Friday, May 29, 2009

MTA Likes Bond Traders So Much to Forgo Subway Cars

Michael Quint/ Bloomberg

May 29 (Bloomberg) -- The first winners in the Metropolitan Transportation Authority’s $750 million bond sale were traders who bought and unloaded the debt immediately for a quick profit, not commuters on the 5:49 p.m. train from New York to Scarsdale.

The April issue was part of President Barack Obama’s Build America Bond program to let local governments borrow at lower cost by having the U.S. Treasury bear 35 percent of their interest expense. The MTA, operator of the nation’s largest transit system, is raising fares an average of 10 percent starting next month to help cover a $1.8 billion budget deficit.

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Wednesday, May 27, 2009

Stimulus bucks set for infrastructure

May 27, 2009

Allissa Kline/Business First

Western New York is set to receive an additional $11.4 million for infrastructure projects as part of the federal stimulus package.

Gov. David Paterson last week announced that several local projects had been certified to meet federal stimulus regulations. Project certifications are required in order to receive the stimulus funding.

The latest influx of government money will be used for highway and bridge repairs in several Western New York counties. Total American Recovery and Reinvestment Act funding dedicated to the region’s shovel-ready transportation projects now totals $43.3 million, the governor said.

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Wednesday, May 20, 2009

Google Smart-grid Service

May 20, 2009 Martin LaMonica/ CNET News

Google has signed on smart-meter manufacturer Itron and eight utilities to offer Goo
gle's PowerMeter Web service for monitoring home energy use.

PowerMeter reads a home's electricity meter and gives the consumer a detailed readout of usage. The idea is that a better understanding of electricity usage--presented via daily trends and data on individual appliances--will help people figure out how to cut consumption.

Google's home energy-monitoring software relies on meters, or add-on devices, that can communicate usage information back to utilties. In a blog post on Tuesday, Google engineer Ed Lu said that the company is seeking to find more smart-meter vendors and utilities to offer PowerMeter.

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SWFs: Not So Big and Scary Anymore

May 20, 2009

Bob Davis/Wallstreet Journal

A year ago, Washington and Brussels worried that sovereign wealth funds from oil-rich countries and Asian exporters could become tools of economic dominance. With an estimated $3 trillion in assets — and supposedly on their way rapidly to $10 trillion — they could give the
governments that own them a powerful lift.

That was then. This is now: SWFs have crash landed along with the rest of global capitalism. According to Monitor Group, a Cambridge, Mass., consulting firm, the funds have lost $57.2 billion on the publicly disclosed investments of $125.7 billion they have made since 2006.
Licking their wounds, the funds began to invest mostly at home after the globa
l economy nosedived at the end of last year, Monitor says, not in the U.S. and Europe.

By the way, Monitor notes, the funds aren’t all that they were cracked up to be anyway. They now have roughly $1.8 trillion in assets. And they are likely to grow to between $5 trillion and $6 trillion in 2012, roughly half of what Monitor and others forecast last year.

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Tuesday, May 19, 2009

Trade Wars Brewing In Economic Malaise

May 15, 2009


Anthony Faiola & Lori Montgomery/Washington Post

Is this what the first trade war of the global economic crisis looks like?

Ordered by Congress to "buy American" when spending money from the $787 billion stimulus package, the town of Peru, Ind., stunned its Canadian supplier by rejecting sewage pumps made outside of Toronto. After a Navy official spotted Canadian pipe fittings in a construction project at Camp Pendleton, Calif., they were hauled out of the ground and replaced with American versions. In recent weeks, other Canadian manufacturers doing business with U.S. state and local governments say they have been besieged with requests to sign affidavits pledging that they will only supply materials made in the USA.

