Senate Panel Greenlights Oil Exports, Offshore Drilling

The moves show momentum for upgrading the nation’s energy infrastructure and lifting a decades-old ban.

It was a big day for energy.

Measures that would end the U.S. oil export ban, ease restrictions on offshore drilling, support energy efficiency and upgrade the nation’s electricity infrastructure won approval from the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee on Thursday, clearing a substantial hurdle to head toward full Senate debate.

“Nobody’s getting everything they want, that’s for darn sure, but I do think this is an impressive journey that we have gone down in the past several months,” Committee Chairwoman Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, said after the votes.

The major bill, the Energy Policy Modernization Act, gives a bit of something to everyone: It would ease the permitting process for natural gas pipelines but also permanently reauthorize the Land and Water Conservation Fund, which supports parks and public lands. The measure also buttresses energy-efficiency initiatives and supports some carbon-free energy sources, such as hydropower, but gives little mention to wind or solar – the two fastest-growing sources of green energy today.

Some of the most divisive issues in energy – from stricter environmental protections to an end to the nation’s ban on oil exports – were not included in the bill. It cleared the committee in an 18-4 vote, and if ultimately signed into law, would be the first comprehensive energy reform to get through Congress since 2007.

“This committee has been too long without moving energy policy legislation,” said Sen. Maria Cantwell, D-Wash., the committee’s ranking member. She formally introduced the bill with Murkowski last Wednesday. “Today is a very important first step in that process.”

Republican Sens. Mike Lee of Utah and Jeff Flake of Arizona, Democratic Sen. Debbie Stabenow of Michigan, and independent Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont – a Democratic presidential candidate – voted against the bill.

A separate measure that would both lift the nation’s decades-old restriction on exporting crude oil and open restricted parts of the Gulf of Mexico to oil and gas drilling passed along party lines, with Republican committee members voting in favor 12-10. Murkowski and some Democrats representing oil-heavy states have long sought to repeal the export ban, arguing it would add a powerful lever to American foreign policy as well as shore up domestic oil production and lower gasoline prices.

“It would help bring down prices at the pump for consumers, and it would be good for our allies,” Boehner told reporters Wednesday, the House’s last day in session before the August recess. “I would support lifting the ban, and hopefully we can work together in a bipartisan fashion to move our energy policies into this century.”

Opponents, by contrast, say such a move would undercut attempts to rein in heat-trapping carbon emissions and slow global warming by encouraging more oil drilling. Some chemical companies and refineries that buy U.S. crude oil also hope to preserve the ban, which they say has helped suppress prices.

The ban dates to the 1970s and the Arab oil embargo, and was implemented by Congress in an attempt to at least partially insulate the U.S. from volatile global markets. Experts disagree whether the strategy worked as intended: Imports dropped through the early 1980s, only to rise again for the next two decades. Imports began falling again in 2006, largely the result of the U.S. domestic production boom.

The American Petroleum Institute, the oil and gas industry’s main lobbying and trade organization, applauded both bills. “The outdated export ban only harms America’s ability to compete with other suppliers, like Iran and Russia,” Louis Finkel, the group’s executive vice president for government affairs, said in a statement.

“It’s ironic that the U.S. would strike a deal to allow Iranian crude onto the global market while refusing to give the same opportunity to American producers,” he said, referring to the nuclear deal the U.S. and other world powers have negotiated with Iran. “Lifting the ban will put downward pressure on fuel costs, create jobs and strengthen our position as a global energy superpower.”

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Training Command ramps up for mission to Middle East

CHARLOTTE, N.C. – In his written statement to the National Commission on the Future of the Army, Lt. Gen. Jeffrey W. Talley, chief of Army Reserve, said, “In an era of persistent conflict and global engagement, with multiple strategically imperative operations ongoing around the globe, protecting and defending the national security interests of the United States requires the full engagement of the Total Army – Active, Army Reserve and Army National Guard.”

Realizing this vision, Talley recently tapped into the 108th Training Command (IET) – one of only five training and exercise commands in the Army’s Total Force, all of which lie in the Army Reserve – to support a joint training mission to the Middle East under the direction of U.S. Central Command, or CENTCOM.

Their mission: Assisting Middle Eastern countries in the CENTCOM area of operations in advising, training and equipping Facilities Security Forces.

The Facilities Security Force provides protection to critical infrastructure, like telecommunications, utilities and mass transit, in and around the region, against hostile forces.

Since 1977, the U.S. has provided training instruction and advisory services at all levels within the region. However, only recently within the last decade has the U.S. supported the regional goal of protecting infrastructure.

“Until now, this mission has been supported by an ad hoc group of volunteers because of the way the mission was funded. I think that while what we had before worked, it certainly wasn’t the best solution,” said Randy Cook, 108th TC G 3/5/7 Staff Operations and Training Specialist.

“This will be an improvement,” said Cook. “Before, you had a group of individuals meeting in theater with no real command structure. Now what you get is an organized unit, with an established command structure from day one.”

Training Middle Eastern countries facilities forces to protect against an armed enemy involves instilling basic leadership principles in order to increase the program’s effectiveness.

“The commander on the ground is responsible for the program of instruction, but the training program is always evolving,” said Cook. “It’s a very fluid process. What we are trying to do is continue to build upon what has already been established to provide a higher quality product.”

Cook adds that because this critical mission has transitioned to an official request for forces, the continuity of having one of the few Army Reserve training units staffed with Soldiers versed in critical combat arms military occupational specialties brings an extra degree of value to the training mission.

“Instead of relying on Soldiers to volunteer, we can now go out and actively recruit as well as qualify the best possible candidates to meet the mission requirements for what we are trying to accomplish.”

“As time goes on and we deploy a complete and ready, trained unit, the quality of training and the quality of personnel that we send over there will steadily improve, from good to great, further adding to the value of the services we provide here at the 108th,” Cook added.

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Nlyte Creating Its Own Market Segment with ITSM Automator

Nlyte fills in the gaps between standalone ITSM systems and physical data center workflows with  DCSM automation, so that they all can be managed centrally.

Nlyte Software appears to be creating a new IT market segment with — oh, boy — its very own new acronym.The San Mateo, Calif.-based company has introduced what it calls the first data center service management (DCSM) package that combines a familiar acronym, DCIM (data center infrastructure management), new workflow capabilities and a turnkey integration into conventional IT service management (ITSM) solutions.What Nlyte does is fill in the gaps between standalone ITSM systems and physical data center workflows with its new DCSM automation, so that they all can be managed centrally.Nlyte’s first three packages, which became available July 21, are engineered specifically for three of the industry’s most well-known management systems: Nylte for BMC, Nlyte for Hewlett-Packard and Nlyte for ServiceNow.

These enable enterprises to maintain accurate, up-to-the minute information about their IT and data center assets, streamline processes and improve the measurement of data center operations. Service level agreements (SLAs) ostensibly become airtight.”With this, you’re going from just managing infrastructure to helping a company effectively deliver a service,”

Chief Marketing Officer Mark Gaydos toldeWEEK.Nlyte thus becomes the first entrant into a whole new IT market, as noted above. This shouldn’t be surprising, however; the company was one of the first in the business to add advanced analytics to its DCIM solution way back in 2010. Now, it seems, data analytics are inside everything.Nlyte is all about efficiencies: mapping, recording and reconnecting all the daily changes that happen within a data center — the newest of which are becoming more agile and changeable all the time, with new hardware and software constantly moving in and out. It’s difficult to maintain up-to-date control of these changes with conventional tools.”What we’ve built is a connection framework that slides Nlyte into these ITSM systems, which enables us to read in and automate the critical infrastructure asset relationship to the DCIM, so that Nlyte automatically creates a capacity block or device, that can be moved to manage inside the environment,”

Rob Neave, Nlyte CTO and co-founder, told eWEEK. “When that movement management happens, we can pass all of the locational changes straight back into the ITSM system.”ITSM Has Been a Blind SpotThe ITSM has been a blind spot for a while, Neave said. DSCM not only bridges the divide between DCIM and ITSM, but it gives enterprises control and visibility of data center processes — not just from the data center perspective, but more importantly, from the purview of IT, Neave said.The Nlyte for ITSM DCSM packages are built on the Nlyte 7 flagship DCIM solution and come with workflow functionality and pre-built connectors for the configuration management database (CMDB) and change management solutions of BMC, HP and ServiceNow.The company already has some use cases of DCSM in the real world.

The tight integration between Nlyte and our BMC tool suite will provide us with a holistic view of our assets and further support our ITSM process improvement initiatives. These include asset lifecycle and configuration management, service catalog, and change and incident management, to name a few,” Brian Desberg, director of Enterprise Data Center Operations at Sutter Health, told eWEEK.”The next big step in the evolution and deployment of ITSM and DCIM is for them to be tied closely together, with DCIM integrated as a component of, or complement to, ITSM. This is becoming especially important for companies with data centers, where efficient, proactive and reliable services are critical,” said Andy Lawrence, vice president of Research, Data Center Technology at 451 Research.”When you combine these systems, you create end-to-end DCSM, which is the end game for companies looking to optimize their data centers and build an efficient and reliable foundation for service delivery.”

