Energy & Fuel

"As it works to reshape the oil industry's image, American Petroleum Institute's media shop has nabbed a former spokesman for the U.S. Chamber of Commerce."

More immediate than the Gulf oil spill to the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection are the gushers, spills, and accidents from the gas drilling boom in the state.

"Interior Secretary Ken Salazar  issued revised rules on Monday for a six-month moratorium on deepwater oil  drilling in the Gulf of Mexico, replacing an earlier one that had been declared invalid by federal courts."

"The incandescent light bulb’s days are numbered. Under federal law, the 100-watt bulbs are supposed to be taken off the shelf next year, followed later by the more common 40- and 60-watt models. But guess who’s still using them? The Department of Energy."

"Plane powered entirely by the sun lands safely in Switzerland after completing its first 24-hour test flight, proving that aircraft can stay airborne during the night using energy gathered from the sun by day."

"A federal appeals court on Thursday turned down the Obama administration’s effort to enforce a six-month moratorium on deepwater drilling in the Gulf of Mexico."

"More than 27,000 abandoned oil and gas wells lurk in the hard rock beneath the Gulf of Mexico, an environmental minefield that has been ignored for decades. No one — not industry, not government — is checking to see if they are leaking, an Associated Press investigation shows."

Just as harmful to the Gulf of Mexico as the BP oil spill is the annual "dead zone" whose increase in recent years has been driven by nitrogen fertilizer used to produce corn ethanol in the U.S. heartland.