(The Center Square) – Oil and gas commingling rules have been updated in accordance with the Big Beautiful Bill in order to strengthen energy production and safety, with energy advocates’ supporting the move.

Larry Behrens from Power the Future told The Center Square: “These reforms are a win for workers and families because commingling allows domestic operators to produce more oil and natural gas at lower cost.”

Power the Future is a nonprofit dedicated to Americans working in reliable energy sources, according to its website.

“After the last four years of red tape and taxpayer-funded failures, America needs more energy,” Behrens said. “This move from the Department of Interior certainly helps deliver.”

Commingling is “the practice of combining oil or gas production from two or more sources into a single stream for measurement and processing,” according to a Department of the Interior news release.

The American Council on Renewable Energy, a group dedicated to energy forms like wind and solar, has not yet responded to The Center Square’s request for comment.

Behrens told The Center Square that “commingling lets producers use shared infrastructure, which will lower the cost of doing business and lower costs for consumers.”

“It can help maximize oil recovery while still maintaining safety and accountability through modern monitoring,” Behrens said.

When asked what else needs to be done for strengthened energy production, Behrens said that “some great next steps could be expanding existing capacity at coal plants to help get more power on the grid and continue their work to bring more reliable and affordable power online.”

“Thankfully, the Trump Administration has the gas pedal to the floor on the road to energy dominance,” Behrens said.

According to the Interior Department news release, the updates made to commingling rules “provide clear standards that support safe operations, improve efficiency and maximize recovery of America’s energy resources.”

The updates are intended to “strengthen energy production and safety.”

The updates are led by the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement (BSEE) and the Bureau of Land Management (BLM).

“BSEE has finalized a rule to clarify expectations for offshore commingling, ensuring production methods protect well integrity, safety and ultimate recovery,” the release said.

Meanwhile, the BLM “is issuing interim guidance to broaden commingling authority on public and tribal lands until updated regulations are complete.”

In addition to aligning with the Big Beautiful Bill’s provisions, the updates to commingling are in accordance with Trump’s executive order “Unleashing American Energy” and support “the Trump administration’s energy and regulatory priorities” by advancing the order’s goals, the release said.

The updates likewise “align with [Department of the Interior] Secretary [Doug] Burgum’s orders emphasizing safe, efficient and predictable oversight of oil and gas operations, reinforcing policies that remove unnecessary regulatory barriers while ensuring maximum resource recovery and environmental protection.”

When reached, the Department of the Interior referred The Center Square to its press release on the updates to commingling, as well as those that concern other recent efforts to “reinforce energy dominance, economic growth, and resource resilience,” as the department told The Center Square. For instance, the Interior Department recently streamlined oil and gas leasing “to advance energy independence and economic growth”; raised the annual Gulf of America revenue-sharing cap to “support coastal protection, restoration and infrastructure projects”; and set an energy leasing schedule “to expand American energy production and strengthen U.S. energy independence.”

In the release, Burgum said that “these updates make it easier to produce American energy without unnecessary bureaucratic hurdles, while at the same time protecting taxpayers, tribes and our shared energy future by ensuring production is safe, efficient and maximizes the long-term value of our resources.”

(The Center Square) – U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement arrests surged by 367% in Georgia this year, with 4,500 illegal aliens arrested in the state between January 20 and July 31, compared to the  963 made under the Biden administration during the same time period in 2021, the Department of Homeland Security says.

Director of Policy Studies at the Center for Immigration Studies Jessica Vaughan told The Center Square that ”the big increase in ICE arrests in Georgia, particularly the arrests of criminal aliens, should have a noticeable effect on public safety, assuming that ICE is able to promptly process and remove them.”

The Center for Immigration Studies is an “independent, non-partisan, non-profit, research organization,” according to its website.

Vaughan said that “removing so many criminal aliens from the community will mean safer streets, safer playgrounds, and safer businesses for everyone.”

Vaughan told The Center Square that “the increase in ICE activity is noticed by other illegal aliens in the community, and many of them are realizing that even if they have not committed other crimes, they may be discovered and arrested, so they are deciding to go home on their own.

“This will open up job opportunities for Americans in Georgia, and relieve the cost to Georgia taxpayers of providing welfare benefits, health care, and education for illegal migrants and their families,” Vaughan said.

“The brunt of the problems from the border crisis under the Biden administration policies was borne by local communities, so now these communities can start to recover,” Vaughan said.

“We are stuck with American criminals, but those criminals who are here in defiance of our laws should be removed so they will not victimize more people,” Vaughan said.

According to a Department of Homeland Security news release, some of the “worst of the worst” arrested in Georgia include noncitizens who have been convicted of trafficking drugs, statutory rape, a hit-and-run, sexual battery against minors, and child molestation.

Homeland Security Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said in the news release: “Biden’s open border [policies] allowed Laken Riley’s killer to be in the country and gave him the opportunity [to] brutally murder the young Georgia nursing student.”

“President Trump promised to put Americans first and remove violent criminals from our country and that’s exactly what we are doing,” McLaughlin said.

“Thanks to his and Secretary [Kristi]  Noem’s leadership, ICE is once again empowered to remove the worst of the worst – including murderers, pedophiles, gang members, drug traffickers, and terrorists,” McLaughlin said.

Vaughan told The Center Square that “the accelerated pace of interior enforcement is a benefit to the entire country.”

“Illegal migrants who are security threats are being taken off the streets, illegal workers are being sent home, and communities will see some fiscal relief from the need to provide services and schooling to so many new arrivals,” Vaughan said.

(The Center Square) – North Carolina’s primary driving route through the Outer Banks on Friday morning remained closed on Ocracoke Island and Hatteras Island.

N.C. 12 was washed over by water and sand from the ocean following the pass of Hurricane Erin. The closure on Ocracoke Island is between the Northern Ferry Terminal and the National Park Service Pony Pens; on Hatteras Island, it is between the Marc Basnight Bridge and Hatteras Village.

In addition to sand removal, pavement damage would determine how long sections of N.C. 12 are to remain closed.

In the 5 a.m. update from the National Hurricane Center, Erin was in the first stages of post-tropical transition about 425 miles south-southwest of Halifax, Nova Scotia, and about 700 miles north of Bermuda. Maximum sustained winds were 90 mph, and the movement had increased to 22 mph.

Hurricane force winds of 74 mph or greater were up to 125 miles from the center of the storm, and tropical storm force winds of 39 mph or greater had grown to 370 miles from the center. A gust of 56 mph was reported on Bermuda at Wade International Airport.

No coastal watches or warnings were in effect on the Atlantic Seaboard.