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New priorities for transportation

The U.S. Highway Trust Fund provides a large portion of the funding for building and maintaining our major roads and bridges. The fund is in such bad shape these days that the U.S. Department of Transportation now maintains a trust fund “ticker” on its website — essentially a countdown to insolvency. At the state level, the California Transportation Commission’s 2011 Statewide Transportation System Needs Assessment described the state highway system as “deteriorating at an accelerating rate.” Locally, the American Society of Civil Engineers gave Humboldt County’s roads a D+ and its bridges a C- in a 2014 report card.

That’s why the first priority of the newly formed Coalition for Responsible Transportation Priorities (CRTP) is to spend our limited transportation dollars on maintenance and repair. CRTP is a group of Humboldt and Del Norte County residents whose mission is to promote transportation solutions which protect and support a healthy environment, healthy people, healthy communities and a healthy economy on the North Coast. After maintenance and repair, our priorities for transportation infrastructure are to fund only new infrastructure which supports healthy, livable, sustainable communities, and to cancel counterproductive road expansion projects which don’t meet these basic criteria.

These are pretty common-sense priorities, and you might think that our public agencies wouldn’t need much prodding to follow them. Given the facts, you might even assume that every available transportation dollar would be allocated to maintaining our existing critical infrastructure in working order. But you’d be wrong. Instead, transportation planners often seem dead set on continuing to spend money to expand roads even more. They often promote projects which do little to make our communities more livable, but do bring in more traffic to cause more infrastructure damage we can’t afford to fix.

In our region, the most prominent examples of this type of misguided project are two big Caltrans developments intended to give the biggest trucks on the road new ways to access our region. These are the famous (or infamous) projects on Routes 199 and 197 in Del Norte and on Route 101 at Richardson Grove in Southern Humboldt.

These projects compete directly with maintenance and repair projects for funding. Much of the money for the two projects is slated to come from the State Highway Operations and Protection Program (SHOPP), a program whose explicit purpose is to fund maintenance and repair projects which do not add capacity to the system. To divert this money to the oversized truck projects, Caltrans apparently found a legal loophole big enough to drive a whole lot of trucks through. But with bridges throughout our region crumbling and the road at Last Chance Grade sliding into the sea, it defies common sense to spend our limited maintenance and repair dollars on new highway expansion.

So how have supporters of these projects tried to justify them? You’ve probably heard the arguments. Boosters claim that they will improve our local economy by lowering shipping costs for local businesses. But few details have been made public. In fact, the only publicly available raw data on economic impacts of either project comes from a survey of 37 businesses expected to benefit from the 199/197 project. In that case, the Caltrans contractor conducting the survey could find only five businesses which said they might hire new employees as a result of the project. With an estimated project cost of almost $20 million to allow only a few businesses to consider expanding, that’s a risky and expensive economic development strategy!

Compare that to another form of transportation infrastructure: the humble trail. In addition to their many community and environmental benefits, trails are cheap to build and maintain and are well documented to increase property values and boost tourism. From an economic development standpoint, Caltrans would do much better to build bicycle and pedestrian trails. Sadly, the agency seems to dismiss most trail projects out of hand while it continues its single-minded quest to rebuild our roads for the benefit of oversized trucks.

It’s up to CRTP — and everyone who agrees with us — to change those priorities. You can find out more at http://ift.tt/1KEK5h6. We hope you’ll join us in taking up the challenge!

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Senate Panel OKs Critical Infrastructure Bill

The Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee passed a bill to protect critical infrastructure as NRECA urged lawmakers to keep the complexity of the electric grid in mind as part of the legislation.

The committee cleared the Critical Infrastructure Protection Act, S. 1846, on July 29.

The legislation, introduced by Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., the committee chairman, calls for the federal government to develop a strategy to protect critical infrastructure from geomagnetic disturbances caused by solar storms, and electromagnetic pulses, which are caused by nuclear and non-nuclear devices.

The bill included an amendment by Johnson that “addressed industry concerns around conflating [electromagnetic pulses] and [geomagnetic disturbances] threats in planning, preparing or mitigating efforts by pulling the terms apart and defining them separately,” said Bridgette Bourge, NRECA senior principal on homeland security.

Bourge added that current legislation in the House combines the two types of threats. They should be addressed separately because they require distinctly different planning, preparation, mitigation and recovery efforts, she said.

“We continue to work with the House to address this issue,” Bourge added. The House Homeland Security Committee passed its version of the legislation on June 25.

As an industry expert on protecting the grid from the threats of electromagnetic pulses and geomagnetic disturbances, Bourge told Johnson’s committee during a July 23 hearing how the power sector practices “defense in depth” to balance preparation, prevention, response, and recovery for various hazards to electric grid operations.

The industry’s priorities are to protect the most critical grid components against the most likely threats, build in system resiliency, and to develop contingency plans for response and recovery, she said.

“When considered as part of the broader spectrum of potential threats to the electric grid, nuclear-induced [electromagnetic pulse] is considered an extremely low-likelihood, high-consequence event. That doesn’t mean the electric industry disregards or ignores its significance, but that it is considered appropriately as part of a broader risk management strategy,” Bourge said.

Bourge urged avoidance of a situation where a single mitigation plan is required for both types of threats.

“These events and threats of these events are very different and should be treated that way,” said Bourge. “They are unique in how and what they impact.

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Ten Tips to Secure the Data Center

Securing a data center can be challenging for a variety of reasons. You can’t secure what you don’t see, for example, and almost everything has remote access capabilities and IP addresses to interface with the Web. Too often, security takes a backseat, which leaves hundreds of embedded and low-level management systems vulnerable. Another problem: communication can either create or control vulnerabilities. How to secure the Internet of things is a burning question today.

Machines communicating with each other may be more efficient, but they can be even less secure than humans communicating online. “We live in a hyper-connected world where IT Infrastructure visibility and access are critical to business success,” said Jay Wirts, general manager, Avocent Core Products at Emerson Network Power, a provider of critical infrastructure technologies and life cycle services for information and communications technology systems. “The flip side is increased vulnerabilities that those access points create. Businesses must think about IT security more holistically, leveraging more secure technologies while adhering to evolving best practices.”

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Ontario Investing up to $11.3 Million to Expand and Modernize Atikokan General Hospital

Infected mobile phones could hack air-gapped computers

Computers isolated from public networks could be hacked through GSM frequencies via infected mobile phones, Israeli researchers have found.

The so-called air-gapped computers, protected against conventional cyber-attacks by their physical isolation from the Internet and company networks, could, it has been revealed, be turned into a cellular transmitting antenna using software that modifies the central processing units.

By doing so, cyber attackers could extract small bits of data including security keys and passwords. The key to such attacks is malicious software that infects both, the eavesdropping mobile phone and the air-gapped computer. The Israeli researchers created such software and called it GSMem.

“GSMem takes the air out of the gap and will force the world to rethink air-gap security,” says Dudu Mimran, from the Cyber Security Research Centre of the Ben Gurion University in Israel.

“Our GSMem malicious software on Windows and Linux has a tiny computational footprint, which makes it very hard to detect. Furthermore, with a dedicated receiver, we were successful in exfiltrating data as far as 30 meters in distance from the computer.”

Although many companies already restrict the use of mobile phones or their inbuilt features such as cameras and Wi-Fi, in the vicinity of air-gapped computers, the protected machines still could be accessed by attackers through the electromagnetic radiation they emit.

The researchers recommended mobile phones and similar devices to be strictly prohibited around air-gapped computers, especially those responsible for critical infrastructure. The operators could also construct insulating walls around the machines to limit the reception of any signal and run regular behavioural analysis to detect any anomalies.

However, cyber-security firm Tripwire said the situation may not be so dramatic as to conduct a successful attack, the hacker would first have to install the malware on both, the air-gapped computer and the mobile phone, which may be tricky.

“The important point here to me, however, is that we all need to recognize that air-gapped-ness is quickly becoming a thing of the past,” said Lane Thames, Software Development Engineer and Security Researcher at Tripwire.

“Ubiquitous computing and communication technologies and its associated devices, such as those driving the growth of the Internet of Things, will cause many headaches for enterprises who require high-levels of security, and this is especially true for organizations that manage critical infrastructures.”

The new research is the third instance when the Ben Gurion team uncovered threats related to supposedly secure air-gapped computers.

Last year, the researchers created a method called Air-Hopper, which utilizes FM waves for data exfiltration. Another research initiative, BitWhisper, demonstrated a covert bi-directional communication channel between two close-by air-gapped computers using heat to communicate.