Outrage spread in Canada, with the Toronto Star last week bemoaning "a plague of protectionist measures in the U.S." and Canadian companies openly fretting about having to shift jobs to the United States to meet made-in-the-USA requirements. This week, the Canadians fired back. A number of Ontario towns, with a collective population of nearly 500,000, retaliated with measures effectively barring U.S. companies from their municipal contracts -- the first shot in a larger campaign that could shut U.S. companies out of billions of dollars worth of Canadian projects.

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Monday, May 18, 2009

Natural gas storage facility under construction

May 16, 2009
Steve Sanders/Laurel Leader-Call


Nearly a half a billion dollar project began in January to create a natural gas storage facility in two salt domes encompassing over 400 acres in Smith and Jasper counties. When completed and in service -- projected to be by the summer of 2010 -- the facility will provide up to 32 billion cubic feet of working gas capacity.

A 43-mile pipeline system will stretch from between Smith, Jasper and Clarke counties and inner-connect with Transco, Tennessee, Gulf South, Southern National and Destin gas pipeline companies and also the proposed Kinder-Morgan Express Pipelines.

One of the elements is a compressor station which pushes the gas down into the ground. It will be located close to the salt dome in Smith which is close to Stringer in Jasper County. A portion of the pipeline will be built from Stringer to past Heidelberg.

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Natural Gas Set to Give Back Most of Rally: Technical Analysis

May 18, 2009

Reg Curren/Bloomberg

Natural gas futures are poised to give back of their recent gains as a head-and-shoulders pattern that formed last week signaled a reversal, according to a technical analysis by John Kilduff, senior vice president of energy at MF Global Inc.

The pattern was created during trading May 12 through May 15, with a surge above $4.50 per million British thermal units on May 13 forming the head, Kilduff said in a telephone interview. Gas reached $4.575 before beginning a decline.

Natural gas futures had risen from $3.155 per million Btu on April 27, the lowest since Sept. 5, 2002, amid speculation that supplies will decline as drilling slows. Prices gained 22 percent in the week ended May 8, the biggest increase in more than two years.

“We’re going to give back the majority of this move, so I’d look for it to give back $1,” he said. “It’s going to be pretty quick because there’s not been a lot of conviction in this buying. This was a rally built on sand.”

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Friday, May 15, 2009

What Are The ‘Top 100′ Infrastructure Projects In the US?

You know the “Top 100 ” for most other important aspects of life–literature, film, hot people, Canadian diddies, the British meat industry–why not US public works projects? Why not, indeed, says infrastructure development firm CG/LA Infrastructure which has pulled together just such a list for 2009.

As a sign of the times, the projects are heavily weighted toward rail and urban mass transit this year, with rail alone occupying four of the top eight positions by project value:

California High-Speed Rail High Speed Rail Passenger - $45 billion (creating 686,250 jobs)
Northeast Corridor HSR Upgrade - $32 billion (488,000 jobs)
I-69 Trans Texas Corridor Highway - $30 billion (600,000 jobs)
Natural Gas pipeline from Alaska to Chicago - $26 billion (520,000 jobs)
Networx program - East Coast - $20 billion (1,000,000 jobs)
NextGen Air Traffic Control System, East Coast - $20 billion (360,000 jobs)
Midwestern HSR Initiative - $20 billion (305,000 jobs)
Electric Freight Rail - $20 billion (400,000 jobs)

Access the Top 100 Projects

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Bridge owner sues, raises racial-bias argument

May 14--WASHINGTON -- The pitched battle over who gets to build a second bridge span crossing the Detroit River has landed in court, with the private owner of the existing Ambassador Bridge arguing that supporters of a proposed rival span are protecting a predominately white, middle-class neighborhood across the border in Windsor, Ontario, while sacrificing a neighborhood of poor Hispanics and blacks in southwest Detroit.

The Detroit International Bridge Co. -- controlled by trucking magnate Manuel (Matty) Moroun and owner of the 80-year-old Ambassador Bridge, the busiest trade crossing in North America -- filed a lawsuit in U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C. today alleging that federal highway officials violated the law by signing off on an environmental impact study of a rival bridge to be located a little more than a mile downriver.

