Christmas is expected to come late for some green groups, or at least that’s what they’re hoping.
    With President-elect Barack Obama and Congress preparing to offer a collossal economic stimulus package in the new year, alternative energy lobbyists, think tanks, and conservation groups are all sending funding wish lists to Washington.
    Energy projects proposed for the stimulus bill range from the conventional (tax credits for renewable energy) to more  exotic ideas.
    Sapphire Energy, a renewable petrochemical company, is pushing for more government funding for the development of algae-based fuel production, including establishing national centers of excellence in algal research and mandating the U.S. Air Force test the use of algae-based jet fuel.
    A non-profit organization focused on reducing greenhouse gas emissions from the building sector, Architecture 2030, is encouraging the incoming administration to invest $167.3 billion over two years into a plan that links lowering mortgage interest rates with energy efficiency.
    Architecture 2030’s proposal would require people buying new homes or refinancing their mortgages to renovate their homes to meet energy reduction targets to get lower interest rates.
    Other suggestions for the economic stimulus are more symbolic. Leroy Miller of American University urges Obama to enact a 12-month plan to make the White House a zero energy building and to purchase a plug in electric vehicle.
    Not to be left out, many wildlife and conservation groups have weighed in with proposals for the economic recovery plan, which is expected to total between $500 billion to $700 billion or even more.
    The Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources has a compilation of these green stimulus ideas and more at: http://energy.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=IssueItems.View&IssueItem_ID=ce27babd-d579-40ce-91e9-7b41510d97d3.

– Ayesha Rascoe

One of the great rules of inventory management — first in, first out — could apply to the process of deducing who will be agriculture secretary in the Obama administration with a wry renaming. In this iteration, it is “first named, first discarded.”

The list of potential nominees deemed as front-runners or consensus choices to run USDA has churned continuously since Barack Obama won the presidential election. And it is unclear when a nominee will be named. Most of the front-runners have faded from attention like flowers at the approach of winter.

In early November, the list of potential nominees was filled with Washington heavyweights, like National Farmers Union president Tom Buis or former Texas Rep. Charles Stenholm, along with former Iowa Gov. Tom Vilsack.

They were superseded by a series of state officials, such as Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius and Pennsylvania Agriculture Secretary Dennis Wolff. Still more potential names surfaced, including first-tem Montana Sen. John Tester and John Boyd, head of the National Black Farmers Association.

One agricultural commentator listed more than a dozen possible candidates at a conference last week, ranging from Patty Judge, the Iowa lieutenant govenor, to Jill Long Thompson, a former USDA official who ran for Indiana governor this year.

Speculation now centers on Colorado Rep. John Salazar, a farmer-rancher and Army veteran. “It’s a real long shot,” Salazar told Reuters. All the same, members of the House Agriculture Committee greeted Salazar like a returning hero when he arrived at a hearing on Monday.

In the Washington parlor game of “Who Gets the Job?” some of the people mentioned for secretary are deemed better candidates for other slots — Dallas Tonsager of the Farm Credit Administration as undersecretary for rural development and lawyer Marshall Matz as undersecretary for nutrition. Matz and Tonsager were prominent in seeking rural votes for Obama. And Californians have been consistent in backing Karen Ross for deputy secretary, the No. 2 post.

South Dakota Rep. Stephanie Herseth Sandlin still draws some attention as a potential nominee. A few congressional staff workers have a theory that Obama eventually will ask the House Agriculture Committee chairman Collin Peterson, despite his frequent disavowals. “It will not be me, I can tell you,” Peterson said a couple of weeks ago.