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West Virginia Senators Announce New Security and Emergency Plans

WASHINGTON, D.C. (WSAZ) — U.S. Senators Joe Manchin, D.-W.Va., and Shelley Moore Capito, R-W.Va., announced Wednesday $7.6 million in funding from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) to the West Virginia Division of Homeland Security and Emergency Management for emergency preparedness and homeland security programs.

This funding will be used to support law enforcement terrorism prevention activities and enhance West Virginia’s emergency preparedness system. A total of $101,856 of the funding will go to the Ohio County Commission to support maritime transportation infrastructure security activities.

“West Virginians must be prepared for any disaster or act of terrorism that may strike, and it is imperative that we have procedures in place to respond to these emergencies and threats effectively,” Manchin tells WSAZ. “This critical funding from FEMA will provide the necessary support we need to enhance our emergency preparedness and terrorism prevention plans and protect West Virginians in the face of any crisis.”

Senator Capito tells WSAZ, “As we face evolving national security threats at home and abroad, these FEMA grants are critical to protecting our homeland. This funding will boost West Virginia’s law enforcement terrorism prevention activities, strengthen our emergency preparedness system and support transportation and facility security plans. Now, more than ever, we need the resources to prepare for unexpected threats and keep West Virginia families and communities safe,”

There are a total of three different programs that are being funded.

State Homeland Security Program ($3,734,500) : This program supports state homeland security strategies to address identified planning, organization, equipment, training, and exercise needs to prevent, protect against, mitigate, respond to, and recover from acts of terrorism and other catastrophic events.

Emergency Management Performance Grant Program ($3,828,831): This program provides states with direction, coordination, guidance, and assistance, to ensure a comprehensive emergency preparedness system exists for all hazards.

Port Security Grant Program ($101,856): This program supports maritime transportation infrastructure security activities in order to strengthen the nation’s critical infrastructure against risks associated with potential terrorist attacks.

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Biden Joins Cuomo to Unveil ‘Transformative’ LaGuardia Redesign

In what many passengers, transportation pundits, and pols have viewed as a long-overdue announcement, Gov. Andrew Cuomo, joined by Vice President Joe Biden, unveiled on Monday the “vision” for the comprehensive redesign of LaGuardia Airport.

The transit hub, once infamously derided by Biden as “some Third World country,” will be transformed into a single, structurally unified main terminal with expanded transportation access, increased taxiway space and best-in-class passenger amenities, Cuomo noted.

Construction on the first half of the new unified terminal, expected to be a $4 billion project that creates 8,000 direct jobs and 10,000 indirect jobs, will be managed by LaGuardia Gateway Partners, a new public private partnership chosen by the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey to build the project.

“New York had an aggressive, can-do approach to big infrastructure in the past—and today, we’re moving forward with that attitude once again,” Cuomo said. “We are transforming LaGuardia into a globally-renowned, 21st Century airport that is worthy of the city and state of New York. It’s the perfect metaphor for what we can achieve with the ambition and optimism and energy that made this the Empire State in the first place, and I want to thank our many partners for joining us to build the airport that New York deserves.”

First-half construction will begin upon final approval from the Port Authority Board of Directors, which is expected in the first part of 2016; the majority of this first half of the project is expected to open to passengers in 2019, with full completion scheduled for approximately 18 months after that.

The second half of the new unified terminal is expected to be redeveloped by Delta Air Lines, which has indicated strong support for the new vision, and anticipates beginning the redevelopment of its terminals on a parallel track with the LaGuardia Gateway Partners project to complete the new unified airport, according to the governor’s office.

In addition to the unified terminal structure, the Governor’s Advisory Panel made a number of other recommendations that will complement the new facility and bring LaGuardia into the 21st century, Cuomo said, including an AirTrain option that directly connects LaGuardia to the New York City subway and Long Island Rail Road at Mets-Willets Point Station; additional space for security check-in, which will help diminish wait times for passengers as they pass through mandatory Transportation Security Administration screening; elevating critical infrastructure in order to keep the airport operational during a flood event and better prepare the airport for similar extreme weather events; and increasing parking options on-site and identifying a location for a cell phone waiting area in order to reduce congestion on local streets.

Currently, LaGuardia contributes more than $16 billion in economic activity to the region annually, generating about 121,000 total jobs and $5.9 billion in annual wages.

Additionally, Cuomo on Monday provided an update on the status of efforts to revolutionize and modernize John F. Kennedy International Airport.

Cuomo announced the construction of a new state-of-the-art hotel at JFK in the historic TWA Flight Center, a $265 million construction project that will break ground next year and is expected to generate 3,700 jobs.

Queens Borough President Melinda Katz, a member of the Governor’s Airport Advisory Panel, said that infrastructure upgrades are critical to the airports in order to remain competitive, and “with them has come the need to mitigate the direct, daily impacts of growth upon the thousands of families immediately surrounding them.”

To that end, Katz recommended that the Port Authority expand its Aircraft Noise program throughout construction phases of the new LaGuardia.

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Behavior Analytics takes center stage in DC

Securonix was recently invited as an ICIT fellow and industry leader to participate in an advisory meeting with senate staffers on the benefits of Behavior Analytics and to help describe the extensive ways in which it can be leveraged for insider and cyber threat detection and risk reduction.

As we sat waiting for our appointment in the senate cafeteria, senators and political figures walked by and the realization on what type of impact our discussion could have began to set in. The opportunity to help set the bar higher for cyber threat detection through data analytics and educate a room – possibly a nation – on the next generation of insider threat detection and mitigation capabilities.

The discussions were engaging, dialog flowed freely, and an appetite to learn and absorb could be felt throughout the room. With the OPM breach and Anthem still showing fresh scars, the importance and need for these discussions is bigger than ever.

Insider threat awareness has dramatically increased over the last 18-24 months, but organizations still focus on external threats, when the very access and data these actors are striving to obtain is available to your internal user population and the modus operandi for the external attackers is to compromise existing internal credentials to obtain access to the data.

The importance of peer analysis, volume spikes, and establishing a baseline of normal behaviors play a pivotal foundation to all conversations around behavior analytics. The complexities of technical vs. non-technical control points, data aggregation and catering to different industries and company sizes all provide their own unique challenges.

It is hard not to feel a great sense of satisfaction at times like these. There is a sense of pride when your daily job includes providing objective analysis that helps other organizations identify how existing technologies can address their insider threat needs. Securonix is leading the innovation for these problems.

To our Securonix partners, customers, and family: we consider these types of moments a reminder that together we are part of a dramatic change in the cyber security space.

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USDA Announces First Private Sector Investments through U.S. Rural Infrastructure Opportunity Fund

Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack today announced the first round of investments in rural infrastructure projects through the U.S. Rural Infrastructure Opportunity Fund. Through the Fund and its expanded public-private partnerships, USDA has facilitated the investment of nearly $161 million in private capital 22 critical water and community facilities projects in 14 states, maximizing the impact of USDA’s own investments in job-creating rural infrastructure projects across the country.

“The Fund and USDA’s other public-private partnership efforts help to facilitate private investment in rural businesses and infrastructure projects and maximize USDA’s own record investments in rural America,” said Tom Vilsack, U.S. Department of Agriculture Secretary and Chair of the White House Rural Council. “USDA and other agencies invest in infrastructure through a variety of federal initiatives, but our resources are finite and there are backlogs of projects in many parts of the economy. Efforts like the Fund help encourage substantial private investment in even more projects that help to grow the rural economy and support rural communities where people want to live, work and raise their families.”

Strong, secure infrastructure-roads and bridges, but also internet access and community facilities like hospitals and schools-improves connectivity and access to information, moves products to market, and makes communities competitive and attractive to new businesses and investments.

Investments include 11 community facilities projects in Colorado, Illinois, Minnesota, Mississippi, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, South Dakota and Wisconsin, including building new nursing homes, constructing new preschool and day care facilities, constructing a new facility for a rural ambulance service that covers a 685 square mile area in South Dakota, and building or upgrading two new critical access hospitals in rural Illinois and North Carolina. In addition, the Fund invested in 11 critical water projects in California, Kansas, Mississippi, North Dakota, Ohio, South Carolina, South Dakota and Texas. Projects include upgrades to existing water systems and the construction of a new reservoir. At least 38 additional critical infrastructure projects are in the pipeline for investment.

The U.S. Rural Infrastructure Opportunity Fund is part of a broader effort across the Department to rethink how to best leverage private sector resources to revitalize and reenergize the rural economy. Last year, Secretary Vilsack announced the creation of a $150 million privately-funded Rural Business Investment Company (RBIC), which has already made three investments in rural businesses with high-growth potential. Earlier this year, Secretary Vilsack announced the launch of two additional new privately-funded RBICs, which will be run by Innova Memphis and Meritus Kirchner Capital. Once the capital has been raised, these companies will make equity investments in rural businesses with high-growth potential. Efforts like the Fund and the RBICs help to maximize USDA’s own portfolio of investments in rural development.

