Sean O'Leary

Electricity Prices Are Surging. The G.O.P. Megabill Could Push Them Higher.

www.nytimes.com/2025/06/04/c...

Planned West Virginia pyrolysis plant misses payments on $44M in bonds The plant, commissioned by a subsidiary of Empire Diversified Energy, was set to convert waste plastic to electricity. Its future is unclear.

Another ARCH2 hydrogen hub project going down in flames. Joins at least five others. The result of absurdly undercapitalized companies trying to develop a product for which there is no market. www.wastedive.com/news/empire-...

A Month from Hell – Ohio River Valley Institute The Ohio River Valley Institute is a think tank focused on lasting job growth, clean energy, and more inclusive civic structures for northern Appalachia.

A month from hell. Northern Appalachia's economic development strategic triad of natural gas, petrochemicals, and hydrogen is failing. Natgas doesn't generate job growth and petrochemicals and hydrogen can't get off the ground. Time for a new strategy. ohiorivervalleyinstitute.org/a-month-from...

Abandoned Wells Could Wreak Havoc for Carbon Storage in West Virginia – Ohio River Valley Institute The Ohio River Valley Institute is a think tank focused on lasting job growth, clean energy, and more inclusive civic structures for northern Appalachia.

From my ORVI colleague, Ted Boettner, as an underequipped and historically deficient state agency prepares to assume regulatory responsibility for carbon sequestration.
ohiorivervalleyinstitute.org/abandoned-we...

The tragedy is that many state leaders think growing reliance on natural gas is economically beneficial when in fact it contributes to job loss, population loss, and rising electric bills. www.eia.gov/todayinenerg...

Boom in AI data centres threatens surge in gas use - Gas Outlook Major tech companies are investing billions of dollars in new data centres to power AI, which could result in rising demand for gas.

gasoutlook.com/analysis/boo...

Load Growth Fever, LNG, and the Risk of Higher Electric Rates – Ohio River Valley Institute The Ohio River Valley Institute is a think tank focused on lasting job growth, clean energy, and more inclusive civic structures for northern Appalachia.

PJM, utilities, and the natural gas industry are using predictions of rapidly rising electricity demand to frog-march the region into greater dependence on gas-fired electricity - a decision that could result in electric rates going up by a third or more. ohiorivervalleyinstitute.org/load-growth-...

Actually, the anti-renewables movement and some state legislatures have no compunction whatever about declaring fracking and related technologies to be "in the public good" in order to undercut property rights and local zoning powers.

Load Growth Fever, LNG, and the Risk of Higher Electric Rates – Ohio River Valley Institute The Ohio River Valley Institute is a think tank focused on lasting job growth, clean energy, and more inclusive civic structures for northern Appalachia.

PJM, utilities, and the natural gas industry are using predictions of rapidly rising electricity demand to frog-march the region into greater dependence on gas-fired electricity - a decision that could result in electric rates going up by a third or more. ohiorivervalleyinstitute.org/load-growth-...

On the other hand, the EPA is doing the natural gas industry's bidding by narrowing environmental reviews for blue hydrogen projects, minimizing public comment opportunities, and fast-tracking state Class VI primacy applications for CCS.

Meanwhile, across the Pond, Germany will shutter a key LNG import terminal in the first quarter of 2025, as EU energy crisis eases. oilprice.com/Latest-Energ... 🛢️🔥 🔌💡

The article champions faux environmental technologies such as CCS that are economic in only narrow applications. Rather than endorsing these technologies that were enacted to appease fossil fuel interests and some unions, we should use their economic inefficiency to warn off investors and bury them.

Opinion | The Surprising Allure of Ignorance We want to know, but we also want not to know, sometimes fiercely so.

www.nytimes.com/2024/12/02/o...

‘Blue’ hydrogen hub struggles to win over Appalachia Dozens of environmental and community groups say the hub has provided little public information on its plans to turn natural gas into a low-carbon fuel.

The Appalachian Regional Hydrogen Hub (ARCH2) is losing developers and support principally because the underlying technology, blue hydrogen, is fundamentally uneconomic for most of its imagined applications. www.eenews.net/articles/blu...

Utility ratepayers in the northern tier of states that get most of their gas from Canada will be particularly hard hit.

Wait for major utility bill hikes in the northern tier of states, from Vermont to Washington. The US imports almost 3 trillion cubic feet of natural gas annually, almost all of it from Canada.

Update this morning on Peabody Energy, a US coal-producing giant, venturing into solar and storage business www.spglobal.com/marketintell...

Here's a previous story about coal producers' ventures into the world of greener energy: www.spglobal.com/marketintell...

Anyone who ever took ECON 101 should have understood that Trump's claim that increased natural gas exports would drive down prices in this country was absurd. Zibel quantifies the absurdity.

Developers drop out of Appalachian hydrogen hub over strict carbon emission caps Several of the initial development partners balk at the terms of a federal tax credit that places restrictions on the amount of carbon in the hydrogen production process.

mountainstatespotlight.org/2024/11/25/a...

Opinion | The Democrats Are in Trouble. This Man Can Save Them. The theories of the 20th-century philosopher John Rawls can inspire a new way for Democrats to find relevance.

www.nytimes.com/2024/11/24/o...

CCS has, for the most part, been "decarbonization theater".

Data centers alone will drive new natural gas consumption “equivalent to roughly 10-30 percent of current U.S. demand for gas-fired power generation,” according to a Bloomberg Intelligence report.

A serious risk is that, if gas generation grows as much as this piece suggests, the install base will become so large that future, more environmentally conscious administrations may be forced to rely on horrifically and unnecessarily expensive CCS to reduce emissions.

No. Just: no. We do not want or need hydrogen for home heating.

The ARCH2 hydrogen hub is struggling badly as projects and developers drop out. Things may get even worse under the Trump administration. ohiorivervalleyinstitute.org/wp-content/u...

This is of particular concern in the Ohio River Valley and northern Appalachia where the economy is already sagging due in large part to an over-reliance on natural gas.

The situation in Fairmont is frighteningly similar to the case of Austin Master Services which dumped radioactive waste along the Ohio River in Martins Ferry, Ohio. In that case, Ohio's attorney general took action. www.youtube.com/watch?v=J4tX...