Energy Update: Week of Feb 16

Friends,

Hoping you are enjoying your President’s Day. That also means the boys of Summer have reported to Spring Training in Florida and Arizona. I always love baseball’s annual trek as a sign of better weather ahead (and we could use it).

Congress is out this week, despite not having funding for DHS, FEMA, TSA and the Coast Guard. Talks continue on that front, but not much progress is expected any time soon. We do expect to see more action on Venezuela issues – especially after Secretary Wright’s visit last week. And if you need follow up to last week’s proposed EPA revocation of its climate-related endangerment finding, my colleague Jeff Holmstead is ready to help.

A really important event this week: On Wednesday, the Business Council on Sustainable Energy and Bloomberg New Energy Finance will roll out the 14^th version of its annual Sustainability Factbook. Reporters can get an embargoed media Q&A at Bloomberg’s offices tomorrow at 2:00 p.m. The Sustainable Energy in America Factbook provides valuable year-over-year data and insights on the American energy dominance and transformation. Let me or Ben Finzel know if you need anything.

Other events include the National Ethanol Conference finishing today in Orlando and National Governors Assn arriving for their Winter meetings at the end of the week.  With energy affordability and grid challenges on the front burner, expect this meeting to be interesting.

I end today with the saddest of news: legendary Oscar-winning actor and ‘Godfather’ mainstay Robert Duvall died today at 95. Duvall was one of few “character actors” to enjoy a long, rewarding and unpredictable career, in leading and supporting roles, including the unflappable Tom Hagen in the Godfather classics, spooky recluse Boo Radley (his first role) in To Kill a Mocking Bird and the irrepressible Lt. Col. Bill Kilgore in Apocalypse Now, who with equal vigor enjoyed surfing and bombing raids. Duvall required few takes for one of the most famous passages in movie history, barked out on the battlefield by a bare-chested, cavalry-hatted Kilgore: “I love the smell of napalm in the morning…Smelled like — victory. Someday this war is gonna end.”

See you at the BCSE event. Call with any questions.

Best,

Frank Maisano

(202) 828-5864

C. (202) 997-5932

FRANKLY SPOKEN

“You will see a lot more strategic reconductoring and grid-enhancing technologies out of the department on both the grant and the loan side in the future. We know that we have to build a lot more generation, and you need transmission to support it. We're looking at identifying particularly those areas of highest system congestion and investing in upgrading that transmission rapidly."

Undersecretary of Energy Alex Fitzsimmons in a speech to NARUC last week.

ON THE PODCAST

New Expert Report Examines Cost Trends on Electricity Rates – Last week, Charles River Associates released a new report examining recent trends in retail residential electricity rates. On this episode of Energy Perspectives, EEI President and CEO Drew Maloney and Matt DeCourcey, vice president of the energy practice at Charles River Associates, explore the key findings, which include that for most U.S. electricity customers, retail electricity rates have generally remained stable and have not outpaced inflation. They also discuss external factors driving higher rates in certain regions, and how new data center tariffs and agreements are helping protect existing customers from the costs of connecting new large loads like data centers.

FUN OPINIONS

Rep. Maloy, Reams Highlight Geothermal  – In an op-ed in The Washington Reporter, Rep. Celeste Maloy (R-Utah) and Citizens for Responsible Energy Solutions (CRES) CEO Heather Reams highlight geothermal in Utah and its role in an "all-of-the-above" energy approach. By enacting smart federal policy to unleash geothermal energy, we can bolster our economy and create jobs nationwide. This is a solution to boost our domestic energy production, lower costs and embrace a true “all-of-the-above” energy approach. Utah can — and should — be a blueprint for the nation for the advancement of geothermal energy.

FROG BLOG

WaPo, Climate Columnist Spar Over Endangerment – The Washington Post published an editorial applauding the Trump administration for revoking the federal government’s authority to regulate climate pollution.

