Where politics, government and energy intersect.
There were two water-related amendments to the Texas Constitution up for vote yesterday. One, Proposition 2, passed and the other. Proposition 8, was voted down. So what does this mean for the future of water in drought-stricken Texas? Here are five things to know about the votes: What is Proposition 2 exactly? It’s an amendment that […]
With about 2,760 employees, 16 regional offices, and an operating budget of $354 million this year, the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality is the second largest state environmental regulation agency in the U.S. The man in charge of Compliance and Enforcement at TCEQ is Richard Hyde. Hyde sat down with reporter Mose Buchele as part […]
NPR reporters, working with the Center for Public Integrity, obtained a never-before published EPA list the Agency uses to track polluters. Roughly one in 10 factories on the most recent list is in Texas.
Today NPR, the Center for Public Integrity (CPI) and StateImpact launch a special series examining how air pollution is affecting communities across the nation called Poisoned Places: Toxic Air, Neglected Communities. It has been twenty-one years since Congress amended the Clean Air Act to deal with toxic air, directing the Environmental Protection Agency to enforce […]
To begin exploring how air pollution may affect your community, use NPR’s interactive map of more than 1,000 Texas facilities that have emitted hazardous chemicals into the air.
Last November, the California-based solar power giant SunPower announced it was moving to Austin. Taking advantage of $2.5 million from Governor Perry’s Texas Enterprise Fund, the company promised to create 450 jobs in the Texas capital and make Texas its third largest office location. Fast forward about a year: SunPower is downsizing. In a statement, […]
Early Wednesday morning, a caravan of buses set out from the Houston area, headed for Austin and the headquarters of the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality. Their goal? To protest a request from Valero Energy Corp. for tax breaks for some of its oil refineries through a system that could give millions of dollars back […]
Yesterday we reported on Valero Energy Corporation’s attempts to get a tax exemption from the state of Texas for upgrades it made to its refineries. The money comes in the form of a property tax exemption from local appraisal districts, which could mean money lost from already-short school and city budgets. Looking at the arguments for and […]
Federal funds would be better spent on traditional jobs rather than those in “green energy” businesses, according to economists with the University of Texas Bureau of Economic Geology. “We looked as objectively as we could,” said Michelle Foss, Chief Energy Economist with the Bureau. “And for quite a long time, for the foreseeable future, (Texas) […]
That’s a direct quote from Andy Saenz, spokesman for the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ). He’s referring to an article on rising sea levels by Rice University Professor John Anderson that was supposed to be part of a larger report on the Galveston Bay, “State of the Bay 2010,” by the TCEQ. So what […]
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