Gov. Rick Scott upends PSC by rescinding appointments - St. Petersburg Times

Mary Ellen Klas

"TALLAHASSEE — The calm that has overtaken the once-embattled Public Service Commission in recent months ended abruptly Wednesday when Gov. Rick Scott withdrew from confirmation four of the five members of the state's utility board."

Senator to present clean energy plan | The Augusta Chronicle

By Sarita Chourey

Morris News Service

Sunday, Jan. 30, 2011

"That's why [Paul] Campbell, a Republican senator from Berkeley County, plans to introduce legislation this year for a clean-energy plan to meet the state's rising energy needs.
'Thirty-eight other states now have either a renewable or clean standard. I don't want to be the last one left out,' Campbell said.
Campbell has been a regular voice in state energy-policy debates, and now is on the energy advisory council of the State Regulation of Public Utilities Review Committee."

Hog farm to generate renewable energy

"A Williamsburg County hog farm will be the site of a new methane gas power generation facility. The farm is partnering with Santee Cooper, Environmental Fabrics Inc. and Clemson University to construct the facility.

The 180-kilowatt Burrows Hall Renewable Energy Facility is expected to begin generating renewable energy for the grid early this summer. It will produce enough power for approximately 90 average South Carolina homes."

Diesel Use in Gas Drilling Cited as Violation of Safe-Water Law - NYTimes.com

By TOM ZELLER Jr.

Published: January 31, 201

"Oil and gas service companies injected tens of millions of gallons of diesel fuel into onshore wells in more than a dozen states from 2005 to 2009, Congressional investigators have charged. Those injections appear to have violated the Safe Water Drinking Act, the investigators said in a letter to the Environmental Protection Agency on Monday.

The diesel fuel was used by drillers as part of a contentious process known as hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, which involves the high-pressure injection of a mixture of water, sand and chemical additives — including diesel fuel — into rock formations deep underground. The process, which has opened up vast new deposits of natural gas to drilling, creates and props open fissures in the rock to ease the release of oil and gas."

Overflows send 5,000 gallons of sewage into Richland Co. waters - WIS News 10 - Columbia, South Carolina |

Logan Smith

"DHEC spokesman Adam Myrick said one spill happened around 1:00pm on Alconbury Court, near Broad River Road. Myrick said about 2,000 gallons of sewage entered Stoops Creek before Alpine Utilities was able to fix the overflow.

Myrick said another spill was located less than half a mile away, on Grove Park Lane off Broad River. About 3,000 gallons of sewage entered a pond through a storm drain"

City faced with subdivision it doesn’t want - Local / Metro - TheState.com

Adam Beam

Council is scheduled to vote on the request tonight at 7. But annexing the property, located off S.C. 277, would require the city to spend $400,000 to fix the area’s private water system, plus an additional $375,000 a year to maintain it. And Police Chief Randy Scott said the expected 542 police calls from the neighborhood every year — more than one per day — would require him to hire four more police officers and spend $290,000 to equip them and $196,000 a year to pay them."