Too close for comfort: fires burn in the hills above the Los Alamos National Laboratory, a nuclear site in New Mexico
Firefighters on Tuesday battled a wildfire that threatened a government nuclear facility in New Mexico, raising fears about the safety of radioactive materials at the Los Alamos National Laboratory.
On Monday, a spot fire at the laboratory was quickly contained and officials
When Bill Barrett Corp, a small US natural gas producer, first went to Utah's Nine Mile Canyon in 2002 to begin drilling, it sought permission to drill fewer than 100 wells. But the price of natural gas has rocketed in the intervening years and now Bill Barrett is seeking approval for 800 more.
Royal Dutch Shell has sought to calm concerns about diminishing oil reserves and access to new supplies, arguing that its existing resource base will provide 55 years of production at current production levels. "We still have a lot of legacy [positions] from the past,'' said Jeroen van der Veer, Shell's chief executive, in an interview with the Financial Times.
Alaska is seeking bids to conduct a comprehensive risk assessment of the state's oil and gas infrastructure to prevent a repeat of the corrosion and spills suffered in recent years at the Prudhoe Bay oilfield, the largest in the US. The engineering analysis, for which bids are due by April 28, is being conducted on the instructions of Governor Sarah Palin. She ordered the audit - to take two years and cost $5m - after the biggest spill at the BP-operated Prudhoe Bay in 2006 revealed corrosion in the pipelines and forced the closure of half the oilfield.
