Connect with us

Energy

‘They’re Gonna Pay For It’: A Texas Billionaire May Be About To Force Greenpeace USA Into Bankruptcy

Published

3 minute read

From the Daily Caller News Foundation

By Nick Pope

The Texas billionaire owner of a major pipeline company is on the precipice of potentially bankrupting Greenpeace USA, The Wall Street Journal reported on Sunday.

Kelcy Warren’s company, Energy Transfer, is seeking legal recourse against Greenpeace’s American arm in court, alleging that several Greenpeace USA entities paid for attacks against the company’s Dakota Access Pipeline and proliferated misinformation about the firm and its project in 2016, according to the WSJ. At the time, the project was a flashpoint in the environmental movement’s crusade against major fossil fuel infrastructure developments, and it was ultimately completed in 2017.

“Everybody is afraid of these environmental groups and the fear that it may look wrong if you fight back with these people,” Warren said in a televised interview in 2017, according to the WSJ. “But what they did to us is wrong, and they’re gonna pay for it.”

Eco-activists flocked to the construction site of the pipeline in North Dakota in 2016 to try to stop the $3.8 billion project from being built, and clashes between the protesters and law enforcement occasionally turned violent, according to the WSJ. The lawsuit, which seeks $300 million in damages, would probably crush Greenpeace USA, though it does not pose such a threat to Greenpeace’s international operations because the organization’s main organizing body based in the Netherlands does not own assets in the U.S.

The company tried to sue in federal court first, and refiled the suit in a state court after a federal judge threw out the original litigation, according to the WSJ. Energy Transfer is pursuing the lawsuit under a law that was originally created to go after the mafia.

As Warren — who once said that climate activists should be “removed from the gene pool” — sees it, Greenpeace USA was principally responsible for delaying the project’s construction and imposing millions of dollars of added costs on Energy Transfer, according to the WSJ. Greenpeace, meanwhile, maintains that the lawsuit could stifle free speech and that it only ever played a supporting role in the protests against the pipeline.

Moreover, Greenpeace USA is also preparing for a range of possible outcomes, including bankruptcy, while some of its leaders and members of the board have fought over what kind of settlement could be palatable, according to the WSJ.

“You’re not going to wear Kelcy Warren out, I can promise you that,” Matthew Ramsey, a director on Energy Transfer’s board, told the WSJ. “He will fight to the bitter end.”

Greenpeace USA did not respond immediately to a request for comment.

Todayville is a digital media and technology company. We profile unique stories and events in our community. Register and promote your community event for free.

Follow Author

Daily Caller

AI Needs Natural Gas To Survive

Published on

 

From the Daily Caller News Foundation

By David Blackmon

As recent studies project a big rise in power generation demand from the big datacenters that are proliferating around the United States, the big question continues to focus in on what forms of generation will rise to meet the new demand. Most datacenters have plans to initially interconnect into local power grids, but the sheer magnitude of their energy needs threatens to outstrip the ability of grid managers to expand supply fast enough.  

This hunger for more affordable, 24/7 baseload capacity is leading to a variety of proposed solutions, including President Donald Trump’s new executive orders focused on reviving the nation’s coal industry, scheduled to be signed Tuesday afternoon. But efforts to restart the permitting of new coal-fired power plants in the US will require additional policy changes, efforts which will take time and could ultimately fail. In the meantime, datacenter developers find themselves having to delay construction and completion dates until firm power supply can be secured. 

Datacenters specific to AI technology require ever-increasing power loads. For instance, a single AI query can consume nearly ten times the power of a traditional internet search, and projections suggest that U.S. data center electricity consumption could double or even triple by 2030, rising from about 4-5% of total U.S. electricity today to as much as 9-12%. Globally, data centers could see usage climb from around 536 terawatt-hours (TWh) in 2025 to over 1,000 TWh by 2030. In January, a report from the American Security Project estimated that datacenters could consume about 12% of all U.S. power supply. 

Obviously, the situation calls for innovative solutions. A pair of big players in the natural gas industry, Liberty Energy and Range Resources, announced on April 8 plans to diversify into the power generation business with the development of a major new natural gas power plant to be located in the Pittsburgh area. Partnering with Imperial Land Corporation (ILC), Liberty and Range will locate the major power generation plant in the Fort Cherry Development District, a Class A industrial park being developed by ILC.   

“The strategic collaboration between Liberty, ILC, and Range will focus on a dedicated power generation facility tailored to meet the energy demands of data centers, industrial facilities, and other high-energy-use businesses in Pennsylvania,” the companies said in a joint release.  

Plans for this new natural gas power project follows closely on the heels of the March 22 announcement for plans to transform the largest coal-fired power plant in Pennsylvania, the Homer City generating station, into a new gas-fired facility. The planned revitalized plant would house 7 natural gas turbines with a combined capacity of 4.5 GW, enough power 3 million homes.  

Both the Homer City station and the Fort Cherry plant will use gas produced out of the Appalachia region’s massive Marcellus Shale formation, the most prolific gas basin in North America. But plans like these by gas companies to invest in their own products for power needs aren’t isolated to Pennsylvania.  

In late January, big Permian Basin oil and gas producer Diamondback Energy told investors that it is seeking equity partners to develop a major gas-fired plan on its own acreage in the region. The facility would primarily supply electricity to data centers, which are expected to proliferate in Texas due to the AI boom, while also providing power for Diamondback’s own field operations. This dual-purpose approach could lower the company’s power costs and create a new revenue stream by selling excess electricity.  

Prospects for expansion of gas generation in the U.S. received a big boost in January when GE Vernova announced plans for a $600 million expansion of its manufacturing capacity for gas turbines and other products in the U.S. GE Vernova is the main supplier of turbines for U.S. power generation needs. The company plans to build 37 gas power turbines in 2025, with a potential increase to over 70 by 2027, to meet rising energy demands. 

The bottom line on these and other recent events is this: Natural gas is quickly becoming the power generation fuel of choice to feed the needs of the expanding datacenter industry through 2035, and potentially beyond. Given that reality, the smart thing to do for these and other companies in the natural gas business is to put down big bets on themselves. 

David Blackmon is an energy writer and consultant based in Texas. He spent 40 years in the oil and gas business, where he specialized in public policy and communications.

Continue Reading

Bjorn Lomborg

The stupidity of Net Zero | Bjorn Lomborg on how climate alarmism leads to economic crisis

Published on

From spiked on YouTube

Note: This interview is focused on Europe and the UK.  It very much applies to Canada. The 2025 Federal Election which will see Canadians choose between a more common sense approach, and spending the next 4 years continuing down the path of pursuing “The Stupidity of Net Zero”.

European industry is in freefall, and Net Zero is to blame.

Here, climate economist Bjorn Lomborg – author of Best Things First and False Alarm – explains how panic over climate change is doing far more damage than climate change itself.  Swapping cheap and dependable fossil fuels for unreliable and expensive renewables costs our economies trillions, but for little environmental gain, Lomborg says.

Plus, he tackles the myth of the ‘climate apocalypse’ and explains why there are more polar bears than ever.

Support spiked: https://www.spiked-online.com/support/

Sign up to spiked’s newsletters: https://www.spiked-online.com/newslet…

Continue Reading

Trending

X