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A high-stakes competition is emerging among energy exporters proposing multi-million-dollar crude terminals along the U.S. Gulf Coast to handle a gusher of shale oil coming from West Texas oilfields. On Monday, private equity firm Carlyle Group became the latest to place a bet, proposing with the Port of Corpus Christi what it said would be the first onshore U.S. export facility able to load the world’s largest crude tankers.

Soo Locks. Photo: U.S. Army Corps. of Engineers President Trump has signed into law sweeping bipartisan legislation that authorizes federal funding for a wide range of water infrastructure projects across the United States, including construction of a second Poe-sized lock at Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan. The America’s Water Infrastructure Act of 2018, which passed the Senate by a vote of 99 to 1, includes the Soo Lock Post-Authorization Change Report that authorizes construction of a second Poe-sized lock. “A second Poe-sized lock was authorized in 1986 but has languished under several Administrations. It was President Trump who made this a...

Apprentice Ryan Buzzy, right, works with Skip Johnson, a trainer for the Stihl Inc. apprenticeship program, on a metalworking lathe in their training area at the Stihl Inc. manufacturing facility in Virginia Beach, Va. (AP Photo/John Minchillo, File) The Labor Department unveiled on Thursday a new website to promote business apprenticeship programs, apprenticeship.gov, billed as a "one-stop source for all things apprenticeship." The free site is essentially a search engine intended to help employers promote opportunities for apprenticeships and to help workers find them. "President Trump’s administration is working to ensure the American workforce has the skills to succeed...

Irving Stroberg made it, dying of cancer in 1977.

The world’s largest cruise ship was delivered to Royal Caribbean International on Friday by STX France at their Saint-Nazaire, France. Symphony of the Seas, Royal Caribbean’s fourth Oasis-class vessel, is 228,081 gross registered tons and measures 362 meters long by 66 meters wide and 70 meters high. The vessel has capacity for 6,800 passengers and 2,000 crew in 2,759 staterooms. By gross tonnage, the Symphony of the Seas takes the title as the largest cruise ship in the world’, surpassing the 226,900 gt Harmony of the Seas, Royal Caribbean’s third Oasis ship which was also built at STX France.

More than nine in ten residents have voted against plans to plant 115 migrants in the small town of Lisdoonvarna, local media reports. The Irish government says there can be “no delay” in beginning to transfer the first batch of asylum seekers it intends to accommodate in a hotel in the town of just 300 people.

Photo at link (give 'em some hits) The first cargo of liquefied natural gas has set sail from the Dominion Energy Cove Point LNG export terminal in Maryland, where the newly constructed liquefaction facility is undergoing final commissioning. The commissioning cargo of natural gas left the Cove Point facility on the Chesapeake Bay on Thursday, March 1, according to Dominion Energy. The cargo was loaded onboard the LNG tanker, Gemmata. Shell NA LNG is providing the natural gas needed for liquefaction during the commissioning process. Once commissioning is complete, the Cover Point terminal will produce LNG for ST Cove Point,...

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(Photos at site) The U.S. Navy on Tuesday assisted in the rescue three fishermen who spent eight days adrift aboard their 19-foot skiff in the South Pacific. The fishermen were first reported missing on February 12 after they failed to return from a fishing trip near Chuuk Lagoon in the Federated States of Micronesia. According to the report, the boat carried food and water, but no safety equipment or radios. Assets from U.S. Coast Guard Sector Guam searched for the vessel for several days before requesting assistance from the U.S. Navy, which tasked crewmembers assigned to the “Fighting Tigers” of...

The LNG carrier Oak Spirit transits the Expanded Panama Canal with a cargo LNG loaded from Cheniere’s Sabine Pass terminal. Photo Credit: Teekay Executives from U.S. LNG exporter Cheniere Energy met with representatives from the Panama Canal this week in Panama to discuss the waterway’s growing LNG vessel segment. (Underlines mine.) Since the opening of the Expanded Panama Canal in 2016, LNG has emerged as the fastest-growing segment for the waterway in part due to the United States emergence as a gas supplier to Asia and other global markets. To date, the Canal’s Neopanamax locks have transited more than 280...

