest J. Moniz, Professor of Physics and Cecil and Ida Green Distinguished Professor, MIT
• Dr. Susan Hockfield, President, MIT
• Daniel Yergin, Pulitzer Prize-winning author and Chairman of Cambridge Energy Research Associates
• Massachusetts clean energy CEOs and others

Wong Auditorium, Tang Center, Building E51, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts

Live webcast.

04/13/2009 at 10:00AM

Please join us Friday, April 10th at noon (eastern time) for a national conference call to learn about one of most exciting climate bills ever introduced in the U.S. Congress. Do you want a STRONG carbon cap? Do you want 100% auction of carbon permits? Do you oppose carbon offsets and the complications they can cause? Do you also want to help protect Americans, especially low-income families, from rising energy prices?

Then you owe it to yourself to join this national conference call on Friday. Learn more about how a “cap and dividend” process will work. Learn why, to be effective, a national carbon cap must be simple, fair, and built to last. Learn about the legislation just introduced by Congressman Chris Van Hollen (D-MD), a powerful leader in the U.S. House of Representatives.

Featured speakers on the call will include

• Michael Noble, executive director of Fresh Energy in Minnesota
• Mike Tidwell, executive director of the Chesapeake Climate Action Network in Maryland/Virginia

The call-in number is: 877-363-2003, code 1051052115

The call is sponsored by:

• Montana Environmental Information Center (MT)
• Fresh Energy (MN)
• Penn Future (PA)
• New Energy Economy (NM)
• Center for Civic Policy (NM)
• Climate Protection Campaign (CA)
• Chesapeake Climate Action Network (MD/VA/DC)
• Plains Justice (IA)
• New York Public Interest Research Group (NY)
• South Carolina Coastal Conservation League (SC)
• Ohio Citizen Action (OH)

Learn more about the cap and dividend concept at www.capanddividend.org. For further information, email George Abar at [email protected] or Ted Glick at [email protected]

04/10/2009 at 12:00PM

More than two dozen organizations, including well-respected groups from the research, advocacy, faith-based, labor and civil rights communities, have come together to ensure that emerging climate legislation protects and provides opportunity for society’s most vulnerable individuals and families. The Climate Equity Alliance unites around shared concerns about the effects of climate change and climate change legislation on low- and moderate-income households. Alliance members believe climate legislation should both help to build an inclusive green economy — providing pathways to prosperity and expanding opportunity for America’s workers and communities — and ensure that low- and moderate-income people receive relief from the higher energy costs that will result, so that they are not pushed into poverty or made poorer.

This conference call for reporters will unveil the Climate Equity Alliance and present the principles drawing these groups together, with particular attention to how policymakers should move forward following the draft legislation introduced by Representatives Henry Waxman (D-CA) and Edward Markey (D-MA).

Speakers:

• Robert Greenstein, Executive Director, Center on Budget and Policy Priorities
• Phaedra Ellis-Lamkins, CEO, Green For All
• Gerry Hudson, Executive Vice President, SEIU
• Other speakers TBA

Click here to register for this conference call.

CLIMATE EQUITY ALLIANCE MEMBERS INCLUDE:

• Green for All
• Center on Budget and Policy Priorities
• Center for American Progress
• Service Employees International Union
• NAACP
• National Hispanic Environmental Council
• Oxfam America
• First Focus
• Economic Policy Institute
• Redefining Progress
• US Action
• Coalition on Human Needs
• The Workforce Alliance
• Center for Law and Social Policy
• The Washington Office of Public Policy, Women’s Division, United Methodist Church
• Union for Reform Judaism
• National Low Income Housing Coalition
• ACORN
• Policy Link
• Citizens for Tax Justice
• Enterprise Community Partners

04/08/2009 at 11:00AM

The 2009 EIA conference is being held April 7-8 at the Washington Convention Center.

Please register onsite at the Walter E Washington Convention Center starting at 7:30am on Tuesday, April 7th.