    — Chuck Abbott

   With the list of candidates narrowing, speculation abounds about who U.S. President-Elect Barack Obama will tap to be energy secretary in his new administration.
    Two of the top candidates mentioned have taken themselves out of the running for the cabinet spot.
    Pennsylvania Governor Ed Rendell, told reporters Monday he had no interest in taking the position as head of the energy department. “I’m a candidate for nothing,” he said.
    Rendell’s lieutenant governor, Catherine Baker Knoll, died earlier this month after a battle with cancer. Knoll’s replacement and Rendell’s successor, if he were to leave his post, is Republican Joe Scarnati.  Rendell said he could not leave Pennsylvania in Scarnati’s hands.
    Senator Jeff Bingaman, the Democratic Chairman of the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources, has also ruled himself out as energy secretary.
    Bingaman recently met with members of Obama’s transition team to discuss the qualifications needed, and mostly likely possible candidates, for the next energy secretary. Bingaman’s committee would have to approve Obama’s nominee.
    Obama has already named about half of his cabinet. He is set to nominate on Wednesday New Mexico governor Bill Richardson, the former energy secretary in the Bill Clinton administration, as commerce secretary.
    With oil prices falling to below $50 this week, the energy secretary post may take on a lower profile. Obama, however, has said he remains committed to revamping energy policy and creating millions of green jobs.
    Some contenders still being floated for the energy position include:
    *Ray Mabus, former Democratic Governor of Mississippi and U.S. ambassador to Saudi Arabia, the world’s biggest oil producer.
    *Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius, a Democrat who fought efforts to allow a coal-fired power plant to expand in her state, saying it would spew more greenhouse gas emissions.
    *John Rowe, chairman and chief executive officer of Exelon Corporation, one of the nation’s largest electric utilities.
    *Dan Reicher, director of climate change and energy initiatives at Google.org.
    *Democratic Representative Jay Inslee, of Washington, who serves on the House Committee on Energy and Commerce. He supports developing a federal program to aggressively invest in alternative energy.

– Ayesha Rascoe

The Bush administration could take advantage of falling oil prices and plummeting fuel demand to replenish millions of barrels of crude into the U.S. emergency petroleum stockpile.
The Energy Department is sitting on a hefty $584 million it raised from selling 11 million barrels of crude to refiners from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve in 2005 after Hurricane Katrina laid waste to the country’s energy infrastructure.  The department wanted to replace the sold barrels, but balked at the cost as the oil price marched relentlessly higher, hitting a record above $147 a barrel in July.
But with a weak economy, crude costs have fallen by more than half to $55 a barrel this week. That is close to the same price the Energy Department sold those 11 million barrels of oil three years ago.
If the department doesn’t use the cash in its piggybank before the Bush administration comes to an end on Jan. 20 some lawmakers want the new Obama administration to use the money to promote alternative energy.
The Energy Department said it is “examining and analyzing” the idea of buying oil for the stockpile now that prices have fallen, but no decision has been made.
Guy Caruso, the former head of the department’s Energy Information Administration who now works at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said buying the oil back  at a delivery rate of 100,000 barrels a day for three and half months would have little market impact and not raise prices.
“With demand being down now, there’s a lot more excess  production capacity. I think producers would love to have a new customer,” Caruso told Reuters. “I think now is an excellent time to do it, unless you’re thinking wait a couple of months and it might be lower,” he added.
The U.S. emergency oil reserve, created by Congress in 1975 after the Arab oil embargo, holds 702 million barrels of crude, but has room for 727 million barrels. The department plans to add 7.7 million barrels of oil to the stockpile from January through May of next year, which would return barrels loaned to refiners this summer when Hurricanes Gustav and Ike disrupted supplies. 

– Tom Doggett

Oil prices are slipping this morning, reacting more to dimming prospects for U.S. growth after a report showed job losses in August than the tropical storms building in the Caribbean.

October crude was last down close to $2 at $105.92 a barrel on the NY Merc — just about the level Iran’s OPEC governor said on Friday is “appropriate.”

Here’s a look at some of the story planning on the Reuters energy team today:

• Checking in on Hurricane Gustav cleanup - it’s been slow. (MMS releases updated production data from Gulf of Mexico in Gustav’s wake (1800 GMT)
• Checking on Entergy’s work to restore power, repair damaged grid
• From Caracas, details of any impact on oil industry from Monday’s electricity blackout.