Dan Stamper, president of the bridge company, called the approval process "a sham from the beginning," saying the rival bridge's supporters -- among them federal, state and provincial officials in Canada and the United States -- were promoting a bridge designed to siphon traffic away from the Ambassador Bridge and its own proposed second span by publishing erroneous traffic statistics and potentially wasting billions of taxpayer dollars.

The lawsuit named the Federal Highway Administration and its Michigan director, James Steele, as defendants and asked that backers of the so-called Detroit River International Crossing, or DRIC, be stopped from taking any more steps toward building the span, including the acquisition of property in Detroit's Delray neighborhood.

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Thursday, May 14, 2009

Largest Off-shore Wind Farm Boost

May 13, 2009 - Engineering News Record

Plans to build the world's largest offshore wind farm off the Kent coast are to go ahead.

Power giant E.ON said the first phase of the London Array project would start later this year and it could be generating power in time for the 2012 Olympics.

The wind farm will be built 12 miles off the UK coast and will involve 341 turbines.

Click to read full article

Top 100 Infrastructure Projects Worth $465B

May 13, 2009

William B. Cassidy/The Journal of Commerce Online

Wednesday, May 13, 2009

Top 100 Infrastructure Projects List Released


www.cgmasi.com/eyeontechnology

And, you thought the infrastructure-spending portion of the Obama Administration's Stimulus Plan was a waste of time and money. CG/LA Infrastructure LLC means to dispel that idea. One way to do so is to identify the top 100 infrastructure projects now in the works, and publish the list, which they've now done.

The Top 100 US Strategic Infrastructure Projects is available as a free download. Readers interested in this topic might want to register for the the North America Strategic Infrastructure Leadership Forum to be held September 22 - 24, 2009 at the Omni Shoreham Hotel in Washington, DC.

"These projects will form the backbone for a new, competitive US economy and breathe life into the Obama government's vision going forward," according to Norman F. Anderson, President and CEO of CG/LA. Led by both the Obama Administration's commitment to improving the nation's faltering infrastructure stock and by a regional drive towards carbon-neutral energy and productive infrastructure, the North American Leadership Forum will host not only the top projects in the US, but also the leading projects in Canada and Mexico. "The US economy is in trouble, and these projects define a powerfully competitive, critical path forward," says Anderson.


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Singapur está interesado en invertir en el país en puertos y aeropuertos

A su criterio, Paraguay fue un país que marcó el rumbo. “Incluso, Norman F. Anderson, presidente de CG/LA Infrastructure, consultora organizadora del encuentro, que está casado con una paraguaya y habla perfectamente el guaraní, en cada intervención durante el foro, lo hacía en guaraní. Es un lobbista muy importante y nosotros debemos aprovechar estas situaciones”.

Eduardo Clari, de Rediex, dijo que buscaron captar el interés de empresarios en la maquinización de Yguazú, concesión de la Ruta 2 y concesión de aeropuertos.
Una empresa de Singapur, experta y número uno en inversiones en puertos, aeropuertos y construcción de viviendas, mostró mucho interés de venir a radicar capitales en Paraguay. Fue en el 7º Foro Latinoamericano de Liderazgo “Infraestructura de Primer Nivel en Latinoamérica - La Oportunidad es Ahora!”, realizado del 27 al 29 de abril, en Houston, Texas, Estados Unidos.

“Una cosa que me llamó mucho la atención fue que una empresa de Singapur, experta y número uno en lo que es puertos, aeropuertos y construcción de viviendas, mostró mucho interés de venir a Paraguay”, declaró ayer Eduardo Clari, director de Ambiente de Negocios, de la Red de Inversiones y Exportaciones (Rediex), quien formó parte de la misión público-privada que participó del encuentro internacional.

