energy industry

Petroleum drilling technology is now making carbon-free power

5:30am October 15, 2024

A new technique for harvesting geothermal energy being pioneered in Utah has passed a significant milestone: Southern California Edison has contracted for enough of the energy to power 400,000 homes.

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Left: Luminalt employee Pam Quan installs solar panels on the roof of a home in San Francisco in 2018. Right: An oilfield worker fills his truck with water before heading to a drilling site in the Permian Basin oil field in Andrews, Texas, in 2016.

Economy

Oil Jobs Are Big Risk, Big Pay. Green Energy Offers Stability And Passion

2:21pm October 21, 2020

by Camila Domonoske

Workers in the energy sector face two paths: The oil industry offers big salaries but more volatility, while clean energy pays less but provides more stability and a sense of mission.

Keri Belcher, who has worked in the oil and gas industry, says she's considering switching careers — even if it means less time outdoors, which is what attracted her to geology in the first place.

Economy

With Oil Collapse, A Geologist Struggles For Prospects; She's 'Just A Little Lost'

2:50pm May 26, 2020

by Camila Domonoske

Keri Belcher has worked in the oil and gas industry. But she's considering switching careers — even if it means less time outdoors, which is what attracted her to geology in the first place.

T. Boone Pickens founded the company that became Mesa Petroleum and later began a hedge fund focused on energy investments. He died Wednesday at age 91.

National

T. Boone Pickens, Iconic Oil Tycoon, Dead At 91

6:54pm September 11, 2019

by Avie Schneider

The legendary energy executive, whose name symbolized big oil, died Wednesday at age 91. He founded the company that became Mesa Petroleum and later began a hedge fund focused on energy investments.

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Ty Cordingly and his dad at a local Gillette diner. He's seen coworkers leave the state for jobs and thinks Wyoming relies too much on the energy industry.

'It's The Stone Age Of Fossil Fuels': Coal Bankruptcy Tests Wyoming Town

4:40pm September 04, 2019

by Cooper McKim

Hundreds of coal miners in Wyoming are still out of work two months after their employer declared bankruptcy. It's a moment of reckoning for a town some think relies too much on the energy industry.

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A 2017 file photo of EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt. Democrats have called for Pruitt's resignation over a variety of spending scandals but President Trump and key Republicans have rallied to his defense.

What Doesn't Kill You Makes You Stronger: Why Scott Pruitt May Be Here To Stay

9:55am April 09, 2018

by Ron Elving

If Pruitt's slavish devotion to deregulation has boosted his stock with Trump, it has also endeared him to an array of conservative activists and organizations who have been looking for heroes.

Two birds covered in oil sit on a rock near Refugio State Beach in Goleta, Calif., in 2015 after an oil spill from an abandoned pipeline spread over the beach. The Department of the Interior says it will no longer criminally prosecute energy companies tha

Accidentally Killing Birds Isn't A Crime, Says Trump Administration

7:03pm December 27, 2017

by Laurel Wamsley

A legal memo from the Department of the Interior declares that the Migratory Bird Treaty Act applies only to purposeful actions that kill migratory birds.