“Climate change is a real problem facing humanity, and reasonable people could support government regulation to push down greenhouse gas emissions,” the Post’s editorial board wrote. “There may come a time when the people elected to enact laws decide the modest benefits of regulating greenhouse gases outweigh the considerable economic costs.”

On his Climate Colored Goggles blog, our friend and former LA Times Reporter/Columnist Sammy Roth blasted the Post less than a week after sending layoff notices to most of its climate change reporters and countered their points.  

“If you’re going to claim that regulating 1.8% of all emissions is a costly waste of time, you might as well argue that fighting climate change is a costly waste of time. Which, come to think of it, was basically the Post’s argument.”

FUN FACTS

GHG Are Already Headed Downward: In spite of an announcements on the future of US Climate policy, GHG emissions are likely to continue to head downward.

 

IN THE NEWS

EPA Revokes Endangerment Finding – EPA revoked a scientific finding that long has been the central basis for U.S. action to regulate greenhouse gas emissions and fight climate change. The rule rescinds a 2009 government declaration known as the endangerment finding that determined that carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases threaten public health and welfare. The Obama-era finding is the legal underpinning of nearly all climate regulations under the Clean Air Act for motor vehicles, power plants and other pollution sources. The repeal eliminates all GHG standards for cars and trucks and could unleash a broader undoing of climate regulations on stationary sources such as power plants and oil and gas facilities. Legal challenges are already underway.

Holmstead Weighs In on EPA Action – Comments from Jeff Holmstead on EPA’s rule to revoke the 2009 endangerment finding. He is a partner at Bracewell and served as the head of EPA's Air Office:

For now, the only legal impact will be on vehicle manufacturers. Revoking the endangerment finding will immediately eliminate all greenhouse gas standards for motor vehicles, but vehicle makers have very long planning cycles, and the revocation of the endangerment finding won't have much practical impact in the near term. 

We expect EPA to revoke the endangerment finding for legal reasons, not scientific ones. This is the only way that they can “drive a stake through the heart of climate religion,” as Administrator Zeldin has said.  If the legal reasoning that they proposed to rely on for revoking the endangerment finding is upheld in court, no future EPA will be able to regulate CO2 emissions.  

But this might actually force Congress to get involved in reaching a bipartisan agreement on actual climate change legislation — probably not during the Trump Administration, but the business community would like to have the long-term certainty that would come with bipartisan legislation, and if the environmental community sees that it can’t get what it wants from EPA, they might be more willing to make the kind of compromises that are always required to pass meaningful legislation.  

Although the environmental community has viewed the endangerment finding as the holy grail, it has done very little to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.  EPA has relied on it to regulate just three industries – power plants, vehicle manufactures, and oil and gas operations.  The Obama and Biden Administrations both issued aggressive rules to reduce CO2 emissions from power plants, but neither of them ever came into effect.  The Supreme Court put the Obama Clean Power Plan on hold almost immediately and later struck it down. And the Trump EPA will soon finalize a rule to revoke the Biden rule, which was also being challenged in court and has not yet had any impact on power plants.  

As for vehicles, neither the Obama rules nor the Biden rules remained in place long enough to require meaningful emission reductions. The Obama rules were revoked under Trump 1 and the Biden rules are now being revoked under Trump 2.

Unless the Democrats control the White House for an extended period and get the courts to uphold stringent climate rules, the endangerment finding won’t do much to address climate change.

The story with methane emissions from oil and gas operations is more complicated.  When it comes to new oil and gas operations, the regulation of methane has not done anything that EPA could not already have done by regulating hydrocarbon emissions, which it has done for years.  On the other hand, EPA’s methane rules for existing oil and gas operations can claim credit for some reduction in methane emissions, but most of the big industry players were already doing most of what the rules require for business reasons. In fact, the oil and gas industry has publicly and privately lobbied EPA not to revoke the existing methane rules.  to be sure, the industry has asked EPA to revise a few requirements to make them more reasonable, but it prefers federal rules to state-by-state requirements, which many states would impose if EPA’s methane regulations were revoked. 

