John Michael Greer: Pieces of the puzzle

…One of the continuing disputes on the end of the peak oil community concerned with agriculture is whether farming will continue to use tractors and the like, or whether draft horses will prove to be more viable. Both sides have good arguments. On the one hand, a large farm running tractors on homegrown biodiesel can […]

EPA toughens smog limits, but not enough for some advocates

Federal regulators imposed tougher limits on smog pollution Wednesday, but the Bush administration rejected pleas from independent scientists and children’s health experts for even more stringent standards. New rules announced by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency will tighten air quality standards set a decade ago, reflecting a growing amount of research indicating that smog poses […]

Farm research network braces for less funds from U.S.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – A leading agricultural research network is bracing itself for a sharp cut in funding from its top donor, the United States, even as bioenergy, population growth, and climate change pose pivotal challenges for global food production. The U.S. Agency for International Development has warned the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research, which […]

The new limits to growth

Let us venture into a political no-go zone and say that, at some point in the not too distant future, there is a bitter pill that we will need to swallow — and we are getting just a foretaste with the current energy crisis. In a nutshell, our global growth-based economic model is fundamentally unsustainable. […]

UK: Car depreciation rates worsening

The current economic uncertainty, coupled with green taxes, are making car depreciation rates worse, according to motor industry analysts. Analysts Eurotaxglass’s have told the BBC the value of used cars will fall by an additional 8% this year. Big family cars, which traditionally lose most value, and four-wheel drive vehicles are worst affected. By comparison, […]

Recession fears revived as store sales tumble

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) — Monthly retail sales suffered a surprising drop last month as American households continued to curtail their spending amid higher energy and food prices and a weakening jobs market. The Commerce Department reported Thursday that total retail sales fell 0.6%, compared to a revised 0.4% increase in January. January sales were originally […]

Department of Energy shines $14 million on solar energy projects

The solar projects have the potential to significantly reduce the cost of electricity produced by PV products from current levels of $0.18-$0.23 per Kilowatt hour (kWh) to $0.05 – $0.10 per kWh by 2015

Samurai-Sword Maker’s Reactor Monopoly May Cool Nuclear Revival

(Bloomberg) — From a windswept corner of Hokkaido, Japan’s northernmost island, Japan Steel Works Ltd. controls the fate of the global nuclear-energy renaissance. There stands the only plant in the world, a survivor of Allied bombing in World War II, capable of producing the central part of a nuclear reactor’s containment vessel in a single […]

Russia, Ukraine axe intermediaries in natural gas supplies

MOSCOW (RIA Novosti) – Russian and Ukrainian energy companies signed a deal on Thursday ending their complex system of natural gas supplies via intermediaries, and fixed a scheme for 2008 deliveries. The agreement came after two days of talks between the heads of Russia’s state gas giant Gazprom and Ukrainian oil and gas company Naftogaz, […]

Oil hits new record of $111 on dollar slump

LONDON (Reuters) – Oil rose to a fresh record high on Thursday, hitting new peaks for the seventh trading day, as a weak dollar overshadowed an increase in U.S. crude inventories. U.S. crude for April delivery struck a new high of $111.00 a barrel. It was trading at $110.93, up $1.01 by 11:02 a.m. EDT […]

Diesel: Fuel for Inflation?

Truckers Face Record Pump Prices to Get Goods to Stores The auto club AAA reported yesterday that both diesel and gasoline prices smashed previous highs. Gasoline rose to a nationwide average of $3.246 a gallon for regular unleaded. Diesel, which has been setting records almost daily for the past three weeks, hit a nationwide average […]

China Raises Fuel Oil Tax to Help Curb Energy Use

March 13 (Bloomberg) — China, the world’s third-largest buyer of crude oil, increased the consumption tax on imported fuel oil by more than fourfold on March 5 as part of efforts to limit energy use. The levy rose to 0.1 yuan ($0.014) a liter from 0.03 yuan, the Beijing-based Customs General Administration of China said […]

What`s up with oil?

Okay, it But even if the price of oil drops in the months ahead, let

Climate change adds to world clandestine migrant dilemma

DAKAR (AFP) – Migration from the world’s poorest nations to the rich West is going to increase and could be speeded up by climate change, a top international agency chief has warned. With growing numbers of poor Africans dying trying to reach Europe on flimsy boats and Asians paying “snakehead” traffickers to get them out […]

China tells developed world to go on climate change ‘diet’

BEIJING (AFP) – The developed world should go on a climate change diet rather than lecture China over its rising greenhouse gas emissions, Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi said Wednesday. Yang told reporters that China’s per capita emission of the gases linked to global warming remained less than one third the average in developed countries. […]

Oil Price Bubble?

