FEMA gave a $156 million contract to a single-employee Georgia company (which had five previously-terminated government contracts) to provide 30 million meals for Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria, according to a report from The New York Times. The company only delivered 50,000 meals and the contract was canceled last October.
Why it matters: Risky contracts awarded in the earliest days after Maria, like Whitefish Energy, indicate that both the federal government and local entities in Puerto Rico simply weren't equipped for the scale of the disaster.
The Energy Department's statistical arm projected Tuesday that rising U.S. crude oil production will level off between 11 million and 12 million barrels per day, a level that's higher than the 2017 version of the annual long-term forecast but could nonetheless prove too conservative.
Why it matters: The increased projection in the base, or reference, scenario underscores the surge in oil development from shale plays — the stuff tapped by fracking and horizontal drilling — in Texas and elsewhere.
America’s biggest oil company is supportinga federal regulation on emissions of methane, a potent greenhouse gas that’s also the primary component of natural gas.
Why it matters: The move puts the oil and gas giant at odds with many of its smaller peers that are urging President Trump to wholly repeal an environmental regulation issued by the Obama administration. It’s the latest and among the most significant signs that some of the biggest fossil-fuel companies want regulatory certainty over outright deregulation.
