PA Hit with Elec Power Price Uncertainty as Wolf Appeals RGGI Case
Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf’s foolish plan to force PA’s coal- and natural gas-fired power plants to begin paying an obscenely high tax on carbon dioxide emissions as part of the so-called Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI) got blocked on July 1 by PA Commonwealth Court (see PA Commonwealth Court Blocks RGGI Carbon Tax Pending Fall Trial). However, Wolf appealed the court decision to the PA Supreme Court. Appealing the case unblocks the new tax and puts it into play again. Power generations are confused as to whether or not they need to include the tax in the costs they pass on to customers (you and me). And what happens if another court reblocks the tax until the full case is heard later this year? Wolf is creating chaos and price uncertainty for electricity in PA.
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In June the Pennsylvania Dept. of Environmental Protection’s (DEP) Environmental Quality Board (EQB) adopted an onerous new regulation that supposedly will capture every last molecule of stray methane that leaks from shale drilling operations (see 
We finally have some good news to share with respect to Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf’s foolish plan to force PA’s coal- and natural gas-fired power plants to begin paying an obscenely high tax on carbon dioxide emissions as part of the so-called Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI). After exhausting various attempts to block it, Wolf published a final RGGI regulation in the Pennsylvania Bulletin in April (see 
Just yesterday MDN told you about this year’s distribution of last year’s (2021) impact fee revenue to local municipalities and to the black hole of Harrisburg politicians (see 
A few days ago MDN received a phone call from the Harrisburg Patriot-News, from a reporter asking editor Jim Willis for comments on the latest activity in the Pennsylvania Marcellus. Are royalties doing better? Has there been more drilling activity? Jim tackled the question about drilling activity this way: Yes, there has been a *slight* increase in drilling activity, but not a huge increase. The reporter talked with multiple sources and published an article yesterday.
Two days ago Pennsylvania House Environmental Resources and Energy Committee (ERE) Majority Chairman Daryl Metcalfe (R-Butler) issued a co-sponsorship memo asking for other House members to sponsor a resolution with him calling for the impeachment of outgoing Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP) Secretary Patrick McDonnell. Metcalfe calls the measure his “parting gift” to McDonnell who is leaving the agency on July 2nd (see 
Last weekend the Pennsylvania Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP) published a notice in the weekly (Saturday) edition of the Pennsylvania Bulletin to announce final guidance (i.e. regulations) on handling radioactive waste going to solid waste processing and disposal facilities from unconventional shale gas drilling operations and other sources. Last year MDN told you about a plan by the Wolf administration to require quarterly testing at landfills that accept shale drill cuttings (see 
Last October Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro, who is now running for governor, indicted Energy Transfer with 48 enviro-crimes related to the building of the Mariner East pipeline project (see 
Pennsylvania, Ohio, and West Virginia are all scrambling to form working groups or other alliances in an attempt to be THE state chosen for one of four regional hydrogen hubs funded by the so-called Biden infrastructure bill (see 
“If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it.” (Quote attributed to Joseph Goebbels, the head of Nazi Germany’s Ministry of Propaganda) The left so often adopts the attitude if you keep repeating the same lie over and over–preferably the bigger the lie the better–the lie will become accepted as the truth. State Sen. Katie Muth, D-Montgomery, chair of the Pennsylvania Senate Democratic Policy Committee, and Sen. Jim Brewster, D-Allegheny, are expert practitioners of this strategy with respect to lying about the Marcellus Shale and fracking. They were at it again last week holding a public (i.e. propaganda) hearing at the Community College of Allegheny County.
The so-called Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI), a tax on carbon dioxide emissions from coal and natural gas-fired power plants aimed at killing off those two sources of energy, is more expensive than ever. Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf is forcing PA to join the RGGI cabal of 11 states (most of them in the northeast), a move endorsed by the man who wants to replace him in November, PA Attorney General Josh Shapiro (see