En el cónclave, tres de los 55 proyectos de infraestructura de la región fueron presentados por Paraguay ante unos 500 líderes empresariales. El objetivo fue buscar inversores para dichos proyectos, teniendo en cuenta que estos quedaron en la página web del organizador.

Clari indicó que Roberto Salinas, de la Iniciativa para la Integración Regional Sudamericana (IIRSA), presentó el proyecto de maquinización de la represa de Yguazú y las líneas de transmisiones de alta tensión (que ya se está encaminando con créditos del BID).

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Latinoamérica con baja capacidad para crear infraestructura

CG/LA Infrastructure LLC ha realizado una encuesta entre los principales ejecutivos de infraestructura en América Latina para medir los ocho requerimientos críticos para la creación de infraestructura en la región. De una calificación minima aprobatoria de 56 puntos, América Latina obtiene 48, muy por debajo de los requerimientos mínimos para un efectivo manejo de proyectos y atracción de inversiones. En general, el sector público obtiene las calificaciones más bajas por su incapacidad para analizar técnicamente los proyectos e ineficiencia en el manejo de ofertas públicas así como por la falta de liderazgo.

La encuesta incluye 15 países de forma individual y aún puede participar utilizando el siguiente
link.

Monday, May 11, 2009

Electric railway sought

May 7, 2009

Alan Gersten/Reuters

Transfesa, a Spanish firm, wants to revitalise the country's ageing railroad system through a US$300m, 400km project, using 70% financing and 30% capital investment. This would be a 30-year concession, with the main railroad running for 220km from Limon to Caldera, from the Atlantic to the Pacific.

Emilio Fernandez, president of Transfesa, said his company presented the proposal to the Costa Rican government last year, but officials had yet to make a decision. He said the railroad had fallen into disrepair and needs revitalisation. The roads in Costa Rica are bad, and that creates problems trying to move goods around the country. Fernandez estimated he would need five years to raise the capital for the project in addition to the 30-year concession.

Fernandez was speaking at the 7th annual Latin American Leadership Forum in Houston. Like many there, he was interested in finding financing for his project, a tough task in today's environment. The country wants to build an electric railway system in the San Jose metropolitan area, which will be a US$520m, 30-year concession covering 18.5km. The first section will run for 10km with eight stations, the second for 3km with four stations and the third for 5.5km with eight stations. Bidding will take place in the second half of the year, and the IDB will provide a US$100m loan this year.

There will be 28 trains of six cars each, carrying 520 passengers. Construction will start in 2011, with two years for the first phase, and one year for the next. The fare will be 75 cents and the project will have an 11-year payback.

The project is designed to reorganise the public transport system in the Greater San Jose area, now plagued with traffic congestion. Also, the project will activate the right side of the railway, which is now inactive, creating a two-directional track that will ease auto congestion and cut carbon dioxide emissions.

Road needs US$1.8bn

May 2009

Alan Gersten/Reuters

The Ruta del Sol road, the country's largest transportation project, is seeking US$1.8bn in private financing to complete two parts of its three-section highway. The first part will be solely government-financed because it involves the most difficult terrain through mountainous parts of the country. This is a one-lane road that the government wants to expand to two lanes to improve traffic flow.

The first section of 78.5km will cost US$687.5m and go from La Villeta to Puerto Salgar. This is the most expensive, so the government decided to finance it totally. The second part will go from Puerto Salgar to San Roque, a total of 528km and cost US$1.1bn. The third section will go from San Roque to Santa Marta, a total of 465km and costing US$776m. The final section also includes a cross valley area and runs from Valleduera to El Carmen de Bolivar.

Andres Escobar Arango, sub-director for the Departamento Nacional de Planeacion, said his government was working with the IFC to arrange financing. He was also looking for private financing, he said, speaking at the 7th annual Latin American Leadership Forum, organised by CG/LA Infrastructure, based in Washington. The National Planning Department, along with the National Highway Institute, is planning the concession terms for the highway.

