Daily Archives: August 3, 2017

Senate confirmed 2 FERC nominees with no discussion 2017-08-03

The Senate took less than two minutes to confirm Neil Chatterjee and Robert F. Powelson as FERC Commissioners, taking it up even earlier than we suspected. The only voice heard voting was Sen. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, the Chair of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee that had forwarded their names. It’s not clear any other Senators were even in the room; certainly none spoke up at any point. She praised the new Commissioners and added that they would “help facilitate the buildout of an aging infrastructure and the add-on of new infrastructure”, which of course means more pipeline boondoggles when the country and the world need to get on with sun and wind power.

Reading the nominations

Worse, there are not one but two more FERC nominees in the pipeline, including a proposed Chair very friendly with pipelines and fossil fuels.

CSPAN, Senate Session, August 3, 2017, Continue reading →

Call Senators now to stop FERC nominees 2017-08-03

Update 2017-08-03: The Senate already did it. But there are more nominations to oppose and other things you can do.

FERC could suddenly get a quorum. Another FERC nominee went to the Senate Wednesday: no FERC rubberstamp Richard Click, general counsel to the minority party, the Democrats, on the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee. Even the two nominees already forwarded to the full Senate June 6, 2017 if confirmed, added to the one still at FERC, would produce a quorum of 3 out of 5. So please call your Senators now and ask them not to vote to confirm any FERC nominee who does not vow to turn the agency to solar and wind power on a smart grid.

No, this won’t stop or turn off Sabal Trail. But it could stop further pipeline boondoggles from being confirmed. That’s good in itself, and could also erode the credibility of Sabal Trail with its creditors.

Here are telephone numbers for Georgia and Florida Senators, and there’s a script farther down. Continue reading →