Related Links: Description of Sandia's advanced microgrid technology Video of Moniz's August 26 speech at Columbia University on climate change policy The Obama administration will provide $1 million for an effort to develop a more resilient electric grid for New Jersey’s public transit systems.U.S. Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz and New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (R) announced on Aug. 26 that they had signed a memorandum of understanding in which the DOE agreed to partner with New Jersey Transit, the state of New Jersey and the New Jersey Board of Public Utilities to assess New Jersey Transit’s energy needs.The DOE and

Denver Hospital Complaint Exhibit Handwritten note cited by Kiewit-Turner as Exhibit A. Courtesy of Kiewit-Turner Multi-building complex may come in at a cost close to $1 billion, says the construction joint venture. To measure how far apart the Kiewit-Turner joint venture is from the Dept. of Veterans Affairs (VA) on the final cost of completing a new veterans hospital in Aurora, Colo., you can start with their differing views of “the note.”The note is a handwritten agreement completed in November 2011. In it, both the contracting venture and the department pledge to devote resources to keep the project cost to

Photo Courtesy of U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission Judge says NRC must resume Nevada waste-site plan review. Work stopped there several years ago. Related Links: U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit's decision Link to Senate nuclear-waste bill text (as introduced), summary and section-by-section analysis The federal appeals court's Aug. 13 ruling was crystal clear. It said the Nuclear Regulatory Commission violated the law when it halted its review of a Dept. of Energy application for an underground nuclear-waste disposal site in Nevada. The court also directed NRC to reopen its evaluation.The next steps in the proposed Yucca Mountain repository's

Related Links: Georgia Slapped by Court in Tristate Water Dispute 11th Circuit Appeals Court 2011 Opinion In the latest salvo in a decades-long dispute, Florida Gov. Rick Scott (R) says his state in September will ask the U.S. Supreme Court to force Georgia to share some of the water from the Apalachicola, Chattahoochee and Flint (ACF) river basins.According to a statement issued by Scott, the collapse of discussions, in 2003, among Alabama, Florida and Georgia "left Florida and Alabama in the same disadvantaged position" just as Georgia was able to stake more claims to the waters.The Apalachicola's water levels are

Related Links: Source of Forged Surety Bonds Remains Mysterious A Bold Individual Surety Claims His Coal-Backed Bonds are Rock Solid Contractors John Melching Jr. and Dallas Collins are based in Pennsylvania and Texas, respectively, and have never met, but they have something in common: They claim they have been cheated in the past year by a business transaction that involved Larry Polec, a Chicago-based surety-bond broker.Polec is easy to spot. He is a former Michigan State basketball player who stands 6 ft, 8 in. Less easy to spot, however, are his roles in and links to an informal network of

Photo Courtesy of the Center for Liquefied Natural Gas Some say LNG terminals and liquefication equipment would provide thousands of jobs and billions of dollars to the economy. Related Links: DOE conditional approval of exporting LNG from Lake Charles Terminal U.S. LNG Boom Fueling Port Projects The announcement on Aug. 7 that the federal Energy Dept. would grant conditional approval to export domestically produced liquefied natural gas from a third U.S. terminal was met by cheers from several industry groups, including the American Petroleum Institute and the Center for Liquefied Gas. But some of those same groups complain that the

Courtesy of U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission Entrance to Yucca Mountain tunnel, under construction (November 2007 photo) Related Links: U.S. Court of Appeals for D.C. Circuit decision Nuke Waste Disposal Solution Still Elusive (enr.com 6/18/12) A federal appeals court has ruled that the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission has violated a federal energy statute and directed it to restart its review of a proposed nuclear waste disposal site beneath Nevada’s Yucca Mountain.But NRC has limited funds on hand to deal with the Dept. of Energy’s application for the waste repository—let alone to build a storage facility at the Nevada site or in

Related Links: PDF of the DOE Report Smarter Grids Finding Limits The Obama administration is calling for more investment in the electric grid to reduce system disruptions caused by increasingly severe weather due to climate change.Released on Aug. 12, the report from the White House Council of Economic Advisers and the U.S. Dept. of Energy does not specify how much should be invested, but notes that, between 2003 and 2012, weather-related outages cost the U.S. economy an estimated $16 billion to $33 billion.Some of the strategies for modernizing the grid outlined in the report include working with utilities to harden

Related Links: White House Announcement on Appointments REI Chief Picked to Lead Interior Dept. President Obama's decision to nominate Michael L. Connor, the Interior Dept.'s Bureau of Reclamation commissioner, as deputy Interior secretary has won praise from key senators.Connor, whose nomination was sent to the Senate on July 31, has led BuRec since 2009. He was counsel to the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee from 2001 to 2009. Committee Chairman Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) calls Connor "a superb choice" for the Interior post. The energy committee's top Republican, Lisa Murkowski (Alaska), said of Connor, "I believe his integrity, work ethic

Related Links: NLRB Fact Sheet on Union Election Rule Supreme Court to Hear NLRB Recess Appointment Case For the first time in a decade, the National Labor Relations Board will have a full complement of five members. But several federal court challenges to NLRB decisions and policies will keep the panel under a cloud of uncertainty for the foreseeable future.The NLRB decides cases that directly affect employers and unions, including those in the construction industry. In recent years, the board has ruled on issues such as union members' rights to display banners criticizing labor practices of contractors working at construction