Government to finance Farac II

May 7, 2009

Alan Gersten/Reuters

The head of the SCT told PFI that the government would finance 75% of Farac II, if necessary, with the winning concessionaire supplying the remaining 25% in equity. "We're willing to do it if no one else will," said Jose San Martin Romero, SCT's director general, in an interview between sessions of the 7th annual Latin American Leadership Forum in Houston.

Farac II, the oft-delayed toll road project, is so crucial that the government will take whatever measures necessary to complete the endeavour. That means that Banobras and Fonadin, two government entities, will supply 75% of the financing, if needed, to complete the project. Fonadin will supply 30% of that financing and Banobras 70%.

During the conference, Banobras's general director confirmed the government entity's commitment. Banobras will supply funding "to avoid derailing of infrastructure project
s", said Alonso Garcia Tames.

Farac II was too big, Garcia said. Therefore, the government cut the concession in half and reduced the cost to US$711m from US$2bn. The SCT agreed and also cut Farac II in half. Now, it has become the North Pacific and South Pacific. The North Pacific, or Farac II, will have 200km of existing roads and 110km of new roads, including two brownfield roads and three greenfield ones. Bids are due by July 10 and the award is set for August 4.

In the new solicitation, the two existing highways are the Mazatlán–Culiacán and the San Jose del Cabo highway, in addition to the construction of three new highways: de Mazatlán, Culiacán y el Corredor and Turistico de Los Cabos. The projects left out of the new concession will be Guadalajara–Tepic, the construction of Sur de Guadalajara, the highway de Tepic, the highway de Puerto Vallarta and Jala–Compostela y el Compostela Puerto Vallarta.

The South Pacific will have 190km of three new roads and 168km of one existing road for a total cost of US$1.6bn. That was tendered on April 21, with interested companies making their proposals by December 16 and the award set for January 20 2010. Construction will start on May 31 2010 and take about two years.

"Our role is to maintain the life of the projects," Garcia said. For example, Farac II took years to prepare and remains too important to the government, so Banobras "will provide a solution" he said.

Previously, deals like this were 75%–25%, debt-to-equity, but now that has jumped to 50–50 "but less equity is available", Garcia said. Also, there are no syndications, only club deals with no risk as well as a sharp reduction in the value of projects. Therefore, Banobras must "think differently". The organisation must handle grants, equity, subordinated debt and guarantees. On the flip side, the organisation has suddenly become very popular with developers.

Fonadin and Banobras will make the debt financing because Farac II will supply badly needed employment as well as giving the country a psychological boost. Roads in Mexico, especially in the South, are congested, in need of repair and overall bad.

Some project finance bankers say that Carlos Slim, the Mexican billionaire, will win the Farac II bidding as a consolation prize because he lost out to ICA on Farac I two years ago. San Martin said Slim was guaranteed nothing, adding that the billionaire had lost out on 20 concession bids in Mexico. However, San Martin said that Slim would be a "strong bidder".

Slim's Ideal and ICA, Mexico's largest construction company, were the only two bidders for Farac II on February 27. But the SCT deemed both bids inadequate, cancelled the auction and rescheduled it.

"Eighteen months ago Farac I was a success," San Martin said. The toll roads raised US$4bn, more than twice what the SCT had expected. Now confident, the SCT launched Farac II.

"At that time, the bigger the better," San Martin said. So, the SCT developed Farac II as a "huge project". Then everything changed. The world's economy took a tumble, dragging Farac II down with it. There were no monolines, no syndications, no lending. "Small is beautiful," San Martin said.

For the February Farac II auction, Banco Nacional de Obras y Servicios Publicos (Banobras), the federal development bank, had pledged Ps15bn (US$1.02bn), and Fonadin, the sovereign fund for infrastructure, had pledged Ps5bn (US$340.2m). The government tried a staple financing, but none of that worked.