CoBank, as anchor investor, agreed to commit up to $10 billion of its balance sheet capacity to lend in conjunction with the Fund, consistent with CoBank’s existing authority. AgStar Financial Services, another Farm Credit institution, also made investments in the first year. Capitol Peak Asset Management manages the Fund, has developed a strong pipeline of infrastructure related projects and investments, is working to recruit additional investors, and is providing capital advisory services to companies in rural America. The USDA and other federal agencies are helping to identify rural projects that could be potential beneficiaries of financing through this new Fund and other private sources.

This announcement comes in conjunction with the second White House Rural Opportunity Investment Conference in Washington, DC, focused on building equity capital in rural America. The conference will connect senior leaders from financial institutions, fixed income funds, and other investors with rural business leaders, senior-level Government officials, economic development experts, and program sponsors to discuss the unmet need for investments in rural America-matching investments with opportunities. This year’s conference builds on the work of the first-ever conference, held last year at the White House and focused on debt investments. The U.S. Rural Infrastructure Opportunity Fund was announced at last year’s conference.

Over the past six years, USDA has made historic investments in every state to support the farmers, ranchers and growers who are driving the rural economy forward, carry out record conservation efforts, facilitate groundbreaking research, promote new markets for rural products, and provide a safe, affordable and nutritious food supply for American families. To see how USDA has invested in your state, visit www.usda.gov/results.

About the White House Rural Council

To address challenges in Rural America, build on the Administration’s rural economic strategy, and improve the implementation of that strategy, the President signed an Executive Order establishing the White House Rural Council. The Council coordinates the Administration’s efforts in rural America by streamlining and improving the effectiveness of federal programs serving rural America; engage stakeholders, including farmers, ranchers, and local citizens, on issues and solutions in rural communities; and promoting and coordinating private-sector partnerships. The work of the White House Rural Council and USDA to bring investment to rural America is an example of how the Administration is creating smart partnerships with the private sector to better support Americans in all parts of the country.

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Cyberattacks Escalate As Critical Infrastructure Providers Remain Confident

Despite the increasing number of major cyber attacks targeting critical infrastructure, technology and security professionals remain confident in their cyber defenses, revealing a disconnect between these executives and the reality of the current threat landscape, according to a recent report by Intel Security and the Aspen Homeland Security Program.

The Holding the Line Against Cyber Threats: Critical Infrastructure Readiness Survey, which was conducted by market research firm Vanson Bourne, interviewed 625 IT decision makers who have a hand in their organization’s security structure, including 250 from in the United States and 125 each from France, Germany and the United Kingdom.

Respondents included individuals were from both the public and private sectors, and representatives from organizations concentrating on energy, finance, government and transportation.

“Critical infrastructure organizations are under constant cyber attack, yet no publicly apparent, massive outage has occurred so far,” the report stated. Yet, “Energy producers, financial services, transportation companies, telecommunications companies and governments are all potential targets.”

According to the survey report, security executives’ confidence in their organization’s cybersecurity posture is rising as threats are escalating. Surprisingly, however, respondents did not make a connection between threat escalation and their own organization’s vulnerability.

The report revealed 75 percent of respondents are either confident or extremely confident in their organization’s cyber attack identification protocol, while 68 percent are confident in mitigation techniques and 65 percent are confident in deflection standards.

Respondents believe their own vulnerability to cyber attacks has decreased over the last three years, with only 27 percent feeling very or extremely vulnerable — compared to 50 percent three years ago.

“According to respondents, attack volume is increasing, security breaches are becoming a frequent occurrence and the rate of code vulnerabilities shows no signs of abating,” the report stated. “Yet, respondents across all countries and sectors in the survey believe their own vulnerability to cyber attack has declined.”

This overconfidence raises serious concerns, authorities said. Although many leaders believe proper cyber preparedness elements are in place, the sheer volume of actual threats targeting these organizations shows this confidence may be unfounded, which may be opening these organizations up to serious security incidents.

In many instances, serious breaches are spurred by simple mistakes. Demonstrating that no threat, no matter how small, should be overlooked, the report revealed, “Analysis of security incidents at a variety of organizations shows that many of them were breached due to basic security failures in the face of a determined and persistent attacker.”

Despite high confidence in their own defenses, US and French respondents in particular rate a serious cyber attack affecting critical services and causing loss of life as highly likely within the next three years. Respondents from the transportation and energy sectors were more likely than their counterparts in other sectors to deem the possibility of such an attack “likely or highly likely.”

However, 64 percent of respondents believe an attack resulting in fatalities has not happened yet because good IT security is already in place.

Respondents maintained that human error remains the number one cause of successful cyber intrusions. No matter what organizations do to strengthen their security postures, individual employees can still fall victim to phishing emails, social engineering and drive-by browser downloads that successfully infect their organizations’ networks.

Interestingly, few executives believe that the proliferation of personal devices at work is a prime cause of cyber attacks, despite the priority assigned to bring-your-own device — BYOD — issues by cybersecurity companies.

In addition, increasing cooperation between the government and private sector is another important measure which can lead to better preparedness, with 86 percent of respondents indicating such teamwork is vital to a successful cybersecurity plan.

“While the security industry works on next-generation solutions and governments work on sensible legislation, there’s still more progress that needs to be made,” the report stated. “Adversaries are innovating at a rapid pace, and countering their progress will take much closer cooperation between government and industry. Organizations and government agencies operating in silos do not help the cybersecurity landscape grow more secure.”

Government and the private sector can join together to take positive steps toward change. Investments in technology to grow functionality and education are critical in addressing cybersecurity concerns.

“This data raises new and vital questions about how public and private interests can best join forces to mitigate and defend against cyber attacks,” said Clark Kent Ervin, director of the Aspen Institute’s Homeland Security Program and former DHS Inspector General. “This issue must be addressed by policymakers and corporate leaders alike.”

To enhance security architecture, the report suggests enhancements to next-generation cyber defense technology, as well as improvements to security management tools, especially cooperation with and sharing of vital security data.

“Collaborating with any and all available resources is key to improving the future of security,” the report stated. “Reducing critical infrastructure risk is a global strategic challenge, requiring much broader sharing of IT strategies and targeted threat intelligence.”

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Peak 10 Building Another Nashville Data Center

Peak 10, Inc., a national IT infrastructure and cloud services provider, broke ground on the company’s 5^th and newest data center in Franklin, Tennessee.

Located approximately 20 miles south of Nashville in Williamson County, Franklin is also home to four other Peak 10 data centers. Upon completion, the new data center will offer 20,000 square feet of office and support space, and 50,000 square feet of data center space, which will be built out over time.  Peak 10 also operates data center facilities in nine other U.S. markets.

“Nashville has been noted by various publications and polls as one of the best places for doing business, and its economy ranks as one of the fastest-growing in the country,” explains David Smith, vice president and general manager for Peak 10’s Nashville operations. “The addition of this facility will enable us to better meet the ever-increasing demand for reliable, enterprise-class colocation and cloud services.”

Like all Peak 10 data centers, the new facility will feature high-level physical security; fully redundant network architecture; and top-tier equipment and technologies from industry-leading equipment manufacturers and technology companies. Prior to opening, the data center will be fully commissioned by an independent quality assurance and engineering team. The process applies key standards for mission-critical data center facilities including ANSI/TIA-942 and other standards established by ASHRAE, NFPA and critical infrastructure manufacturers.

Century Investment Partners, based in Franklin, Tennessee, is the developer and owner of the project. Century Skanska is the general contractor. Davis Stokes Collaborative PC is the architect.

“Peak 10 plays a critical role in providing complex IT solutions to companies in Williamson County and the entire region,” said Matt Largen, president and chief executive officer of Williamson Inc., which combines the Williamson County, TN Chamber of Commerce and Economic Development.

“We are thrilled the company has decided to expand their presence in the Nashville region,” he added. “Peak 10 is an integral part of the Middle Tennessee economy, and its employees also give countless hours to area non-profits to make this a better place for everyone.”

Peak 10 first entered the Nashville market in 2006, as it was experiencing the surge in economic growth that continues today. The area is globally known as a hub for healthcare companies, with many of them focused on the technology aspects of that sector. Its central location to major U.S. markets also makes it an attractive location for the corporate headquarters of many organizations.

Peak 10 currently provides IT infrastructure services to a wide range of companies in the Nashville area, including Tractor Supply Co., Music City Networks, 247 Sports, Source Medical and Broadcast Music, Inc. The company’s comprehensive compliance program, which includes a full-time, on-staff compliance officer, is particularly attractive to the company’s many healthcare and financial services customers.

