Energy and Environment
January 14, 2013 -
The company is seeking to reduce its civil liabilities under the Clean Water Act by excluding the oil it salvaged from the total amount spilled in the 2010 Deepwater Horizon disaster. Meanwhile, the court has approved a settlement for medical claims related to the spilled oil and dispersants used to break up the slick.
January 11, 2013 -
With new data out showing that 2012 was the warmest year on record for the contiguous United States, and with costs mounting due to droughts and other climate-related disasters, will political leaders finally take action to address the problem?
January 10, 2013 -
As the House wrestled with the fiscal cliff deal, the Senate approved nominees for the Tennessee Valley Authority's board. But conspicuously absent from the list that Sens. Bob Corker and Lamar Alexander sent for approval was Dr. Marilyn Brown -- the board's only sustainable energy expert.
January 4, 2013 -
Most of the $1.4 billion in fines and penalties that Transocean has agreed to pay for its negligence in the 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill disaster will be sent to the Gulf Coast region to fund environmental restoration work.
January 2, 2013 -
Speaking today at the N.C. Bankers Association's 2013 Economic Forecast Forum, incoming Republican Gov. Pat McCrory said he would waste no time in joining with Virginia, South Carolina and Georgia to begin negotiating with the federal government to drill offshore for gas and oil.
December 21, 2012 -
Dec. 22 marks four years since a coal ash impoundment collapsed at a TVA power plant in Tennessee, inundating a community and two rivers. As EPA drags its feet over issuing federal coal ash rules, politicians backed by industry interests are maneuvering to block the agency's ability to protect people and the environment -- even though their states have been adversely affected by poor regulation.
December 20, 2012 -
Bill Ritter, who led a revamp of Colorado's fracking regulations and is now being considered to head the U.S. Department of Energy, visited North Carolina this week to share his thoughts with the state's fracking commission. With controversy over the risky practice roiling his home state, Ritter emphasized the need for drillers to obtain what he called a "social license" to operate.