The SCT reviewed its package, going to Paris, Spain and New York to talk to the major players. "They told us: 'Look, at this time, you have to make smaller packages'," San Martin said. That's exactly what the government did.

Stimulus funds can rebuild passenger rail infrastructure

May 9, 2009

Matt Zimmerman/The Emporia Gazette

AS PEOPLE across Kansas observe National Train Day today, the anniversary of the first transcontinental railroad, Emporia should also consider a future that includes a thriving passenger rail system. Members of the Northern Flyer Alliance, a growing economic development alliance across Kansas, see an immediate opportunity to use the economic stimulus funding to achieve a long-time goal – reviving passenger rail as a tool for economic revitalization, energy efficiency and a solid transportation infrastructure.

Picture this. Passenger rail bringing visitors to downtown Emporia from rural Kansas and beyond, generating a vibrant cultural and economic environment that will bring people back to our city’s core. Passenger rail has the potential to connect outlying communities and stimulate economic recovery along the route. Rail transportation also will allow east central Kansas to become less vulnerable to energy, environmental, and infrastructure problems in the future.

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Stimulus Package Underwhelms Infrastructure Investors

May 7, 2009

Keenan Skelly/Wall Street Journal

Investors and lawmakers attending the Dow Jones Infrastructure Summit Thursday weren’t particularly enthused about the $30 billion that President Barack Obama’s administration has slated for infrastructure in its economic stimulus package.

Their biggest issue: it simply isn’t enough, not coming anywhere close to the $2 trillion estimated to be needed to help the U.S.’s infrastructure catch up to that in many other developed nations.

“The stimulus is a down payment,” said Patrick Natale, executive director of the American Society of Civil Engineers, which gave U.S. infrastructure a grade of D- in 2008. “It’s a start but there’s a lot more to do.”

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U.S. water infrastructure needs seen as urgent

May 8, 2009

Jim Christie/Reuters
New York

The crumbling U.S. infrastructure is routinely in plain sight, from potholes strewn across interstate highways built during the Eisenhower administration to rusting Depression-era bridges connecting those old highways.

At its most extreme, neglect can turn catastrophic: Experts had long expressed concern that New Orleans' aging levees could fail in the face of a major hurricane and they did dramatically in the wake of Hurricane Katrina in 2005.

By contrast, the condition of the nation's water infrastructure is often hidden from view. Drinking water and efficient sewage disposal is taken for granted along with the safety of the buried pipes, but was much on the minds of several guests at this week's Reuters Infrastructure Summit.

Out of sight, water infrastructure remained largely out of mind for U.S. policymakers in the federal economic stimulus effort. The $787 billion program allotted less than $10 billion for drinking and wastewater projects.

State and local officials will not turn the cash away but they say much more is needed to fix and add capacity to the nation's water systems.

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Mexico's ICA eyes Pemex infrastructure boom

May 7, 2009

Reuters

Mexican construction giant ICA, a big winner from Mexico's infrastructure drive, expects state oil company Pemex to take over leadership in rolling out new mega-projects, the company's chief financial officer said.

Pemex is poised to kick off several major projects including clean gasoline and diesel fuel plants at its six refineries, several cryogenic gas processing plants and a planned new oil refinery that could cost $10 billion.

"Pemex is reactivating," Alonso Quintana told the Reuters Latin American Investment Summit on Thursday.

"They are finally rolling out projects that had been up in the air, like the clean gasoline program."

ICA does much of its work in the energy industry through a 50-50 joint venture with U.S. engineering giant Fluor Corp.

The company boosted its order backlog to approximately 40 billion pesos last year and is projecting revenues to grow as much as 30 percent in 2009 as work on major projects, such as a new Metro line in Mexico City and a major hydroelectric dam, progress.

"It's a big challenge (to keep our order book stable), but yes it is possible, especially with Pemex as the driver," Quintana said.