Treasury Issues General Licenses Authorizing Activities for Venezuelan Oil, Gas Sector – Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) issued two general licenses authorizing certain activities related to operations in Venezuela’s oil and gas sector. As further detailed below, OFAC General License No. 49 authorizes US persons to negotiate and enter into contingent contracts for certain new investments in Venezuela’s oil and gas sector, while General License No. 50 separately authorizes certain transactions relating to specific entities’ oil or gas sector operations in Venezuela. These general licenses do not authorize any transactions involving persons located in Russia, Iran, North Korea, Cuba, China, or any entity owned or controlled by, or in a joint venture with, such persons. Similarly, the general licenses do not authorize the unblocking of any property blocked pursuant to the Venezuela Sanctions Regulations or any transactions involving blocked vessels.

Kiggans, Others Seek Answers from Hegseth, Burgum on Offshore Wind Pause – Rep. Jen Kiggans (VA-02) joined Reps. Nick LaLota (NY-01) and Andrew Garbarino (NY-02) in sending a letter to Secretary of War Pete Hegseth and Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum regarding the recent decision to halt certain offshore wind projects, including the Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind Project (CVOW) off the coast of Virginia Beach. Read excerpts from the letter:

“Like many of the constituents we represent, we support an all-of-the-above energy strategy that treats all energy sources fairly, carefully weighs legitimate security risk and real environmental impacts, and does not lock Americans into unsustainable energy mandates.”

“Many of the projects implicated by the recent decision are near completion, with billions of dollars already invested, and some are already delivering power to local communities. Further delay prevents our constituents from accessing the affordable and reliable electricity they need and expect.”

“Completing these projects according to plan is essential to achieving American energy dominance and strengthening our national security by reducing reliance on energy produced by our adversaries.”

“We respectfully request additional information on the analysis underlying the recent decision, including how radar interference, environmental tradeoffs, long-term subsidy exposure, workforce impacts, and broader national security considerations were assessed. Transparency on these issues is essential to maintaining public confidence and ensuring our energy policies advance both economic growth and national security.”

E15 Deal Stalls – Agreement on legislation to allow year-round E15 sales continued to elude farm and oil interests despite a Sunday deadline. A draft plan by the House GOP’s Rural Domestic Energy Council failed to win support by the weekend from mid-sized oil refiners who killed year-round E15 in an earlier defense bill. Despite breaks for those refiners from having to bear the cost of small refiner exemptions, it didn’t seem to be enough. Rural Voices USA launched a digital and billboard campaign late last week demanding that Congress pass year-round E15 legislation. The campaign targets congressional districts across Iowa, Michigan, Minnesota, Nebraska, and Wisconsin. The group says it’s focusing on states where farmers are bearing the brunt of a worsening agricultural crisis – while Congress continues to stall on a commonsense solution.

ON THE SCHEDULE THIS WEEK

National Ethanol Conference Set – The National Ethanol Conference is current underway in Orlando with E15 on the front burner in Congress.. NEC is the most widely attended executive-level conference for the ethanol industry. Past events have welcomed industry leaders from across the United States and 20 countries. Since 1996, the Renewable Fuels Association’s NEC has been recognized as the ethanol conference for the latest, timely information on marketing, legislative, and regulatory issues facing the industry. Our friends Kevin Book and API’s Wil Hupman are among the speakers, along with ethanol industry experts.

Brookings Looks at Data Centers – Tomorrow at 11:00 a.m., the Center for Technology Innovation (CTI) at Brookings will host a webinar to discuss new CTI research detailing how local leaders can use community benefit agreements to address public concerns to ensure companies are more transparent, fair and equitable as they build new data centers for AI expansion. Following a discussion of the report, Brookings CTI Senior Fellows Nicol Turner Lee and Darrell West will lead a discussion with several experts on what communities can do to address local concerns, understand the costs and benefits of data centers, and reach concrete agreements that protect community interests.

