By Jeff Spross
Boston-based renewable energy company First Wind just finalized agreements to provide a Utah utility with 320 megawatts of solar capacity for the next two decades. And the circumstances of the contracts are yet another example of how falling solar prices are reshaping the market.
http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2014/06/20/3451429/utah-solar-purpa/
Yesterday, Communities for a Better Environment (CBE) filed suit against the Bay Area Air Quality Management District for the District’s illegal permitting of the Chevron (“Modernization”) Expansion Project. CBE had previously requested the District to revoke the permit that allowed Chevron to build a Richmond refinery expansion that could increase air pollution from one of the state’s biggest industrial climate polluters without required emission prevention and environmental reviews.
http://www.cbecal.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/CBE-Press-Release-BAAQMD-Suit.pdf
By Eric de Place and John Abbotts 
This article features and interactive map that shows 276 reported derailment in the Northwest (from Minnesota to Oregon/Washington) in 31 months. That is roughly one every 3.5 days.
By Jon Cox, Bakersfield Californian
First responders think of the rail yard by Bakersfield High School when they envision the worst-case scenario in Kern County’s drive to become a major destination for Midwestern oil trains. This article mentions the other two proposed sites in California: Benica and Pittsburg,
Oil train yard…in the backyard of a high school
P66’s denial of using Bakkan crude as a feedstock doesn’t take all the heat of project. It still wants to go full bore on the expansion even as oil usage in California drops and the promise of Monterrey shale fields rapidly fades.
On top of that, a question lingers: how can the public be assured that Bakkan crude is not coming in…if cars continue to be grossly mislabeled? (http://www.nbcnews.com/news/investigations/oil-companies-face-fines-over-mislabeled-crude-shipments-n23211 )
And now P66 doubles down on its expansion at Nipomo and declares that its feedstock is not going to be from the Bakkan oil fields. All of which begs the following question: Just where will it be coming from?
The answer to that question is not in the article but in the memory banks of the people of Crockett and Rodeo.
Back in 2012/13, Phillips 66 — in an attempt to deflect any negativity regarding Canadian Tar Sands — assured local folks that the refinery was primarily using Bakkan Crude and fracked Monterrey shale oil. Later, the press revealed that Concophillips (the parent company), Shell and the Koch brothers pretty much owned the Tar Sands exports. On top of that, explosive Bakkan crude was turning out to be public relations nightmare.
In cases like these, there may be no “lesser of two evils”…
Ground Zero: the community around P66’s Nipomo refinery
Read more here: http://www.sanluisobispo.com/2014/04/25/3037503/no-bakken-crude-planned-for-nipomo.html?sp=/99/177/183/#storylink=cpy
By Ari Phillips (Climate Progress)
Another step towards America becoming a petro-colony for China: China’s largest petrochemical refiner, Sinopec, just signed a propane deal with Phillips 66. Unlike Crude (which is a restricted export) there are no such limits to LPG. And now that oil companies are fracking everywhere here at home, China apparently sees America as the source for its energy needs,
http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2014/04/10/3425190/liquefied-petroleum-gas-china-export/
By Joan Lowy (Associated Press).
National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) Chair Deborah Hersman
Washington D.C. Spurred by a series of fiery train crashes, a push by government and industry to make safer tank cars used for shipping crude oil and ethanol has bogged down in squabbling and finger-pointing over whether they’re needed and if so, who should pay.
Pie de la resistance: The oil industry claim safety standards are not “data driven” and delay change.
http://bigstory.ap.org/article/rail-safety-effort-marred-squabbling
By Tom Lochner (Contra Costa TImes)
SAN FRANCISCO — A discussion of five Bay Area energy projects and their permit status was moved to next month, after a regional committee hosting it spent most of a morning talking about another matter of public concern, the tracking of emissions from petroleum refining.
By Jad Mouawad (New York TImes)
Unchanged Federal policies allow railroad NOT to disclose basic information about hazmat shipments barreling though our cities and past our back yards.
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/16/business/despite-spills-hazards-ride-the-rails-in-secret.html?_r=1
data:text/mce-internal,
Crockett-Rodeo United to Defend the Environment 