• EPRINC President Lucian Pugliaresi Testifies at Senate Budget Committee Hearing “Left Holding the Bag: The Cost of Oil Dependence in a Low Carbon World”

    The U.S. Senate Budget Committee has jurisdiction over the Congressional Budget Office. In that position, its roles are to draft the U.S. Congress’ annual budget and to monitor that budget’s implementation.

    Under the chairmanship of Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), the Committee has held five hearings since the 118th U.S. Congress was seated in January. Four of these hearings have focused on the risks and costs of extreme events and weather such rising seas, wildfires, and hurricanes, with the balance on President Biden’s 2024 Fiscal Year Budget Proposal.  

    Using the novel definition of “stranded assets” that is gaining currency in certain parts of economic academic literature and some general interest publications, the Committee held a hearing titled: “Left Holding the Bag: The Cost of Oil Dependence in a Low Carbon World”  at 10am on Wednesday March 29, 2023. Lucian Pugliaresi (on Twitter at @LPugliaresi), President of the Energy Policy Research Foundation (EPRINC), testified along with four other witnesses. His testimony can be found here, and the testimony of the other witnesses as well as a video recording of the event are accessible at the link above.

  • EPRINC’s Director of Research Programs Max Pyziur Comments on Montgomery County, MD’s Imminent Ban on Gas Stoves

    Washington Times reporter Sean Salai pursues the Montgomery County, Maryland imminent natural gas ban story. With a population of 1.1 million, Montgomery County is Maryland’s largest county and adjacent Washington, DC. In December 2022 and seeking to mitigate GHG emissions, the County Council unanimously passed legislation to ban natural gas heating in new buildings beginning in 2026.

     
    EPRINC’s Director of Research Programs Max Pyziur comments on the motivation and efficacy of the ruling in the Washington Times Article, here.
  • EPRINC President Lucian Pugliaresi Participates in Congressional Roundtable on American Energy Security

    The leadership of the U.S. House Energy & Commerce Committee (E&C) under Chairwoman Cathy McMorris Rodgers are hosting a series of roundtables in order to help establish its agenda for the 118th Congress. Critically, some of these roundtables are focused on Energy. The first one was held on January 10th, 2023 with the theme of “Unaffordable Energy Costs” (the link is here). The second, with the broad theme of Energy Security, took place on Thursday, January 26th, 2023.

    EPRINC’s President Lucian Pugliaresi presented at this E&C Roundtable. His remarks and associated charts can be found here. The Committee also invited David Gattie, Associate Professor of Engineering, University of Georgia, and Senior Fellow, Center for International Trade and Security, Pat O’Loughlin, President and CEO, Buckeye Power, Inc. and Ohio Rural Electric Cooperatives, and Dr. Edmund O. Schweitzer, III, Founder, Schweitzer Engineering Laboratories. The recording of the Roundtable is accessible at this link.

    EPRINC has been at the forefront of U.S. policy discussions relating to Energy Security. During the early 1970s and under the leadership of John Lichtblau and Larry Goldstein, EPRINC (then known as PIRINC) were critical in informing leadership of the U.S. Congress on the importance of the establishment of the Strategic Petroleum Reserve as a key component of America’s energy security apparatus/architecture (choose one).

    Per its mission, EPRINC has continued to be involved in energy policy discussions, security and otherwise, providing its perspective on the need for efficiency and matching benefits to costs. More recently, beginning in November 2021, EPRINC has presented testimony four times on a broad range of energy matters (RFS, leasing on public lands, cost challenges of the Energy Transition) to the U.S. Senate’s EPW Committee as well as the U.S. House E&C and Natural Resources Committees.

    Based on the expertise that EPRINC presented at these Hearings, EPRINC received further inquiries from commercial and governmental entities for comment, perspective, and data on the energy matters of the day.

  • EPRINC and IEEJ CoHost DC Workshop: “Global LNG, Energy Security, and the Transition”

    The Institute of Energy Economics Japan (IEEJ) in Tokyo and the Energy Policy Research Foundation, Inc. (EPRINC) in Washington DC have hosted an in-person workshop on December 15-16, 2022 in Washington, DC. The workshop, Global LNG, Energy Security, and the Transition, brought together a small group of policymakers, practitioners, and experts from the U.S., Asia, and Europe to chart a path forward to address fundamental challenges of meeting rising global requirements for LNG, new threats to energy security, and measures to cost-effectively address the challenges of the energy transition. The workshop supported the six-year joint effort of IEEJ and EPRINC on the role of LNG in sustaining global energy security and worldwide requirements for new energy supplies.