CSIS Hosts Electricity Price Discussion – CSIS’s Energy Security and Climate Change Program hosts a discussion tomorrow at Noon with former FERC Commissioner Allison Clements and Ryan Hledik, Principal at The Brattle Group, exploring the complex factors behind rising electricity prices, the role AI data centers will play in future rate trajectories, and innovative policy solutions to protect affordability, maintain reliability, and enable U.S. competitiveness in a cutting-edge technology.

Forum Looks at Emissions, Decarb – NYU’s Institute Policy Integrity hosts a webinar tomorrow evening featuring emissions-accounting experts Aaron Bergman, Jesse Jenkins, Gavin McCormick, and Christine Pries to discuss the trade-offs in the proposed revisions and their broader importance. The design of the Scope 2 framework shapes investment decisions and consumer behavior, and the revisions could have implications for decarbonization across the global economy.

BCSE, BNEF to Roll Out 2026 Sustainability Factbook – The Business Council on Sustainable Energy and Bloomberg New Energy Finance will roll out the 2026 Sustainability Factbook at an embargoed media event on tomorrow at 2:00 p.m. at Bloomberg’s offices. Then on Wednesday, they will hold another lunch briefing for other stakeholders at Bracewell. The Sustainable Energy in America Factbook provides valuable year-over-year data and insights on the American energy transformation.

Carbon Forum Set for San Diego – The Carbon Solutions Forum is set for Wednesday and Thursday, in San Diego.  The event will examine what early CCS projects are revealing and how execution strategies are shifting. Our friend Jon Dearing of National Cement will be on CCUS and integrating carbon capture into energy and industrial facilities.  EPA’s Scott Mason and DOE’s Valerie Reed are also speakers.

Forum Tackles Infrastructure Questions – The American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) on Wednesday hosts a discussion at Meridiam on how the public and private sector are collaborating to find new solutions for investing in the nation's infrastructure. ASCE's 2025 Report Card for America's Infrastructure identified the need to sustain investment as vital if we are to continue to improve the nation's infrastructure. Bringing further perspective, ASCE's Investment Forum will examine how investors are financing projects, the role of asset management in project development and sustainability, and how system owners and operators are improving resiliency of the nation's energy network.

Forum Looks at Skilled Workers to Achieve Climate Goals – On Wednesday at 9:00 a.m., the Center for Global Development holds a virtual discussion on workers and emissions reductions can't be achieved without skilled workers. Skilled workers are needed to complete tasks, like installing solar panels or heat pumps, that must be completed to cut carbon emissions. But there aren’t enough of these workers. Analyses from numerous countries suggest shortages of tens or hundreds of thousands of trained workers.

Forum Looks at AI, Nuclear – Broadband Breakfast holds a virtual discussion on Wednesday at 12:00 p.m. on AI, Nuclear Power and Data Centers. The explosive growth of artificial intelligence is driving unprecedented power demands from data centers, with tech companies racing to secure dedicated nuclear energy to fuel their AI infrastructure.

Bracewell Hosts Maritime Fuels Summit – On Thursday, the Maritime Innovation Coalition and Bracewell host a Maritime Fuels Policy Summit event. The event features slate of government officials to participate in panels from mid-morning through the afternoon, including luncheon speakers. The agenda includes discussions of the congressional agenda, opportunities for progress on appropriations, energy, tax, important federal regulations, and international agreements. The event is off-the-record and closed to press.

NGA Winter Meeting, POLITICO Govs Summit Set – The National Governors Association will host the 2026 Winter Meeting in Washington, DC on  Thursday and Friday February 19^th and 20^th. The Winter Meeting is the most well-attended annual gathering of Governors, and we look forward to welcoming special guests and national experts for solutions-driven conversations on pressing national issues including education, energy, economic growth, artificial intelligence and more.  POLITICO will hold its annual Governors Summit alongside the meeting featuring a series of forward-looking conversations with governors from across the country about how state leaders are setting the agenda for America’s next chapter.

