Comments on: You’re Ugly But “We” Love You Big Oil

By: New Energy Plan – Offshore Drilling - Domestic Fuel

New Energy Plan – Offshore Drilling - Domestic Fuel — Wed, 31 Mar 2010 21:50:24 +0000

[...] believe the only group that will be truly happy after today’s speech is our frenemy Big Oil. Obama said, “So today we’re announcing the expansion of offshore oil and gas exploration, [...]

By: sciguy2

sciguy2 — Wed, 17 Feb 2010 07:01:14 +0000

Rick, there is more and hopefully more will be discovered. 1) Democratic Congressional Candidate Debbie Cook affected the vote by passing out a corn ethanol myths & half-truths sheet of paper just before the meeting. Then she presented that information as if it was factual, and was given a preferential position to present it at the beginning. She’s not on SCAG even. 2) Debbie Cook and one or two others hinted at ARB numerous times, including wondering why they were not taking ARB’s research findings into account. The research findings are exactly what this and previous articles on DF were talking about. ARB has tainted the public discussion in this way. They are more important in this SCAG decision than what would appear at first. One can watch the meeting on SCAG’s website. 3) There were more reasons than their opposition to corn ethanol, but that is what they focused on. And this wasn’t to be corn ethanol anyway, but waste beverage and cellulosic ethanol. 4) These partnerships between governmental agencies, Clean Cities, and private industry are happening all over the country–this would have been nothing new. 5) Pearson Fuels did submit its application correctly–internal politics and miscommunication within SCAG caused additional concern. SCAG and Clean Cities have partnered to provide grants to single applicants many times before and will many times in the future, rest assured. A grant that provides $10.9 million, 221 local jobs, and clean air for the region (part of SCAG’s mission) should not be turned away in such rash manners. This was a poor decision by SCAG based mostly on unscientific and quite probably Oil-funded research backed by appointed officials with Oil ties financially and relationally, which hurt local jobs, the local economy, and local health. It is a huge shame, unethical, and there even may have been illegal activity (not necessarily at SCAG) that contributed to the decision. Reference CA codes against conflicts of interest.

By: Rick

Rick — Tue, 16 Feb 2010 16:01:21 +0000

The agency that turned down the E85 funds – the Southern California Association of Governments (SCAG) – is a completely different agency than the ARB. SCAG has very little, if anything, to do with implementing LCFS. SCAG turned the money down for more reasons than their skepticism about corn based ethanol. There is a lot more to the story than has been reported thus far. What has been reported thus far is cherrypicking at best and does not even begin to get into the complexities of this E85 grant, using federal stimulus funds (which require NEPA analysis for every site) for 50+ fueling stations, legal concerns about a public agency sole-sourcing tens of millions of business, and the backstory on how this whole project was put together to begin with.

By: sam

sam — Sat, 13 Feb 2010 13:37:04 +0000

When politicians are controlled by corporations, innovation and positive environmental change remain squelched. It is all about money and so-called experts worried about losing their positions. “Do as we say or else” is the state of our nation at this time and what a shame it is, which is why China and other nations are beating us silly with clean energy technology implementation.