Headquartered in Charlotte, N.C., Peak 10 owns and operates 25 data centers in key U.S. markets and serves a diverse range of customers in the U.S. and abroad.  To learn more, visitwww.peak10.com.

About Peak 10

Peak 10 provides reliable, tailored cloud computing, data center and other information technology (IT) infrastructure solutions and managed services, primarily for mid-market businesses. Peak 10 solutions are designed to scale and adapt to customers’ changing business needs, enabling them to increase agility, lower costs, improve performance and focus internal IT resources on their core competencies. Peak 10 holds the Cisco® Cloud Provider Certification with a Cisco Powered Cloud Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) and Disaster Recovery as a Service (DRaaS) designation. Peak 10 undergoes annual examinations by third party auditors and helps companies meet the requirements of various regulatory and industry standards such as SOC 1, SOC 2, SOC 3, Safe Harbor, HIPAA, PCI DSS, FISMA and ITAR. For more information, visit www.peak10.com or thePeak 10 Newsroom for the latest news.

About Century Investment Partners

Century Investment Partners (“CIP”) is a real estate investment and development company based in Franklin, TN with roots dating to 1958.  The founders are well versed in all phases of development drawing from their experience in principal investing, site selection, entitlement, approval, planning and completion.  CIP’s affiliated companies allow for the firm to operate as a full service, vertically integrated investment and development firm allowing for cost efficiencies, speed and accuracy in the development process.  CIP’s mission is to set and maintain the highest standards of excellence through the time tested traditions of honesty, hard work and stewardship of capital.

About Skanska

Skanska USA is one of the largest, most financially sound construction and development companies in the U.S., serving a broad range of clients including those in transportation, power, industrial, water/wastewater, healthcare, education, sports, data centers, government, aviation and commercial.  Headquartered in New York with offices in 34 metro areas, we have more than 10,000 employees committed to being leaders in safety, project execution, sustainability, ethics and people development. In 2014, our work in building construction, civil and power/industrial construction, commercial development and infrastructure development (public-private partnerships) generated $7.3 billion in revenue.  Global revenue of parent company Skanska AB, headquartered in Stockholm and listed on the Stockholm Stock Exchange, totaled $21 billion in 2014. Skanska shares are publicly traded in the U.S. on the OTC market under the symbol SKBSY through a Level I American Depository Receipt program. 

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Backfitting the Safety Act

Lawmakers are looking at how to wedge new parameters into an anti-terror product liability measure to encompass growing cybersecurity concerns, but tech experts say the move would be complicated.

A House Homeland Security panel heard from experts on how a 2002 law — the Support Anti-Terrorism by Fostering Effective Technologies Act — could be adapted to protect companies that make cybersecurity technology and the critical infrastructure providers such as banks, electric utilities and transportation companies that use it.

The Safety Act was written to spur contractors to invent anti-terrorism products and services. Department of Homeland Security-approved products and services that get Safety Act certification would face little or no liability if the technologies failed in connection with a terrorist attack.

Panelists at the Cybersecurity, Infrastructure Protection and Security Technologies Subcommittee hearing July 28 were split on how altering the law would affect cyber-defense technology markets.

Brian E. Finch, senior fellow at the George Washington University Center for Cyber and Homeland Security, told the panel that the law should be amended to expand DHS Secretary Jeh Johnson’s ability to invoke liability protections to cover acts “other than terrorism” to include cyberattacks.

“In light of those threats, I firmly believe that promoting and incentivizing the use of cybersecurity best practices and effective technologies, policies, and procedures are critical to our nation’s security. I also firmly believe that the private sector is ready and willing to adopt those best practices, technologies, policies, and procedures,” he said. However, he added that the challenge “is determining which of those items are in fact ‘the best’ or even ‘quite good.'”

Finch also noted that massive cyberattacks and the cybersecurity decisions that accompany them are inevitably followed by a “tsunami” of law suits and second-guessing. “Thus, programs that help companies determine which cybersecurity measures to adopt and will help them minimize their exposure to unnecessarily expensive and protracted litigation are desperately needed,” he said.

That argument was countered by Andrea M. Matwyshyn, Microsoft Visiting Professor at the Center for Information Technology Policy at Princeton University. Rolling out blanket liability protections for certain technologies is akin to “allowing [a company’s] general counsel to select” what gets used, she said. That decision, she said, should be left to IT personnel more familiar with constantly shifting technology.

“The Safety Act’s primary feature – a grant of limited liability to companies whose products are certified by the Department of Homeland Security and to their customers – is a poor fit for stimulating improvements and incentivizing adherence to best practices in information security,” she said. Allowing protections for certain products would only serve to disrupt the market. “The marketplace for information security products and services has dramatically evolved since the passage of the Safety Act,” she said. “While the Safety Act’s liability limitation incentives for creation of new information security products may have been helpful in 2002, in 2015 they are unnecessary.”

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Security agencies reveal 11,000 cyber security incidents targeting businesses, critical infrastructure

The nation’s top spy agencies are warning that the number of cyber security threats facing Australia is increasing by the day.

The Australian Cyber Security Centre (ACSC) partners with agencies including ASIO and the Federal Police.

In its first unclassified report it has revealed there were more than 11,000 cyber security incidents affecting Australian businesses last year.

More than 150 of the incidents involved critical infrastructure and so-called systems of national significance.

The ACSC said it saw “daily” cyber espionage activity targeting Australian Government networks but “Australia has not yet been subjected to any activities that could be considered a cyber attack”.

It said: “Destructive cyber attacks could be considered equivalent to an armed attack, and therefore, an act of war.”

The centre urged Australian businesses to guard against the risk of cyber threats and said banks and energy companies were among the most targeted firms in 2014.

“To combat the threats detailed in this report and reduce the risk of compromise, organisations must move now to implement cyber security measures to make Australia a harder target, increase the confidence of Australians when they are online, and maximise the benefits of the internet for Australian organisations,” the centre said.

Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull said he welcomed such reports.

“It’s important that all of us are aware of the risks of cyber crime and a lot of the basic internet hygiene that you can practice will protect you against much of it,” Mr Turnbull said.

“Make sure all of your software is up to date, all of your applications are up to date, don’t open attachments from anyone without being sure they’re from someone you know and trust.”

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China’s Chongqing province to launch $129 bln in PPP projects-state media

China’s central Chongqing province plans to launch 800 billion yuan ($129 billion) worth of projects over the next six years which it will invite private investors to build, own and operate, the China Securities Journal reported on Tuesday.

The public-private partnerships (PPP) will be part of some 1.8 trillion yuan worth of infrastructure projects that the province will undertake in the years up to 2020, provincial mayor, Huang Qifan, told the newspaper.

PPP projects launched so far this year include an expressway, hospitals, and carparks, he said.

Beijing is increasingly encouraging the country’s local governments to turn to PPP projects to fill a widening funding gap as it clamps down on traditional off-balance sheet borrowing by local authorities.

In May, China’s state planning agency released a list of more than 1,000 proposed PPP projects totalling 1.97 trillion yuan planned for 29 areas including Beijing and southeastern Jiangxi province.

Analysts, however, caution that the take-up rate by private investors for PPP projects has so far been tepid, due to concerns over project profitability.

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Britain can easily double Indonesia investment, eyes infrastructure : David Cameron

British Prime Minister David Cameron sought to forge closer business ties with Indonesia on Tuesday, saying British investment could easily double if deals can be clinched on infrastructure projects.

Indonesia is Cameron’s first stop on a four-day trade mission to Southeast Asia to spur lucrative business deals and encourage new political alliances to counter Islamist militancy.

Britain, Indonesia’s fifth largest foreign investor, is particularly interested in investing in I ..
When Indonesia announced its 276 billion pound infrastructure plan, the next opportunity for British businesses became clear,” Cameron told a Jakarta forum of government and business officials from both countries, according to a pool report.

Cameron highlighted Britain’s 15 billion pound ($25 billion) Crossrail project, that will connect Heathrow airport west of London to the county of Essex in the east, through 42 km (26 miles) of new tunnels, as an example of the expertise it can br ..

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Hedge Funds Continue to be Bearish on US Oil

Hedge funds are more bearish about the outlook for U.S. oil prices than at any time for almost five years, according to data from the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission.

Hedge funds and other money managers had a net long position in WTI-linked futures and options equivalent to just 118 million barrels of oil on July 21, down from a recent high of 294 million barrels 11 weeks earlier (http://ift.tt/1OygpmG).

The net position was the smallest since September 2010. Money managers interested in oil have a long bias (there has been no net short since the current time series began in 2006). So the small net long indicates an unusually high level of bearishness among hedge funds.

Sentiment has turned bearish as a series of negative factors hit the market in quick succession, including the nuclear agreement with Iran, China’s stock market tumble, rising output from OPEC, an uptick in the number of rigs drilling for oil in the United States, and flush oil stockpiles.