IN THE FUTURE

Forum looks at Trade Clean Energy Nexus –ACP convenes a NEXUS forum on trade and supply chains on February 23^rd and 24^th at Convene Hamilton Square. The event unites the experts working at the intersection of energy and trade for deep-dive conversations around procurement, compliance, tariffs, and more.

State of the Union Set – House Speaker Mike Johnson invited Trump to give the State of the Union address on February 24^th.

WaPo Hosts AI Power Forum – The Washington Post is hosting a forum on Wednesday February 25^th at 9:00 a.m. to look at powering the AI Age. The event will feature conversations about how America can build new sources of energy and strengthen its energy security.

Forum looks at Legal Questions of DeReg Agenda – On Wednesday, February 25^th at 2:00 p.m., NYU’s Institute Policy Integrity hosts a webinar where staff members will examine a year of widescale federal deregulation and the legal vulnerabilities of these efforts. Several of our attorneys will review the aggressive and sometimes unprecedented legal theories the Trump Administration has used in its pursuit of deregulation, along with the key issues and strategies behind upcoming litigation against regulatory rollbacks.

Yergin, Pascal Discuss Chamber Copper Report – On Tuesday February 27^th on Capitol Hil, the US Chamber holds an in-person Critical Minerals Working Group briefing featuring S&P experts Dan Yergin and Carlos Pasquel. The session will highlight the release of S&P’s study, “Copper in the Age of AI: Challenges of Electrification.” This important new study analyzes the global outlook for copper supply and demand through 2040, focusing on copper’s essential role in meeting the growing requirements of electrification, digitalization, and technologies such as AI, data centers, electric vehicles, and defense.

EPSA Competitive Power Summit Hosts Danley, Rosner – The Electric Power Supply Assn holds its 5^th annual Competitive Power Summit on March 3^rd at the Grand Hyatt.  The event features a day of expert panels and featured speakers discussing critical issues facing competitive power and the U.S. electric system, as well as what it takes to build what’s needed at the pace required to keep power both reliable and cost-effective.  Headline speakers include DOE’s James Danley and FERC Commissioner and former Chair David Rosner.

CCS Forum Set – The Global CCS Institute holds its annual Europe Forum on Carbon Capture and Storage on March 4^th in Brussels, Belgium. The event is a key platform for policy leaders, NGOs, industry experts, academics, financial institutions, and the public to explore the latest developments in carbon capture and storage (CCS) across Europe.

Water Power Week to Highlight Key Hydro Role – The week of March 9^th, the National Hydropower Association holds its annual Water Power Week 26 in Washington, DC. Sen. Lisa Murkowski will headline the event. 

Energy Abundance Forums Set – The American Energy Abundance Alliance, a new initiative of BCSE, is holding the 2026 Energy Abundance Forum in Washington, DC on March 11^th and 12^th  to address connect with fellow BCSE members and learn the latest updates on energy policy.

Burgum, Wright Headline Japan Energy Forum – The Indo-Pacific Energy Security Ministerial and Business Forum (IPEM) is being held on March 14^th and 15^th in Tokyo, Japan convening of Ministers, CEOs and senior leaders shaping the future of energy security in the Indo-Pacific. IPEM brings together government and industry to advance trusted partnerships, unlock investment and strengthen resilient, secure energy supply chains across the region.  US officials attending include Secretary Burgum, Secretary Wright, Ex-Im Bank President head John Jovanovic and many more.  Look for an energy deals on LNG to be featured here.

USTDA, NEDC to Coordinate Forum – Mark your calendars of for a major LNG event in advance of CERA Week on Friday March 20^th coordinated by NEDC and the US Trade & Development Admin at the US Chamber.  More details on this soon. 

CERA Week Set – CERAWeek is on for March 22^nd to 26^th. The event is the most prominent energy Conference of the year and features three mutually reinforcing platforms: The Executive Conference, the Innovation Agora and Partner Programs. The industry's foremost thought leaders convene to cultivate relationships and exchange transformative ideas. Our programs are designed to advance new ideas, insight and solutions to the biggest challenges facing the future of energy, the environment, and climate.