Both parties admit the choice for president will be clear. The energy debate is no less cloudy.

On climate change, both Democratic candidates Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton espouse a cap-and-trade emissions program with an auction of 100 percent of emission credits to force emitters to quantify their pollution levels. The objective in both senators' plans is to get emissions 80 percent below 1990 levels by 2050.

Sen. John McCain, the likely Republican candidate, pledged a "market-based energy reform" that would rely far less on government subsidies.

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New Smog Rules are Here
By Ken Silverstein, Energy Biz Insider

Tougher smog rules are here. But the clean air debate once again illustrates the divide between a conservative, pro-industry administration and its harshest critics among the environmental and health communities. The standards aim to protect public health and set out to limit ozone pollution, or smog, by utilities and other manufacturers as well as the automotive sector.

The Environmental Protection Agency took the middle road. Ground level ozone, whose main component is smog and which contributes to heart and respiratory ailments, is triggered when sunlight reacts with nitrogen oxides and volatile organic compounds. The new rule changes the current standard of 80-84 parts per billion to 75 parts per billion. EPA's own scientific experts said that the threshold should be lowered to between 60 and 70 parts per billion, all to minimize the number of premature deaths.

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ConocoPhillips, BP Plan Pipeline for Alaska Gas

The two oil giants said they will spend $600 million over the next three years on a design for a project that industry experts say could cost more than $30 billion, potentially making it the largest private construction project ever in North America.

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Gas Producers Rush to Pennsylvania

Natural-gas producers are swarming into Pennsylvania to chase what many are betting could be the next big thing: a thick wedge of gas-bearing rock called the Marcellus Shale.

The recent surge in interest was triggered by disclosures in the fall from producer Range Resources Corp. of Fort Worth, Texas, that it had drilled a well there producing more than three million cubic feet of natural gas a day, proving that Marcellus Shale wells can be profitable. Since then, Range has reported wells that produce even more gas.

The result is a land rush unmatched anywhere else in North America as companies try to snap up drilling acreage on a giant swath of rock stretching from West Virginia across Pennsylvania to the northeast corner of the state, 90 miles from New York City.

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