Hedge funds have cut their long positions since May by just over 100 million barrels from 388 million to 281 million. On the short side of the market, money managers have added almost 70 million barrels to take their total to almost 163 million barrels.

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Taking a road trip this summer? Enjoy America’s crumbling infrastructure

U.S. gas futures turn higher after falling to 2-week low in early trade

Investing.com – U.S. natural gas prices turned higher after falling to a two-week low on Monday, as market players assessed the outlook for U.S. demand and supply levels.

Natural gas for delivery in September on the New York Mercantile Exchange touched an intraday low of $2.739 per million British thermal units, the weakest level since July 10, before rebounding to trade at $2.814 during U.S. morning hours, up 3.9 cents, or 1.42%.

Updated weather forecasting models continued to call for above-normal temperatures across most parts of the U.S. next week, before a shift to cooler weather pushes readings to near normal across much of Northeast and Midwest in the following week.

Demand for natural gas tends to fluctuate in the summer based on hot weather and air conditioning use. Natural gas accounts for about a quarter of U.S. electricity generation.

According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, natural gas storage in the U.S. rose by 68 billion cubic feet last week. Analysts had expected an increase of 70 billion cubic feet last week.

Supplies rose by 92 billion cubic feet in the same week last year, while the five-year average change is an increase of 53 billion cubic feet.

Total U.S. natural gas storage stood at 2.828 trillion cubic feet as of last week, 28.2% higher than during the same week a year earlier and 2.9% above the five-year average for this time of year.

Last spring, supplies were 55% below the five-year average, indicating producers have made up for all of last winter’s unusually strong demand.

The EIA’s next storage report slated for release on Thursday, July 30 is expected to show a build of approximately 55 billion cubic feet for the week ending July 24.

Supplies rose by 88 billion cubic feet in the same week last year, while the five-year average change is an increase of 48 billion cubic feet.

Elsewhere on the Nymex, crude oil for delivery in September shed 39 cents, or 0.81%, to trade at $47.75 a barrel, while heating oil for August delivery dropped 0.93% to trade at $1.615 per gallon.

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ISIS hackers set sights on symbols of state, including critical Australian infrastructure

ISIS hackers set sights on symbols of state, including critical Australian infrastructure

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POWER stations, air traffic control towers, city water supplies and banks are potential targets of a “cyber caliphate” terror attack, intelligence agencies warn.
A top-level security briefing obtained by The Courier-Mail warns tech-savvy terrorists are already engaging in basic acts of sabotage but could advance to targeting “symbols of state authority” and critical Australian infrastructure.

“Terrorists will continue to be attracted to targets that offer high symbolic value and the greatest potential for generating mass casualties, economic damage, media attention and public anxiety,’’ the briefing revealed.

It warned that cyber sabotage could be carried out in conjunction with more “traditional tactics”.

“Terrorists will probably continue to favour traditional tactics, such as explosives and armed attackers, due to the wider media coverage and psychological impact these tactics generate,” it said.
“An act of cyber sabotage could be used to assist or enable an attack using these tactics, however we assess that a lack of current technical capability makes this unlikely in the short term.”

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It warned that the “acquisition of already available tools and malware, or collaboration with non-aligned groups, could lead to increased cyber capability within extremist circles”.

The briefing emphasised that terrorists were already “engaged in rudimentary acts of cyber sabotage”, including “acts designed to deny, degrade, disrupt or destroy information and/or linked systems and hardware”.

Attacks on Brisbane’s air traffic control system could cause chaos, especially if done in
Attacks on Brisbane’s air traffic control system could cause chaos, especially if done in conjunction with traditional terror tactics.
While the briefing doesn’t specify what infrastructure could be attacked, the US Commission on Critical Infrastructure Protection revealed the banking industry, military installations, power plants, air traffic control centres and water systems were potential targets of cyber terrorists.
Western intelligence agencies are also on alert against ISIS’s so-called “Hacking Division’’, which recently posted personal details online about more than 100 US military personnel and encouraged supporters to kill the soldiers.

ISIS sympathisers have carried out cyber-terror attacks against hundreds of companies and groups around the world, including some in Queensland.

It is understood the pro-­jihadi “hacktivists’’ have direct ties to ISIS strongholds in the Middle East.

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Road construction is key driver of jobs

It’s easy to take the roads for granted, but for some contractors, road work is the economic engine of their business.

Steve Wilk, owner of Wilk Paving in Rutland, said his company has done a mix of state and municipal road projects for most of its 31-year history.

“Road construction is probably 75 percent of our business,” Wilk said.

Wilk said the season for road construction lasts from April 15 to Oct. 15. During that time, he said, Wilk Paving can have up to three road projects going at once. Last week the company paved 3½ miles on Route 106 near Springfield, and earlier this season, it handled projects in Fair Haven, West Rutland and Benson.

Wilk Paving employs 22 people, and Wilk said road construction is critical for those jobs.

“The bulk of them are relying on the road projects that we get,” he said. “It’s the largest part of our business.”

Sue Minter, secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation, said a lot of jobs depend on Vermont’s investments in its transportation infrastructure.

“I think it has a very significant impact on our economy,” she said.

Minter said construction jobs are generally well-paid positions. According to federal Bureau of Labor Statistics, construction workers’ pay in Vermont averaged $45,400 in 2013, which was 10 percent higher than all private sector wages in the state.

Minter noted that road projects in Vermont also create work for equipment and materials suppliers. She said local restaurants receive additional business from workers on projects in their area.

Lenny LeBlanc, chief financial officer of the Vermont Agency of Transportation, said the state budgeted $21.5 million for road and bridge construction projects in Rutland County in the current fiscal year – and that’s excluding aviation and rail projects.

Minter said the Federal Highway Administration uses a calculation saying that for every $36,000 spent on transportation infrastructure, one job is created. By that measure, the $21.5 million the state has budgeted for road and bridge construction projects in Rutland County should create 597 jobs.

LeBlanc said the state budgeted $40 million for road, bridge, aviation and rail projects, combined, in Rutland County. Again using the federal calculation for jobs created, that $40 million should create 1,111 jobs.

Minter said the state plans to spend more than $600 million statewide on infrastructure projects including state and local roads, bridges, transit and aviation.

Cathy Voyer Lamberton, executive vice president of Associated General Contractors of Vermont, said road construction has a major positive impact on jobs, as does the construction industry in general.

“Construction as a whole is significant not only for the state, but for the nation,” Lamberton said.

She said road construction also provides work for a lot of different kinds of professionals, such as pipelayers, excavators, guardrail subcontractors and utility workers.

Lamberton, Minter and Wilk have all kept close track of the federal transportation funding debate in Washington this year. Congress faces a July 31 deadline to approve a new federal transportation bill. As of Friday, the bill remained under debate in the U.S. Senate.

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NABARD Sanctions Rs 652 Crore to Odisha

BHUBANESWAR:  The National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (NABARD) has sanctioned Rs 652.70 crore to the State under 21st tranche of Rural Infrastructure Development Fund (RIDF) for 2015-16.

With the new sanctions, the cumulative assistance of the national bank to the State now stands at Rs 12,648 crore for implementing 1.98 lakh projects in various sectors such as irrigation, rural connectivity, animal husbandry, infrastructure development, jetties and passenger waiting halls for inland waterway transport and rural drinking water supply.

During a meeting held at Mumbai last week, NABARD management had sanctioned funding for 11 rural roads and one rural bridge project involving assistance of Rs 234.08 crore. The projects envisaged to create additional road length of 197.94 kms and bridge length of 155 metres in the State.

Supporting the State Government’s Biju Setu Yojana, NABARD has sanctioned Rs 284 crore assistance for construction of 102 bridges. The fresh RIDF assistance also includes 23 flood protection projects involving assistance of Rs 114.73 crore and Rs 19.89 crore for 154 lift irrigation projects (tubewell and river lift) under Biju Krushak Vikas Yojana (BKVY).

The projects will create, stabilise and develop irrigation potential of 84,952 hectares (ha) and the assured irrigation will be provided to 3,432 ha under BKVY, NABARD sources said.

Since development of infrastructure is key to faster economic growth, the RIDF assistance is major source of funding for various projects across the State catering to the critical infrastructure needs in rural areas.

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Kenya, U.S. Companies in Talks on Multibillion-Dollar Port Deal

Kenyan and U.S. companies are negotiating a potential multibillion-dollar agreement with the Kenyan government to help develop the East African country’s biggest infrastructure project.

The U.S. companies want to take part in the Lamu Port Southern Sudan-Ethiopia Transport Corridor, which envisages the construction of a port, power plant, railway and other facilities, according to Issa Timamy, governor of Lamu county in southeastern Kenya. Discussions are being led by Aeolus Kenya Ltd., a closely held power and infrastructure developer known as AKL, he said in a phone interview on July 21.

