MURKOWSKI ENERGY BLUEPRINT CALLS FOR CCUS, EOR

Document Also Suggests Refocusing DOE’s Coal Programs 

Tamar Hallerman
GHG Monitor
2/8/13

An energy policy blueprint unveiled this week by the top Republican on the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee broadly calls for federal energy programs to support CO2 utilization and enhanced oil recovery. But the highly-anticipated set of proposals released Feb. 4 by committee Ranking Member Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) also suggests reforming the Department of Energy’s coal R&D program to expand its focus beyond carbon capture, utilization and storage. It says the program has “become narrowly focused on carbon dioxide emission reductions to the exclusion of other opportunities.”

DOE’s CCS and Power Systems program currently accounts for a large chunk of the Department’s Fossil Energy R&D budget. For Fiscal Year 2012—its funding levels extended through the end of March under current stop-gap legislation—CCS and related programs account for more than two-thirds of Fossil Energy R&D’s $534 million budget. Murkowski’s blueprint, which includes roughly 200 policy recommendations for updating the country’s energy system, instead calls for the establishment of a “renewed emphasis on broader environmental, gasification and liquefaction technology development opportunities, in addition to carbon capture, utilization and sequestration” within the program.

The blueprint also calls on DOE and the Department of Interior to promote enhanced oil and gas recovery from depleted wells by offering “abbreviated leasing and permitting processes for previously explored or developed fields where enhanced oil recovery is applicable.” It also says agencies like the Environmental Protection Agency could help provide some regulatory certainty for the continued utilization of CO2 via EOR by continuing to treat those injection sites as Class II wells under its Underground Injection Control program. “By 2020, we must diversify coal utilization while continuing to improve its environmental performance. To reach this goal, balance must be restored between coal’s role in providing affordable energy for robust economic growth and the environmental standards we rightly expect from the producers and users of this resource,” the blueprint states. Painting in broad strokes, the document suggests that the government do this by establishing long-term procurement contracting authority for the federal government for alternative coal-derived fuels, as well as repealing the government prohibition of procuring coal-derived fuels like coal-to-liquids. It also calls for the government to limit new environmental regulations and loosen existing ones like the Environmental Protection Agency’s New Source Review program.

‘Conversation Starter’

Murkowski announced her proposals, which were more than a year in the making, during a speech at the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners’ winter meeting in Washington, D.C. this week. During that speech, Murkowski emphasized that the blueprint is meant to be a “conversation starter” to spur what will likely be piecemeal legislation, as opposed to the broad, comprehensive energy bills that were commonplace as recently as 2005. She indicated the desire to “hit restart” on a national energy policy she said is outdated. “I believe there must be a new conversation—a better conversation—and I intend to start it today,” she said Feb. 4. “New technologies are emerging, changing the facts as so many thought they knew them, and our nation’s energy discourse is not keeping up.”

Murkowski acknowledged that while many of her recommendations may not garner the bipartisan support necessary to pass the Democrat-controlled Senate, some issues like hydropower, critical minerals and liquefied natural gas exports could gain traction in both parties. She said she’s spoken at length with Energy Committee Chairman Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) about working together on multiple issues. “I feel much more optimistic about our prospects [of passing energy legislation] this year,” Murkowski told reporters.

Blueprint Calls for More Focus on R&D

Murkowski’s blueprint notably includes broad support for the expansion of basic scientific research funded by the government. “Only basic and rigorous research will produce the dramatic breakthroughs we need to reach a future in which clean energy and energy independence are more than just slogans,” the document says. It suggests that the government “significantly” increase its basic research budget, including that for DOE’s Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E) program, but only if it is offset by cuts elsewhere in the budget or by dedicating a portion of new energy production revenues for the purpose.

The proposal prioritizes achieving full independence from Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) oil imports by the end of the decade. It suggests approving the controversial Keystone XL pipeline extension, opening up more public lands to oil and gas development and expediting the federal permitting process for resources in places like the Outer Continental Shelf. It also calls for the development of unconventional sources of energy like oil shale and methane hydrates and more leasing of renewables on public lands, as well as expanded energy efficiency efforts.