The latest projections pointed Hurricane Ike toward the middle of the Texas coast, skirting to the west of the main region for offshore production in the Gulf. Nonetheless, oil companies have shut more than 95 percent of offshore production and 90 percent of refining capacity on the mainland. Weakening demand is still the driver for the market this morning; crude oil prices are under pressure

Elsewhere in the oil patch, an U.S. Interior Department report makes for unusually salacious reading, with claims that employees who oversaw oil drilling on federal lands had sex and used illegal drugs with workers at energy companies. “When confronted by our investigators, none of the employees involved displayed remorse,” inspector general Earl Devaney said.

The internal report on the department’s Minerals Management Service emerges a day after Democratic lawmakers in the House of Representatives unveiled legislation that, if passed, would permit offshore drilling at least 50 miles from U.S. coasts.

Some of the stories Reuters commodities reporters are tracking today:

• House Agriculture committee hold hearing on price movements in agriculture and energy commodity markets
• USDA export sales
• US ITC releases base metals import data

It’s like deja vu for the top mining executives who are presenting their corporate pictures this week at the Denver Gold Forum, an annual industry get-together. Just like last year, top mining executives are still grappling with the touchy issues of renewing reserves, controlling costs and struggling to put projects into production.

Here’s a look at some of the latest Reuters stories out of Denver from reporter Frank Tang:

• Barrick confirms cost view
• Freeport CEO says confident on DRC Tenke project
• Barrick to tackle costs with oil assets, new mines
• Newmont sees costs constraining Boddington mine
• Lower copper prices hurting Freeport-McMoran - CEO

More from the Denver Gold Forum

Photo:  A bar of gold bullion is seen in the museum of the Bank of England, in London, March 25, 2008. REUTERS/Luke MacGregor/Files.

A surprise cut in production from OPEC and Hurricane’s Ike’s looming presence in the U.S. Gulf of Mexico are supporting oil prices above $100 a barrel. Just a daily move? Not to some. On OPEC, UBS told clients: ”We think this is a serious deal for a real cut… In this market, direction matters and this is a turn.”

It’s hard to grasp just what’s behind the volatility in oil prices lately, says Jim Landers of the Dallas News, taking on the Bubble Theory for the $40 a barrel drop in oil prices since July 11. (Pictured above: Havana before Ike hit)

Here are some of the stories Reuters commodities reporters are keeping an eye on today:

• MMS releases updated production data from Gulf of Mexico in Gustav’s wake
• Independent report on role of speculators in big oil, commodities price swings
• Denver Gold Conference winds down but not before we’ve heard from miners Freeport, Newmont and Barrick

Mining executives gathering this week for the Denver Gold Forum can’t be blamed for keeping at least half an eye on the market. Gold fell sharply earlier today with the sell-off spilling into other precious metals.

Among the companies presenting, Russia’s Polymetal forecast gold output of 250,000 ounces this year, 300,000 ounces in 2009, and 335,000 ounces in 2010, increasing to 460,000 ounces by 2011. More news from Denver here

Of note among some of the other stories for commodities reporters today:

• Argentine farm leaders due to press demands for changes to govt policy in meetings with lawmakers, possible announcements of fresh protests.

•  Hurricane Ike barrels toward southern Gulf Coast. Watching for impact on cotton market now. (Hitting Key West, Fla. in picture on right)

Hurricane Ike kept oil prices ahead Monday as the storm barrels toward southern Florida but the wider trend on crude prices is less clear. Credit Suisse cut its third quarter 2008 U.S. crude oil forecast to $120 per barrel and fourth quarter forecast to $110 per barrel.

Here are some of the stories Reuters is watching today in other commodities markets.

• USDA issues crop progress report of year
• Day 1 of Consumer Federation of America, Grocery Manufacturers conference on food prices. Agenda is here
• National Farmers Union annual Fall Fly-In begins. Appearances by USDA officials including Agriculture Deputy Secretary Chuck Conner expected. More
• Mexico suspended meat exports to allow checks to comply with U.S. sanitary regulations (Sep 5)