“AKL has been in ongoing negotiations with the U.S. government and the government of Kenya proposing a suite of integrated, critical infrastructure solutions that will initiate Kenya’s Lapsset program,” the Nairobi, Kenya-based company said in an e-mailed response to questions on Sunday. It said the group of U.S. companies interested in the project, known as Lapsset, includes Bechtel Group Inc.

Discussions about the deal coincide with U.S. President Barack Obama’s visit to Kenya and come amid competition for influence in Africa, where China surpassed America as the continent’s biggest trading partner in 2009. Chinese trade with Africa reached $198.5 billion in 2012, compared with U.S.- African trade of $99.8 billion, according to the Washington-based Brookings Institute.

The suite of projects being negotiated by AKL is known as the American package, Timamy said.

‘Very Excited’

U.S. Transport Secretary Anthony Foxx said last month his government is “very excited about Lapsset and we want the American package to be considered,” according to a statement issued by Kenya’s presidency June 25 after talks with President Uhuru Kenyatta.

Bechtel, based in San Francisco, confirmed by e-mail on Sunday that it’s among the U.S. companies in talks with AKL. Kenyan presidency spokesman Manoah Esipisu said he couldn’t immediately comment when called on Sunday. Treasury Secretary Henry Rotich didn’t answer his phone when Bloomberg sought comment.

Projects being sought by AKL include an 880-megawatt liquid-natural-gas-fired power plant, an oil pipeline to transport crude finds in northern Kenya and neighboring Uganda, and six berths at a deepwater port in Lamu, according to Timamy. A desalination plant will also be built in Lamu to address water shortages in the area, he said.

Kenya’s Treasury has estimated the Lapsset project will cost $26 billion. The country envisages also building resort cities, an international airport and an inter-regional highway, according to the government’s website.

Improving Security

Building the infrastructure will help alleviate the damage that has been wrought on Lamu’s economy by attacks by al-Shabaab, Timamy said. The county borders Somalia, where the al-Qaeda-linked militants have waged an insurgency since 2006. They’ve also carried out raids along Kenya’s coast, include one in Mpeketoni, near Lamu, in June 2014 in which at least 60 people died.

The national government has taken measures to improve security in the area, including starting construction of a border fence, deploying more security forces and improving telecommunications to help encourage investors, Timamy said. AKL plans to ensure that the local community benefits from any projects that are signed, by providing education and training to enable local residents to get jobs, he said.

“The projects are designed to protect Kenyan interests, and will be funded privately by Kenyan and global investors,” AKL said.

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The government’s top workers, Group 3

The annual “Sammie” awards, handed out in the fall by the Partnership for Public Service, honor federal employees for their accomplishments. The Post is profiling the 30 finalists. The nonprofit partnership provided the names and descriptions.

Bridget Lynn Roddy

State Department

Engaged a growing number of college students through a “virtual” foreign service

The State Department dispatches people to countries all over the world, but it has tried something new during the past few years: employing student interns who stay at their universities while working on projects in distant places such as Botswana, Cyprus, India and the Marshall Islands.

These students are part of a “virtual” foreign service that has grown exponentially during the past five years under the management of Roddy, 33, the Virtual Student Foreign Service program manager.

The program started at the State Department in 2009 with 44 projects and has grown significantly to include 10 additional federal agencies, more than 300 projects annually and 650 positions, due in large part to Roddy’s success in educating students and agencies about the benefits and possibilities of virtual internships.

“In the internship world, this is very cutting edge,” said Eric Woodard, director of fellowships and internships at the Smithsonian Institution, a participating agency. “For her to manage and grow this program is a real achievement.”

During the 2014-2015 academic year, more than 3,300 students applied for a virtual internship. They have served as journalists, scientists, mathematicians, graphic designers, researchers and social media experts for a variety of agencies from the Department of Agriculture to NASA.

Adam R. Schildge. (Aaron Clamage/Partnership for Public Service)

Developed a program after Hurricane Sandy to make public transportation systems more resilient

Hurricane Sandy caused one of the worst public transportation disasters in U.S. history, flooding and damaging rail yards, train tracks, tunnels, power stations, bus depots and critical operations centers throughout the Northeast.

Congress responded with a $10.9 billion special transportation appropriation, including $3.6 billion that could be used for “resilience” grants dedicated to protecting the infrastructure that was repaired after Sandy and would be at risk of damage by natural disasters in the future.

Schildge, a relatively new FTA employee with just four years of federal experience, was put in charge of developing and carrying out a competitive grant program with these resilience funds.

Colleagues said Schildge developed a novel methodology for rating and evaluating the projects and awarding the grants. This new approach, they said, helped assess whether proposed construction projects would result in reduced damages in the event of another disaster, and also would be cost effective considering the probability of another disaster occurring.

“People riding public transportation through areas of New England and the Mid-Atlantic region will be on systems built to better endure extreme weather events,” said Matt Welbes, the FTA’s executive director.

Lucile Jones. (Aaron Clamage/Partnership for Public Service)

Lucile Jones

U.S. Geological Survey

Spurred communities and states to prepare for catastrophic earthquakes

Jones, an internationally known seismologist and science adviser for risk reduction at the USGS, is leading groundbreaking research on earthquakes and turning it into public action that can save lives and property.

Through countless interviews, public lectures and local meetings, Jones has shared her research so that communities, states and the federal government can take measures to shore up critical infrastructure and to be better prepared to respond if a major earthquake occurs.

Jones has done research on estimating the short-term probability of foreshock and aftershock sequences, which have become the basis of all earthquake advisories issued by the state of California.

With this and other scientific information on earthquakes in hand, Jones has been able to depict the likely consequences of catastrophic natural disasters. These disaster simulations include the ShakeOut scenario, which details the devastating effects of a potential southern San Andreas Fault earthquake; the ARkStorm Scenario of a California statewide winter storm; and the SAFRR Tsunami Scenario to describe the California impact of an Alaskan tsunami.Based on her work, for instance, Los Angeles is replacing the tunnel that brings water from the Los Angeles Aqueduct across the San Andreas Fault.

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Chemical Facility Program Failures Continue To Put Nation’s Critical Infrastructure At Risk

A terrorist attack on the nation’s high-risk chemical facilities could prove catastrophic. Toxic chemicals could be released from the facility or stolen to produce chemical weapons which could be used to inflict mass causalities in the United States.

Although the US established the Chemical Facility Anti-Terrorism Standards (CFATS) over a decade ago, CFATS has struggled with a laundry list of significant challenges—including backlogs, mismanagement, and missed goals—hindering the program’s mission to protect the nation against chemical terrorism.

And CFATS is still struggling, according to a recent Government Accountability Office (GAO) audit report. After conducting a recent assessment of the current status of CFATS, GAO auditors determined errors in facility-reported data may be preventing the program from lessening the nation’s risk of a terrorist attack on chemical facilities.

“Individuals intent on using or gaining access to hazardous chemicals to carry out a terrorist attack continue to pose a threat to the security of chemical facilities and surrounding populations,” GAO said. “DHS, through the CFATS program overseen by the Office of Infrastructure Protection’s Infrastructure Security Compliance Division (ISCD, has made progress in identifying chemical facilities that pose the greatest risks and in expediting the time it takes to approve security plans.”

“However,” GAO continued, “DHS has not taken steps to mitigate errors in some facility-reported data and does not have reasonable assurance that it has identified all of the nation’s highest-risk chemical facilities.”

Sen. Tom Carper (D-Del.), ranking member of the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs said GAO’s audit “shows DHS has made real progress and has significantly accelerated its pace for reviewing security plans and chemical facilities since the law went into effect. However, GAO also noted numerous challenges remain.”

Carper said DHS still “needs to shore up its processes for addressing noncompliant facilities, and verify key information in order to accurately assess risk. DHS should take GAO’s recommendations to heart. My staff and I plan to engage the department early and often in order continue to make the program better. If Congress, the administration and industry work together, as we’ve done before, we can continue to make progress and shape a program that keeps these vital facilities and the jobs they provide secure, protects our communities and the environment, and allows our businesses to thrive.”

The CFATS program was established pursuant to the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Appropriations Act in 2007. Then, in December 2014, the Protecting and Securing Chemical Facilities from Terrorist Attacks Act reauthorized the CFATS program for an additional 4 years while also imposing a number of requirements to improve the program.

Prior to the legislation’s approval, Homeland Security Todayreported a congressional report produced by former Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs ranking member Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) determined DHS’s $600 million effort to improve the nation’s resiliency in the fact of an attack on chemical facilities was a “near total failure.”

In 2013, a GAO audit report disclosed it had found “critical flaws still existed in DHS’s approach to calculating risk, meaning DHS could be focusing and regulating the wrong facilities; a seven to nine year backlog of chemical facilities’ security plans in the CFATS program; and poor engagement and transparency with regulated companies.”