Click to read full article

Friday, May 8, 2009

Recession whets US appetite for PPP


May 7, 2009

Ed Owen/ New Civil Engineer

The recession has prompted US interest in Public-Private Partnerships (PPP), such as the Private Finance Initiative (PFI), a form of procurement the US has traditionally resisted.

According to research from Halcrow and McGraw-Hill Construction, 92% of experienced state and local officials are ‘interested’ in PPP, while 71% think PPP is just as or more attractive during the financial crisis.

“We are faced with a great opportunity—the opportunity to lead with new thinking regarding infrastructure funding, particularly through vehicles such as PPP,” said Halcrow’s North American president Michael Della Rocca.

“I fundamentally believe it is within our collective ability to redefine the funding, procurement, implementation, management and renewal of our infrastructure assets and provide a network that will make a genuinely positive difference to people’s lives and to the broader wealth of America.”

The report suggests that despite massive investment announced in infrastructure in the President Obama’s 2009 stimulus package - £33.2bn (US$50bn) for transportation alone.

According to the research: “This is only a fraction of the funding needed long-term. The U.S. is facing serious challenges as its roads, bridges and tunnels deteriorate.”

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Thursday, May 7, 2009

U.S. Infrastructure Bond Fund gets Second Look

New York
May 6, 2009

Jim Christie/Reuters

As U.S. policymakers focus on aging infrastructure, they must also consider creating new vehicles for financing public works, including a national bond fund partnering with Social Security, public pension and private equity funds.

Richard Little of the Keston Institute for Public Finance and Infrastructure Policy told the Reuters Infrastructure Summit that his idea for such a fund seemed odd a year ago to officials in Washington.

Now, officials are giving it a second look in the face of the trillions of dollars in infrastructure work the United States may require in coming decades at the same time as liabilities from federal entitlement program will swell, Little said on Wednesday.

"I don't see anyone having a sustainable (funding) model in place for general government, let alone infrastructure," Little said. "Why not create a vehicle where the federal government could issue infrastructure bonds?"

Click to read full article

CG/LA Infrastructure Announces Projects of the Year Nominees

HOUSTON, TX
April 24, 2009

The 7th Annual Latin American Leadership Forum announces the nominees for six Project of the Year awards, to be presented at next week's event in Houston. According to Norman F. Anderson, President & CEO of CG/LA Infrastructure, "At a time when infrastructure is the critical economic issue for all of the countries in the Americas, these projects are the examples to be followed." The Leadership Forum -- featuring the Top 50 projects in Latin America, with 500+ participating executives -- will be held from April 27 to 29th at the Westin Galleria in Houston.

Click to read full article

Guatemala sees more oil exploration

Claudia Perez Rivas

Guatemala is awaiting the approval for a tender offering of 12 exploration blocks in the country’s Peten and Pacific basins.

At a presentation given at the 7th Latin American Leadership Forum in Houston, Texas, it was reported that the exploration projects were in the preliminary stages seeking approval from the president and the ministry council.

The projected investment needed to carry out the exploratory programmes of the blocks comes to about $250 million.

The blocks consist of three offshore areas in the Pacific basin and nine other areas in onshore Peten basin.

The projects are designed to expand oil exploration in the country already suffering from an energy crisis.

Latin American Leadership Forum

April 20, 2009

The Greater Houston Partnership hosted a news conference this morning to announce the 7th Annual Latin American Leadership Forum that will be held in Houston next week.


"One of the things that I wanted to accomplish when I came here as president of the Greater Houston Convention & Visitors Bureau was to marry up the economic demographics of Houston and the groups that we brought, and also to do more international business," said Greg Ortale, in opening the news conference, citing next week's forum as an example of success in both areas, giving credit to Port of Houston Authority Commissioner Jim Fonteno for his part in attracting the conference.

"The trade relations between North and South America hold so much potential, not for just what's there now, but for the growth," said Harris County Judge Ed Emmett. "I think we are going to see that be really our blossoming flower, if you will, of international trade."