    Background

    Prior to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, world energy markets were experiencing sustained shortages and rising prices from years of underinvestment in oil and natural gas production. Today, pricing pressure on LNG continues to rise well above historic trends from rising demand in Europe as the continent searches for alternative sources to replace lost supplies from Russia. Of special concern in the current market environment for Asia is the severe cost constraints in using LNG. The rapidly rising cost of LNG is especially troublesome for the developing world in Asia as sustained high prices will incentivize continued reliance on coal and petroleum liquids. High prices for LNG will undermine initiatives throughout Asia to pursue Net-Zero aspirations.

    Securing adequate new supplies of LNG for the world market requires overcoming a series of unique financial, policy, and regulatory challenges. LNG projects require large-scale financial commitments binding sellers and buyers for much as 20 years for projects to reach final investment decision. In many cases, aspirational goals seeking to abandon so-called legacy fuels and leap directly to the renewable fuels and low carbon technologies of the future can be counter-productive and undermine long-term progress to Net-Zero outcomes. The energy transition will be both long and difficult. LNG and natural gas offer numerous opportunities for both the developed and developing world to enhance energy security, accelerate the transition away from coal, and make substantial progress in achieving lower carbon emissions. International financial institutions, public financial institutions and private banks will have to work together to ensure that LNG development can proceed with adequate long-term commitments and sufficient investment to bring substantial volumes of new supplies to the market.

    Venue and Discussion Topics

    Our excellent venue, the Cosmos Club, permitted extensive opportunities to discuss the broad challenges of energy supply and geopolitical stress points. We identified five subject areas to focus the panel presentations and discussions. These were:

    1. LNG’s Role in World Energy Supply; Now and in the Future
    2. Addressing Policy Obstacles and ESG Challenges in Bringing New LNG Supplies to Market
    3. The Role of Public and Private Financial Institutions in LNG Production
    4. Asian Energy Security and the Energy Transition – How the Asian Economies Adjust to the New Price Environment and Security Threats
    5. What Advice Should We Give to the G7 for Next Year

    Additionally, EPRINC and the Embassy of Japan in Washington DC cohosted a dinner to facilitate more discussion between participants the evening of December 15.

    The presentations from the workshop can be downloaded from this link, the agenda from the workshop is here, and photos from the two day event are here.

  • EPRINC President Lucian Pugliaresi and EPRINC Fellow Trisha Curtis Participate in Heritage Foundation Panel

    On Wednesday, November 9 at noon, EPRINC President Lucian Pugliaresi and EPRINC Fellow Trisha Curtis participated in a Heritage Foundation panel called “What Will Happen to Energy in the Next Congress?” The panel, hosted by Heritage’s Diana Furchtgott-Roth, was described by Heritage as follows:

    “The soaring price of energy concerns all Americans, from high costs at gasoline pumps to exorbitant electricity bills. The solution is under our own feet. The United States has energy reserves of oil and natural gas that would allow us to lower prices by increasing production of energy and pipelines, which are needed to move the resources across the country. So, what might the next Congress do to lower energy prices?”

    The video of the event can be found on the Heritage Foundation website, here.

  • EPRINC Fellow Tristan Abbey Writes Open Letter Recommending a Bipartisan Investigation: “Did Biden Break the Strategic Petroleum Reserve?”

    EPRINC Fellow Tristan Abbey has written this open letter titled “Did Biden Break the Strategic Petroleum Reserve?” The letter was sent on October 27, 2022 to Senators Joe Manchin and John Barrasso, chairman and ranking member, respectively, of the U.S. Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources.

     

    The letter calls for a bipartisan investigation into the operational impacts of the White House’s “historic 180-million-barrel drawdown” focusing on the following quetisons:

    1. Have maintenance requirements — well remediation, cavern closure, pipeline and pump replacements, etc. — increased as a result of the drawdown?
    2. Have any caverns collapsed or been closed temporarily or permanently as a result of the drawdown? Does the administration intend to close down any caverns or sites as a result of the SPR’s depletion? If so, which ones and over what time period?
    3. What is the current status of Life Extension II, the long-awaited $1.4 billion modernization program? Has it fallen further behind schedule?
    4. If the administration does refill the SPR, will the construction of new caverns and other infrastructure be required? Will an equal volume of oil be bought that was sold?
  • Lucian Pugliaresi and Michelle Michot Foss Pen Article for RealClear Energy: “Bad Energy Policy Ideas Never Die”