In addition, a 2013 DHS Inspector General audit identified “thirteen major deficiencies in the CFATS program, including a continuing backlog, lack of appropriate employee training, wasted funds and a culture of management-retaliation and suppression of opposing opinions against employees.”

“Today – eight years later – there is little, if any, evidence to show that the more than half a billion dollars DHS has spent created an effective chemical security regulatory program or measurably reduced the risk of an attack on our chemical industrial infrastructure,” Coburn said at the time.

Coburn added, “Since its creation, the CFATS program has been beset by chronic mismanagement, missed goals, backlogs and regulatory excess. This program exists to increase our nation’s security against attacks on chemical facilities, but it hasn’t adequately met that goal. Combined with the current leadership at CFATS, I am confident this bill will provide the necessary fixes to put the program on track to reducing our nation’s vulnerability to chemical terrorism.”

GAO’s most recent audit indicated the CFATS program continues to struggle to overcome some of these challenges. Specifically, ISCD categorized approximately 2,900 facilities as high-risk based on unverified and self-reported data in evaluating facilities for a toxic release threat, which is essentially the threat posed to surrounding populations if the toxin was released.

One of the aspects considered in determining the toxic release threat is the distance of concern— an area in which exposure to a toxic chemical cloud could cause serious injury or fatalities from short-term exposure. ISCD requires facilities to calculate this distance using a web-based tool, but ISCD does not verify facility-reported data for facilities it does not categorize as high-risk for a toxic release threat.

However, GAO estimated more than 2,700 facilities (44 percent) of an estimated 6,400 facilities with a toxic release threat misreported the distance. Consequently, the audit recommended DHS verify the distance of concern reported by facilities is accurate.

In addition, GAO also discovered ISCD has made substantial progress in approving site security plans and conducting compliance inspections. However, ISCD does not consistently ensure compliance and effectively measure program results. Compliance with site security plans is essential, since these outline the planned measures that facilities agree to implement to address security vulnerabilities.

To ensure consistency in addressing non-compliance with the CFATS program, DHS must make sure it has documented processes and procedures for managing non-compliant facilities.

Currently, ISCD addresses compliance issues on a case-by-case basis. GAO revealed almost half (34 of 69) of the facilities ISCD inspected as of February 2015 had not implemented one or more planned measures by deadlines specified in their approved site security plans and therefore were not fully compliant with their plans.

The audit report stated, “Given that ISCD will need to inspect about 2,900 facilities in the future, having documented processes and procedures could provide ISCD more reasonable assurance that facilities implement planned measures and address security gaps.”

As an important part of the nation’s counterterrorism efforts, strengthening the CFATS program will continue to be a critical way to keep dangerous chemicals out of the hands of those who wish to do us harm. DHS concurred with GAO’s recommendations and has outlined steps to address them.

DHS concurred with GAO’s recommendations and has taken steps to address them. According to Bob Davis, National Protection and Programs Directorate, DHS believes that documenting processes to track non-compliant facilities is worthwhile and, as had previously been done with all other major aspects of CFATS implementation, the Department is in the process of developing and documenting such procedures for this final stage of the CFATS process.

In addition, as recommended by GAO, the Department will develop a performance measure that includes only planned measures that have been implemented and verified. Davis explained that, “It is important to note there is no single measure that can fully capture the impact of CFATS. This is due to the complexity of the CFATS program and the many ways in which it reduces risks.”

Finally, DHS has begun developing a revised Top-Screen application and supporting tiering methodology that eliminates the need for facilities to calculate and self-report Distances of Concern. While this is in development, DHS will establish a process through which it will verify Distances of Concern submitted in new Top-Screens for accuracy before finalizing a preliminary tiering result for any facility with threshold quantities of a release-toxic chemical of interest.

“DHS’ CFATS program focuses specifically on security at high-risk chemical facilities and continues to make strides in securing facilities in communities across the country,” said Davis. “Since the program’s inception, more than 3,000 facilities have eliminated, reduced or modified their holdings of chemicals of interest. DHS concurs with the GAO’s recommendations and has already taken steps to implement them.”

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Durbin Fights for Transit Funding Increase in Senate Transportation Bill

WASHINGTON, D.C. –(ENEWSPF)—July 24, 2015. During the Senate’s negotiations on a long-term reauthorization of federal surface transportation programs, U.S. Senator Dick Durbin (D-IL) fought aggressively for robust funding for bus and rail transit program that provide services to communities across Illinois. Durbin worked to secure as much as $600 million additional spending for rail transit programs – which would benefit agencies like the Chicago Transit Authority – that were funded at a much lower level in the original version of the bill. This morning, the Senate began debate on a bipartisan, long-term transportation bill that was negotiated this week by Senate leaders.

“I could never have supported a transportation bill that neglects transit systems like Chicago’s CTA, so I worked across the aisle with Senators McConnell and Boxer to increase our federal funding commitment to commuters in this long-term transportation bill,” Durbin said. “Public transit systems offer safe, dependable and affordable access to employment, educational and healthcare opportunities. But communities across the nation are facing a crisis of increasing transit ridership and aging infrastructure that can’t keep pace.”

The transportation legislation being considered by the Senate funds several transit programs, including: the Bus and Bus Facilities program and the State of Good Repair program. These programs benefit agencies across Illinois, including the Chicago Transit Authority, Metra, Pace Suburban Bus Service, Bloomington-Normal’s Connect Transit, Champaign-Urbana MTD, Peoria’s City Link, MetroLink in the Quad Cities, and others.

Durbin worked to increase funding for the State of Good Repair program, which helps transit agencies that are least 7-years-old maintain and repair bus and rail systems. In Illinois, the primary beneficiaries of this program are urban transit rail systems, like the Chicago Transit Authority, which is one of the nation’s largest and oldest transit systems. Durbin fought to secure an addition $100 million per year in additional spending through this program, which brings its total funding to $15.41 billion over six years.

The bill also includes $4.29 billion in funding for the Bus and Bus Facilities program over six years, which is especially critical to downstate Illinois communities. Just last year, Bloomington-Normal’s Connect Transit received $2 million in funding to purchase up to eight replacement buses. Chicago has also benefited from this program, and has recently received $10.3 million to upgrade the current fleet of Chicago Transit Authority buses.

After 33 short-term extensions of surface transportation programs, it has been nearly two months since the Senate passed a stop-gap measure to keep the country’s major transportation and infrastructure programs running through the end of July, when the Highway Trust Fund is expected to become insolvent. Durbin has long advocated for a long-term reauthorization bill that would give states and communities the certainty necessary to move forward with critical infrastructure projects.

“Congress has passed 33 straight short-term extensions of surface transportation programs, and in the last decade, not one has been longer than two years. We cannot patch our way to prosperity,” Durbin said.

Federal funding is particularly important to Illinois transportation. More than 80 percent of Illinois’ transportation spending for its 6-year plan comes from the Highway Trust Fund. Each year, nearly $1.4 billion is dedicated for highways, roads, and bridges and $600 million goes to Illinois’ transit systems. U.S. Census Bureau data shows the design, construction and maintenance of transportation infrastructure supports 138,701 full-time jobs in Illinois. These employees earn a total annual payroll of $5.7 billion and contribute an estimated $500 million in state and federal payroll tax revenue.

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Open source, adaptable infrastructure key to Etsy platform business model

How does Etsy keep its platform business model in tune? Deploying up to 60 code changes a day is par for the course.

Etsy Inc., the vast exchange for handcrafted and vintage items, relies on open source technology and a high-tempo software release schedule to support its platform business model.

The company, which in April completed its initial public offering, has become one of the most visible platform businesses, carving a niche in the arts-and-crafts field. On the supply side, some 1.4 million artisans and merchants have joined Etsy’s worldwide community, selling everything from bed knobs to broomsticks and even a number of kitchen sinks. The platform currently offers 32 million items for sale. On the demand side, Etsy reports 1.4 million active buyers who generated sales of $1.93 billion in 2014.

The Etsy engineering team’s top task: maintain a platform that keeps those constituencies happy.

Engineering must ensure we do our part to maintain a platform that serves the needs of our community, first and foremost,” said John Allspaw, Etsy’s senior vice president of infrastructure and operations. “That means across the organization we’re focused on creating the best buyer and seller experiences, handling everything from payments, trust in the marketplace, to search and data engineering.”

For an emerging platform business model, information technology may not top the owner’s agenda. Building a community and setting the ground rules for participation and conflict resolution are often the first priority. IT, however, tends to become a higher priority as a platform scales and matures. That’s been the case for Etsy, which was founded in 2005. Today, Etsy’s technology infrastructure plays a critical role in the current stage of the platform’s evolution.

“We’ve developed a platform that is geared toward continuous deployment, speed, and long-term operability and performance,” Allspaw explained.

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