Click to read full article

$50.4 Billion in Infrastructure Projects Announced at the 7th Annual Latin American Leadership Forum

"World-Class Infrastructure In The Americas The Opportunity Is Now!"
Houston, TX

Apr 6, 2009

The 7th Annual Latin American Leadership Forum, announces the Top 50 infrastructure projects in Latin America, to be presented by project developers from throughout the Americas on April 27-29, in Houston, TX. Total project value exceeds $50 billion, across 10 infrastructure sectors, with total job creation of 2 million jobs / year. VIPs from around the region are participating, including the governor of São Paulo, Brasil, and the CEO of the Panama Canal Authority.

"What we are seeing is an explosion of infrastructure project opportunities in the region," according to Norman F. Anderson, President & CEO of CG/LA Infrastructure, the Leadership Forum organizer. "The public and private sectors throughout the region are making a serious decision to double the level of infrastructure investment, and build their way out of the crisis." The 500+ executives participating in the Forum include executives from leading oil & gas firms, including Pemex and Petrobras, along with global engineering/construction and technology/equipment firms. "The Forum is specifically designed to bring them all together," according to Anderson.

Click to read full article

Wednesday, May 6, 2009

Telvent's Smart Grid Demonstration Project in a Box Helps Utilities

Telvent , the IT company for a sustainable and secure world, announced it is offering its proven Smart Grid Solution components as a pre-configured package to help a single utility or group of utilities assess the value of Smart Grid technologies. This unique development, named Demonstration Project in a Box, will allow deployment of a supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) system, distribution management system (DMS), outage management system (OMS), and advanced metering infrastructure (AMI) - in a scaled integration that matches the utilities' business case.

The Demonstration Project in a Box concept builds on Telvent's already-popular Pilot-in-a-Box approach that provides electric meters, communications infrastructure, and head-end software in a fully working, low-cost and low-risk system. The Demonstration Project in a Box extends this concept, adding its Smart Operations Suite modules for SCADA, DMS, OMS and GIS, all interfaced with Telvent's Smart Integration Framework.

Jeff Meyers, head of Telvent's Smart Grid Solution initiative, reported that utilities will find the Demonstration Project in a Box very useful in validating a specific business case. "The Telvent Demonstration Project will enable a utility to deploy smart grid technology in a range of scales, from a single feeder to a set of feeders to a group of substations," he explained. "Further, it is modular in design, so the utility deploys the technologies it needs, no more and no less, to demonstrate a particular use case or set of use cases." To illustrate, he described how a utility might deploy a Demonstration Project with AMI and OMS components to assess how smart metering can affect reliability and outage response, while another utility might implement SCADA and DMS together with voltage regulation and/or capacity controls to reduce or flatten voltage profile on specific feeders.

"Telvent is eminently prepared for today's demand for smart grid operations," emphasized Telvent's Chairman Manuel Sanchez. "Our components all feature open architecture and can be fully integrated with standard technologies. As a result, the energy provider benefits from interoperability that can optimize the two-way, real-time information system best meeting its needs. This focus on interoperability and security allows our clients to feel confident that they can move forward today with a solution that will be effective as Smart Grid technology grows and evolves."

Monday, May 4, 2009

Conservative wins Panamanian vote

By Adam Thomson, Mexico City

A supermarket owner has won Panama’s presidential election, paving the way for a rightwing, business friendly government to lead the tiny Central American nation for the next five years.

With most of the vote counted, 57-year-old Ricardo Martinelli was winning Sunday night with just over 60 per cent. Balbina Herrera, leftwing candidate for the incumbent Democratic Revolutionary Party (PRD), was trailing far behind with just 37 per cent.

In a speech late Sunday, Mr Martinelli called for national unity. “This is a victory for all the people of Panama,” he told voters. “I make a call to all our opposition – to all the parties that opposed us – that you all are all Panamanians... Tomorrow we have to start a new day.”

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