Oil prices climbed to their highest level ever, reaching over $108 per barrel this week. And Americans are feeling this price spike at the pump, with gasoline averaging $3.22 per gallon. An analysis released by the investment firm Goldman Sachs suggested that oil prices might soar to $200 per barrel. Does this make sense? Not […]

Atlantic’s Gulf Stream has huge influence on atmosphere

PARIS (AFP) – The conveyor belt of Atlantic warm water known as the Gulf Stream massively influences the lower layers of the atmosphere, a finding that could shed light on a poorly-understood aspect of global warming, scientists report. The Gulf Stream flows from the western tropical Atlantic to the northeast, bathing coastal western Europe with […]

A new ‘neighborhood watch’: Azeri horsemen guard BP pipeline

The $100 million effort stretches across 450 towns and is part of a growing push for corporate social responsibility. DUZDAG, Azerbaijan – Six days a week, Seymur Alizadeh and his chestnut-brown mare patrol the Azerbaijani countryside. Buried a few feet below is the prized Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan (BTC) oil pipeline, which delivers nearly 1 million barrels of […]

Oil prices burst record 110 dollars

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) — Oil prices rebounded to another record high Wednesday afternoon after initially plummeting when a government report said supplies of crude and gasoline had risen much more than expected. In afternoon trading, U.S. light crude for April delivery surged to a high of $110.20 before closing at $109.92. Oil had traded as […]

Survey: Talent not surfacing in oil, gas industry

The talent pool is drying up for some oil and gas companies, according to a survey released Wednesday. Ernst & Young LLP and Rice University surveyed human resources executives at 22 international oil and gas companies, and found that nearly 90 percent say the talent shortage has become one of the Top 5 business issues […]

ConocoPhillips reduces long-term production outlook

ConocoPhillips, the third-largest U.S. oil company, cut its projection for long-term production growth. Output will increase at a rate of 2 percent, according to slides for a presentation that Chief Executive Officer Jim Mulva and other executives are making to analysts today in New York. The company, which didn’t specify the term for the projection, […]

Landmines Block Egypt’s Access to Oil and Gas

…Some 22 million landmines and unexploded ordnance have lain hidden in the northwest of Egypt since World War II, Fathy El-Shazly, national project director for mine clearance and development at the Ministry of International Cooperation, told United Nations news service Irin. Many of the mines are near the battlefield of El-Alamein, where the British Eighth […]

Crude Bull Run May Be A Long Ride With Capital Constraints

WASHINGTON (Dow Jones)–As oil prices threaten to spike above $110 a barrel Tuesday – daily setting new inflation-adjusted records – some industry experts say the bull run is in for a long ride and crude could surge even higher. While in the short term, traders are concerned about inventory levels heading into the summer, Jeffrey […]

States await word on new air pollution rules

EPA may tighten smog cutting requirements to protect millions of people WASHINGTON – States and local officials across the country awaited word Wednesday on whether they will have to further cut air pollution to protect millions of people, especially the very young and the elderly, from respiratory illnesses. The Environmental Protection Agency is planning to […]

IEA to convene meeting on surging oil prices

LONDON (Thomson Financial) – The International Energy Agency will convene a meeting of oil industry experts in Paris on Monday on the current surge in crude prices, which have leapt from record to record in the last 10 days, an IEA spokesman said Wednesday. ‘There will be a meeting on prices with experts, both from […]

Iran encourages gas cartel

Iran has stated that it believes an Opec-style cartel for natural gas producers could help cut production and costs and benefit customers. “Iran supports setting up a body that would guarantee the rights of both consumers and producers,” vice minister at the Oil Ministry Ali Kordan, told the Iranian daily Ettelaat, according to Reuters. “Trading […]

OPEC oil surges to more than 100 dollars a barrel

VIENNA (AFP) – The price of oil produced by OPEC countries has topped the 100-dollar-per-barrel mark for the first time, the cartel said on Wednesday. OPEC’s daily basket price, which is always published with a 24-hour delay and serves as the reference price for the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries, rose to 100.57 dollars on […]

$4-a-gallon gas forecast in some areas

WASHINGTON The EIA report notes, however, that “even if the national average monthly gasoline price peaks near that level, there is a significant possibility that prices during some shorter time period, or in some region or subregion, will cross the $4 per gallon threshold.” The projection came as the Energy Department and the International Energy […]

Khurais Me A River

The Khurais Megaproject is the largest integrated development project in Saudi Aramco history. Slated for completion at the end of 2009, it includes the expansion of oil production in the Khurais, Abu Jifan, and Mazalij fields. These fields lie approximately midway between Riyadh and the Ghawar oil field, and sea water for injection will be […]

The new geopolitics of crude oil

…Last week was a defining moment in international relations. West Texas and North Sea Brent crude oil, the world Geopolitical supply shocks have added a risk premium to crude oil prices ever since the fall of the Saddam Hussein regime in Iraq. Terrorist attacks against pipelines and oil storage depots in Basra and the Saudi […]

« Previous Page — Next Page »

LATEST NEWS HEADLINES

• Why the IEA is Wrong About Peak Oil Demand
• Did we inadvertently speed global warming?  
• Venezuela’s Oil Monopoly Eases
• Why Germany is Choosing Natural Gas Over Nuclear Power
• U.S. coal-fired electricity generation decreased in 2022 and 2023

• America Cracks Down on Methane Emissions from Oil and Gas Facilities
• Meet America’s Newest Oil Trader Extraordinaire: Joe Biden
• Is It Time To Refill America’s Strategic Petroleum Reserve?
• Oil prices set to end year 10% lower as demand concerns snap winning streak
• What’s Driving America’s New Oil and Gas Boom?
• China’s peak oil demand bombshell eviscerates Danielle Smith’s energy strategy