[Reuters] Bit by bit, the U.S. petroleum industry is turning world oil markets inside out. First, sharp drops in U.S. imports of crude oil eroded the biggest market that producers like OPEC had relied on for many years. Now, surging U.S. exports – largely banned by Washington until just two years ago – challenge the last region OPEC dominates: Asia.

[Reuters] In the two years since Washington lifted a 40-year ban on oil exports, tankers filled with U.S. crude have landed in more than 30 countries, ranging from massive economies like China and India to tiny Togo. The repeal has unleashed a flood of U.S. shale oil, undercutting global crude prices, eroding the clout of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and seizing market share from many of its member countries.

[Reuters] California will block the transportation through its state of petroleum from new offshore oil rigs, officials told Reuters on Wednesday, a move meant to hobble the Trump administration’s effort to vastly expand drilling in U.S. federal waters. California’s plan to deny pipeline permits for transporting oil from new leases off the Pacific Coast is the most forceful step yet by coastal states trying to halt the biggest proposed expansion in decades of federal oil and gas leasing.

MainAll NewsUS & CanadaCanadian PM: Sharia law is compatible with democracy Canadian PM: Sharia law is compatible with democracy Justin Trudeau insists Islamic law isn't incompatible with democracy. The American Center for Democracy disagrees. Who's right? Contact Editor Chana Roberts, 05/02/18 15:58 Share Canada continues to support and implement Sharia Law. The American Center for Democracy (ACD) quotes Imam Aasim Rashid of Vancouver, British Columbia, who spoke in October 2017 at Thompson Rivers University, explaining why the Canadian government wants to implement Sharia Law. "I’ll tell you who wants to bring Sharia Law," Thompson said then. "The Canadian government wants...

NEW BRITAIN - A court interpreter was charged by state police Monday with attempted kidnapping after he allegedly tried to lure a 12-year-old girl out of New Britain Superior Court in September. Mahfuz Alhamid, 28, of Meriden, is accused of asking a girl waiting for her mother, who was having a probation meeting, if she would kiss him and go out to the parking lot with him. The girl became frightened and approached a stranger for help at the courthouse, a warrant for Alhamid’s arrest said. The man she asked for help was wearing a court-ordered electronic ankle bracelet and...

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The Military Sealift Command hospital ship USNS Comfort (T-AH 20) arrives in San Juan, Puerto Rico, Oct. 3, 2017. U.S. Navy PhotoMilitary Sealift Command’s hospital ship USNS Comfort (T-AH 20) returned to Naval Station Norfolk after providing life-saving medical care in Puerto Rico in the aftermath of Hurricane Maria. Comfort departed Virginia Sept. 29 and had been in Puerto Rico for almost two months providing disaster relief support after Hurricane Maria devastated the island. Comfort worked with the Puerto Rico Department of Health and U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) to treat patients since it arrived in Puerto...

Wärtsilä 31SG coming off the factory line in Vaasa, Finland. Photo credit: WärtsiläFinnish technology group Wärtsilä has introduced a gas-fueled version of its Wärtsilä 31 marine engine, which is recognized by Guinness World Records as the world’s most efficient 4-stroke diesel engine. The engine, dubbed the Wärtsilä 31SG, builds on the efficiency of the successful Wärtsilä 31 engine, but with added flexibility and efficiency compared to its conventionally-fueled and dual-fuel predecessor. “The defining feature of the Wärtsilä 31SG is its ability to achieve simple-cycle efficiency levels in excess of 50 % (compared to around 40 % with modern gas turbines),...

Captain Paul Watson from the controversial marine conservation group Sea Shepherd says that a lack of resources and technology compared to the Japanese whalers has made it impossible for the group to effectively combat the killing of whales in the Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary. As the Japanese whaling fleet embarks on its annual whale hunt in the Southern Ocean, for the first time in 12 years Sea Shepherd will not be sending ships to the whale sanctuary. The group initially announced the decision to end the yearly campaign in August. “The reason that Sea Shepherd Conservation Society is not now...