    EPRINC President Lucian Pugliaresi has co-authored an article published on October 25, 2022 in RealClear Energy entitled “Bad Energy Policy Ideas Never Die“. In it, they discuss their concerns with recent public policies related to energy that have been proven to be major issues that will be difficult to recover from. A quote from the article with their proposed solution is below:

     

    “To the fearful leaders in our country: step out on your turf and support the domestic oil and gas industries in ways that will build investor confidence and calm markets. There simply is no other way to meet the future without a strong domestic base for energy and materials. Others will take note, including troublemakers we face now and those we’ll face in the future.”

     

    https://www.realclearenergy.org/articles/2022/10/25/bad_energy_policy_ideas_never_die_860905.html

  • EPRINC’s President Emeritus and Trustee Larry Goldstein Quoted in October 4th 2022 NY Times
    OPEC is scheduled to meet October 5th 2022 in Vienna Austria to consider strategic guidance to its members and allies on global crude oil production. NY Times journalist Clifford Krauss discusses the issues in play ahead of the meeting, calling on and quoting EPRINC’s Larry Goldstein for insight.
     
    The article, entitled “Saudi Arabia and Russia May Find Their Oil Pricing Power Limited”, can be read here.
     
  • EPRINC’s Max Pyziur Participates in Westchester County Association (WCA) Sustainable Business Conference
    On Thursday July 14, 2022, the Westchester County Association (WCA) held their first Sustainable Business Conference. Focusing on the implementation challenges of New York State’s 2019 Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act and other related legislation, the WCA convened an afternoon of panels, plenary events, and a networking reception to discuss approaches and feasibility.
     
    EPRINC’s Max Pyziur participated in the Conference’s panel discussion “Moving New York to a Low Carbon Future – How Can We Get There?” Max’s presentation underscored the scale of the challenge in the context of global and U.S. GHG emissions, as well as offering perspective on implementation risk by reviewing key power grid events in California and Texas.
  • “The Low Carbon Energy Transition” by Ivan Sandrea and Lucian Pugliaresi

    EPRINC Trustee, OIES Research Associate, CEBRI International Board Member Ivan R. Sandrea Silva and EPRINC President Lucian Pugliaresi have authored a paper entitled “The Low Carbon Energy Transition: A window of opportunity for a new phase of economic development in Africa and Latin America?” This paper is directly related to a presentation given by Ivan at the CEBRI  online conference called “Sustainability and the New Energy Economy in a Multipolar World.” A pull quote from the paper is below:

    “In the African and Latin American regions, climate change concerns and the energy transition have received a lot of negative and positive attention and is building significant support especially among the growing youth. But the energy transition is also causing recurring dislocations for both global and regional leaders, the industry, investors, and policymakers. The environment itself is also being affected, and ironically, the level of confidence for the net zero path is dropping as rising energy prices hit the region’s economies. This is because the energy transition “movement’ in the Western world is occurring in a very disorganized and uncoordinated manner, and that is where we see both a major problem unfolding and an opportunity for the leading economies and leaders.”

EPRINC President Lucian Pugliaresi Testifies at Senate Budget Committee Hearing “Left Holding the Bag: The Cost of Oil Dependence in a Low Carbon World”

The U.S. Senate Budget Committee has jurisdiction over the Congressional Budget Office. In that position, its roles are to draft the U.S. Congress’ annual budget and to monitor that budget’s implementation.

Under the chairmanship of Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), the Committee has held five hearings since the 118th U.S. Congress was seated in January. Four of these hearings have focused on the risks and costs of extreme events and weather such rising seas, wildfires, and hurricanes, with the balance on President Biden’s 2024 Fiscal Year Budget Proposal.  

Using the novel definition of “stranded assets” that is gaining currency in certain parts of economic academic literature and some general interest publications, the Committee held a hearing titled: “Left Holding the Bag: The Cost of Oil Dependence in a Low Carbon World”  at 10am on Wednesday March 29, 2023. Lucian Pugliaresi (on Twitter at @LPugliaresi), President of the Energy Policy Research Foundation (EPRINC), testified along with four other witnesses. His testimony can be found here, and the testimony of the other witnesses as well as a video recording of the event are accessible at the link above.

