Royal Dutch Shell's bid to drill in the Arctic this summer took another step forward on Friday when the U.S. Interior Department approved its oil spill response plan for the Chukchi Sea.

Shell's response plan would allow the company to rapidly contain a massive spill in the challenging Arctic environment, the department said.

The United States must urgently work to find a new central site to house its spent nuclear fuel and probe whether Japan's nuclear disaster has any safety implications for storage at the country's plants, a federal panel said on Thursday.

The U.S. government has struggled with how to manage the 65,000 tons of radioactive waste produced by its nuclear reactors over decades and stored throughout the country.

BP will be allowed to participate in an upcoming U.S. offshore oil and gas lease sale despite its role in the largest offshore oil spill in U.S. history, a top government regulator said on Thursday.

Michael Bromwich, head of the newly formed Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement, said his agency determined that it would not be appropriate to ban BP from obtaining new leases to drill offshore.

"They don't have a deeply flawed record offshore," Bromwich told reporters after testifying at a House Natural Resources committee hearing.

The U.S. Energy Department finalized loan guarantees for two major solar projects on Wednesday, as the deadline loomed for the government's renewable-energy incentive program.

The government wrapped up deals that would back $737 million in financing for a solar thermal plant sponsored by privately held SolarReserve LLC and $337 million in financing for a Sempra Energy photovoltaic solar project.

With funding for the government's loan program set to expire at the end of the week, investors have been watching to see what deals will be completed before time runs out.

The nuclear regulator said on Thursday that it will require operators of the nation's 104 nuclear reactors to review their earthquake risks as part of an ongoing update of seismic hazards for power plants.

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission said it will provide existing plants with a seismic analysis tool later this year that will allow plants to perform "an updated review."

Lax trade restrictions and high sugar prices should allow the United States to overtake Brazil in ethanol exports during the second half of 2011, the U.S. Energy Information Administration said on Wednesday.

During the first five months of 2011 U.S. ethanol exports more than doubled from the same period last year, the EIA said.

"For the remainder of 2011, it is likely that the United States will surpass Brazil as the world's largest ethanol exporter due to recent supply shortages and resulting high sugar prices in Brazil," the EIA said in its weekly petroleum report.

A federal panel sketched out its first vision of a regulatory roadmap for the booming shale natural gas industry on Thursday, urging more transparency on the use of chemicals and more careful treatment of waste water.

In a report closely watched by leading energy companies who fear higher costs from more government oversight, the panel acknowledged that the risk of the chemical fluids used to crack open shale fissures leaking into drinking water was "remote", but offered a host of ways the industry could win greater public trust for the controversial process of "fracking".

The House of Representatives on Tuesday approved legislation that would set a firm deadline for the Obama administration to decide the fate of a proposed $7 billion pipeline that would transport Canadian oil sands crude to the U.S. Gulf Coast.

The House voted 279-147 in favor of the bill that would force the State Department to approve or deny a permit for TransCanada's planned Keystone XL pipeline by November 1.

Republican Congressman Ed Whitfield said the bill would cut through the "endless delays" that have held up the pipeline for nearly three years.

Some nuclear plants could do a better job preparing for a catastrophic event, including ensuring safety equipment is in good working order, the top federal nuclear regulator said on Friday.

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