Wednesday agenda

7:30 AM	Registration and Badging
	Concurrent Sessions
9:00 AM	(7) Energy Data Needs (8) Energy and the Media Moderator: Margot Anderson (EIA) Moderator: John Anderson (Resources for the Future) Speakers: Jeff Genzer (Duncan, Weinberg, Genzer & Pembroke, P.C.) Philip Hanser (Brattle Group) Shirley Neff (Center for Strategic and International Studies) Frank Rusco (U.S. Government Accountability Office) Speakers: Barbara Hagenbaugh (USA Today) Steven Mufson (Washington Post) Eric Pooley (Harvard University) Robert Rapier (R-SQUARED Energy blog)
10:30 AM	Break
11:00 AM	(9) Investing in Oil and Natural Gas – Opportunities and Barriers (10) Greenhouse Gas Emissions: What’s Next? Moderator: Bruce Bawks (EIA) Moderator: Howard Gruenspecht (EIA) Speakers: Susan Farrell (PFC Energy) John Felmy (American Petroleum Institute) Michelle Foss (University of Texas) Paul Sankey (Deutsche Bank) Speakers: Joe Aldy (Executive Office of the President) Dave Cavicke (House Committee on Energy and Commerce) Greg Dotson (House Committee on Energy and Commerce) Joe Goffman (Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works)

04/08/2009 at 07:30AM

The 2009 EIA conference is being held April 7-8 at the Washington Convention Center.

Please register onsite at the Walter E Washington Convention Center starting at 7:30am on Tuesday, April 7th.

Tuesday agenda

7:30 AM	Registration and Badging
9:00 AM	Plenary
	Welcome – Howard Gruenspecht Acting Administrator, Energy Information Administration Keynote Address – Dr. Steven Chu, Secretary of Energy Energy and the Macroeconomy – William D. Nordhaus, Sterling Professor of Economics, Yale University Energy in a Carbon-Constrained World – John W. Rowe, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Exelon Corporation
10:30 AM	Break
	Concurrent Sessions
11:00 AM	(1) The Future for Transport Demand (2) What’s Ahead for Natural Gas Markets? Moderator: Andy Kydes (EIA) Moderator: Steve Harvey (EIA) Speakers: Lew Fulton (International Energy Agency) David Greene (Oak Ridge National Laboratory) Lee Schipper (Precourt Institute, Stanford University) Speakers: Brian Jeffries (Wyoming Pipeline Authority) James Simpson (BENTEK Energy, LLC) Rick Smead (Navigant Consulting) John Strom (Haddington Ventures, LLC) Christine Tezak
12:30 PM	Lunch Break
1:45 PM	(3) Meeting the Growing Demand for Liquids (4) Electric Power Infrastructure: Status and Challenges for the Future Moderator: Glen Sweetnam (EIA) Moderator: Scott Sitzer (EIA) Speakers: Eduardo González-Pier (PEMEX) David Knapp (Energy Intelligence Group) Fareed Mohamedi (PFC Energy) Speakers: P. Kumar Agarwal (Federal Energy Regulatory Commission) Timothy J. Brennan (University of Maryland) Mark G. Lauby (North American Electric Reliability Corporation)
3:15 PM	Break
3:30 PM	(5) Renewable Energy in the Transportation and Power Sectors (6) Financial Markets and Short-Term Energy Prices Moderator: Michael Schaal (EIA) Moderator: Tancred Lidderdale (EIA) Speakers: Denise Bode (American Wind Energy Association) Bob Dinneen (Renewable Fuels Association) Bryan Hannegan (Electric Power Research Institute) David Humbird (National Renewable Energy Laboratory) Speakers: Jeffrey Harris (Commodity Futures Trading Commission) Robert McCullough (McCullough Research) Adam E. Sieminski (Deutsche Bank) Robert Weiner (George Washington University)
5:00 PM	Adjourn

04/07/2009 at 07:30AM