EPRINC Senior Research Analyst Batt Odgerel Quoted in Bloombgerg’s Kari Soo Lindberg and Stephen Stapczynski’s Article “Xi Aligns With Putin Against US, But Hesitates on Gas Deal.”

While that pipeline could supply China with a cheaper alternative to liquefied natural gas, Xi’s government remains focused on securing diversity of supply — essentially not repeating the European error of excessive reliance on Russia. And there’s a lot of countries seeking to sell gas at the moment, including the US, Qatar, Australia and Turkmenistan, according to Batt Odgerel, a senior research analyst at the Energy Policy Research Foundation, Inc.

“It’s a buyer’s market for China,” he said. “Unless Russia gives an extremely pleasant offer, China can wait as long as it wants. Additional gas from Russia is not required, especially after the lockdown-induced economic downturn.”

The full article can be accessed here.

EPRINC Joins Group of Thought Leaders In Writing to Japan’s Prime Minister About Natural Gas and Its Importance to Energy Security

On Tuesday, March 7, 2023, concurrent with CERAWeek in Houston, the leadership of several prominent energy trade associations and think-tanks convened a half-day meeting with senior G7 energy delegates dubbed The Joint Energy Security Forum. Ahead of the deliberations that will lead to and be a part of the G7 leadership meeting on May 19-21, 2023 in Hiroshima, Japan, the Forum discussed the importance of natural gas in meeting global energy security and climate-related goals, especially in the context of Russia’s maligned use of its natural resources.

 
Key to these goals is the continued and expedited investment in all components of natural gas production and trade by G7 countries. Concluding the Forum, the Energy Policy Research Foundation, along with LNG Allies, the American Petroleum Institute, and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, among others, authored and signed a letter to Japan’s Prime Minister Fumio Kishida, cc’ing the leadership of other G7 countries, affirming the importance of global energy security and natural gas’ critical capabilities to achieve them.
 

EPRINC’s Director of Research Programs Max Pyziur Comments on Montgomery County, MD’s Imminent Ban on Gas Stoves

Washington Times reporter Sean Salai pursues the Montgomery County, Maryland imminent natural gas ban story. With a population of 1.1 million, Montgomery County is Maryland’s largest county and adjacent Washington, DC. In December 2022 and seeking to mitigate GHG emissions, the County Council unanimously passed legislation to ban natural gas heating in new buildings beginning in 2026.

 
EPRINC’s Director of Research Programs Max Pyziur comments on the motivation and efficacy of the ruling in the Washington Times Article, here.

EPRINC President Lucian Pugliaresi Participates in Congressional Roundtable on American Energy Security

The leadership of the U.S. House Energy & Commerce Committee (E&C) under Chairwoman Cathy McMorris Rodgers are hosting a series of roundtables in order to help establish its agenda for the 118th Congress. Critically, some of these roundtables are focused on Energy. The first one was held on January 10th, 2023 with the theme of “Unaffordable Energy Costs” (the link is here). The second, with the broad theme of Energy Security, took place on Thursday, January 26th, 2023.

EPRINC’s President Lucian Pugliaresi presented at this E&C Roundtable. His remarks and associated charts can be found here. The Committee also invited David Gattie, Associate Professor of Engineering, University of Georgia, and Senior Fellow, Center for International Trade and Security, Pat O’Loughlin, President and CEO, Buckeye Power, Inc. and Ohio Rural Electric Cooperatives, and Dr. Edmund O. Schweitzer, III, Founder, Schweitzer Engineering Laboratories. The recording of the Roundtable is accessible at this link.

EPRINC has been at the forefront of U.S. policy discussions relating to Energy Security. During the early 1970s and under the leadership of John Lichtblau and Larry Goldstein, EPRINC (then known as PIRINC) were critical in informing leadership of the U.S. Congress on the importance of the establishment of the Strategic Petroleum Reserve as a key component of America’s energy security apparatus/architecture (choose one).

Per its mission, EPRINC has continued to be involved in energy policy discussions, security and otherwise, providing its perspective on the need for efficiency and matching benefits to costs. More recently, beginning in November 2021, EPRINC has presented testimony four times on a broad range of energy matters (RFS, leasing on public lands, cost challenges of the Energy Transition) to the U.S. Senate’s EPW Committee as well as the U.S. House E&C and Natural Resources Committees.

Based on the expertise that EPRINC presented at these Hearings, EPRINC received further inquiries from commercial and governmental entities for comment, perspective, and data on the energy matters of the day.

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