NatGas, Elec Prices in Boston, NYC Continue to Soar – Lack of Pipes
Last week MDN told you about a spike in natural gas and electric rates in New York City and New England, thanks to the cold snap and lack of natural gas pipelines into the region (see NatGas Prices in Boston, NYC Double in One Day, Electric Up 55%). Natgas spot prices at Algonquin Citygate (Boston) had spiked to $9.69/Mcf. This week the price is up again–now at $11.97! It’s the same pattern for NYC.
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Two of New York City’s five retirement pension funds, representing 70% of the $239.8 billion retirement system, announced yesterday they will divest their portfolios of all investments in fossil fuel companies. The two pension funds together own roughly $4 billion worth of fossil fuel securities. The divestment will take place gradually, over the next five years. A third pension fund with $7.8 billion under management is expected to do the same, soon.
Big Green (Democrat) organizations are feeling full of themselves following the Biden/Harris election and winning control of the Senate. They’re making some pretty big boasts of what they’ll demand from Biden and Chuck Schumer. Demands like no new pipelines, ban natural gas everywhere, force all new cars to be electric, yada yada yada. One of the worst of the worst of the Big Green groups is the radical National Resources Defense Council (NRDC). In a blog post yesterday, the New York chapter of the NRDC lays out its 2021 plans that include their intent to try and block the construction of the New Jersey LNG export facility and block construction of the PennEast Pipeline in Pennsylvania.
Mob rule now prevails in New York City under Mayor Bill de Blasio. In February we told you about a mob of anti-fossil fuelers attempting to block the final few feet of construction for a 6.8-mile natural gas pipeline stretching from Brownsville to North Brooklyn (see 
In June, the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA), in conjunction with the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA), published final rules to allow specially constructed tanker cars for railroads (DOT-113 tank cars) to ship LNG (see 
This would be funny if it weren’t so darned sad. In Lansing, NY, just outside of Planet Ithaca in Tompkins County, the local utility (NYSEG) wanted to build a short pipeline in 2017 to supply new customers with natural gas, but was blocked by crazies who irrationally hate fossil fuels (see 
You know anti-fossil fuelers are getting desperate when they make silly claims like a clean-burning natural gas power plant on the Hudson River (Orange County, NY) is killing crows and trees. One well known anti claims she witnessed the “sudden death” of 200 crows. And the trees in her backyard are “collapsing.” It’s all supposedly because of a nearby state-of-the-art power plant.
The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) is making official what has, until now, been unofficial (but enforceable via court orders)–state environmental agencies have exactly one year to dither around and then either grant or reject issuing a Section 401 permit for pipelines (and other projects) to cross rivers and streams and wetlands. Last week FERC issued a Notice Of Proposed Rulemaking (NOPR) to make the one-year time limit (a part of law under the Federal Clean Water Act) an official part of FERC regulations too.
In Lansing, NY, just outside of Planet Ithaca in Tompkins County, the local utility company, NYSEG, wanted to build a short pipeline in 2017 to supply new customers with natural gas, but was blocked by crazies who irrationally hate fossil fuels (see 
It’s not unusual for companies in the business of delivering methane molecules to customers (the local gas utility company) to invest in the long-haul gas pipelines that deliver gas into their system. Consolidated Edison (ConEd), which serves much of New York City and its suburbs with natural gas, is one such company.
New York City is home to some 15 “peaker plants”–small electric generating plants that fire up to provide electricity during times of high demand when the regular electric grid can’t handle the load. The plants are fueled mostly by oil, some are fueled by natural gas. NRG Energy wants to convert its old oil-fired peakers with natural gas, which is far cleaner and more efficient. However, a group of hardened Socialist Democrats (actually Communists) who have won primaries over the summer, unseating more moderate Democrats, are demanding all of the peakers be shut down. How’s that for stupid?
Pipeline builder Otis Eastern, headquartered in Wellsville, NY (western part of Upstate) has built a lot of pipelines throughout the northeast since its founding in 1936. In recent years the company has worked on a number of Marcellus/Utica projects, including Energy Transfer’s Mariner East 2 project and National Fuel Gas Company’s Marcellus Gas to Market project. Otis is selling itself for an undisclosed amount to a much larger company, Artera Services, LLC, based in Atlanta, Georgia.
In February MDN told you about an effort by the radicalized Sierra Club to block a New York landfill from accepting drill cuttings from the Pennsylvania Marcellus (see 
Each day New York State becomes more like a third world, tinhorn dictatorship. High and Supreme Lord Andrew Cuomo (governor and dictator of NY) has issued edicts to *permanently* ban all fracking in the state. The suckup legislature dutifully obliged (see