Uranium Market Glowing Green

From copper to gold, from oil to natural gas, prices for the earth’s riches have skyrocketed in the past few years as emerging markets added vast demand and speculators revved up markets in ways never seen before. But one commodity trumped them all: uranium. For decades, the trade belonged to a handful of insiders who […]

Inside the First Wind-Powered City in America

Rural Rock Port, Mo., looks like just about any small farm town — with mostly cattle pastures and cornfields. But there is something remarkable on the horizon. Peeking out above the rooftops and the tree line stand four towering windmills. The sleek 40-story turbines spin like pinwheels in the afternoon breeze, harvesting Rock Port’s newest […]

Kenya: Safaricom’s Solar And Wind Energy Solutions Earn Praise

A model adopted by Safaricom to power its base stations using small wind turbines and solar systems will help ensure telecommunication reaches Africa’s remotest regions. Telecommunications industry analysts meeting in Cairo said low access to electricity was one of the greatest impediments to such projects.“Only four per cent of Africa has electricity and most base […]

China facing renewed fuel shortages

China’s leaders are facing renewed pressure over shortfalls in diesel and gasoline, with lines growing at filling stations in major cities Monday as the gap widens between international crude oil values and centrally controlled fuel prices. The shortages, first reported in southern and inland China, appeared to be spreading to the wealthier areas in the […]

Oil Left in the Ground

High prices still haven’t prompted companies to use advanced extraction methods. Even with record-high oil prices, about two-thirds of the oil in known oil fields is being left in the ground. That’s because existing technologies that could extract far more oil–as much as about 75 percent of the oil in some oil fields–aren’t being widely […]

The oil transition

Running on empty? Fears over oil supply move into the mainstream On a rainy day last month, four drummers, three guitarists, a bagpiper, two didgeridoo players and 186 others assembled in the rural English town of Cirencester to discuss turning their neighbourhoods into low-impact communities built around farming, arts and crafts and herbal medicine. After […]

Rising fuel prices — all bad?

So, with gas approaching $4 a gallon, why are the vast majority of us still zooming along above the speed limit? Or letting our parked vehicles idle — getting 0 mpg — as we go into convenience stores? Increased fuel prices are as sure as death and taxes. Oh, there’ll be a few brief lulls […]

The Incredible Shrinking Superpower

Worried about the high cost of filling up? President Bush is on the case. Last Friday he arrived in Riyadh to urge King Abdullah, the leader of the world’s largest petroleum producer, Saudi Arabia, to put more oil on the market. At the sun-bleached airport, Bush was greeted with the Gulf’s signature mix of garish […]

Russian energy chief urges gas export rethink

Gazprom, the Russian state-controlled gas monopoly and the main supplier to the EU, should concentrate on supplying its domestic market to avoid shortages at home, one of the country’s leading liberals has argued. Anatoly Chubais, architect of Russia’s 1990s privatisation programme and now the head of its former electricity monopoly, said: “I think that, in […]

Iraq could have largest oil reserves in the world

Iraq dramatically increased the official size of its oil reserves yesterday after new data suggested that they could exceed Saudi Arabia’s and be the largest in the world. The Iraqi Deputy Prime Minister told The Times that new exploration showed that his country has the world’s largest proven oil reserves, with as much as 350 […]

Drilling for Defeat?

Nearly two decades ago, Republicans won the West by linking Democrats to environmentalists, who supposedly cared more for the spotted owl and other favored species than they did for the jobs of loggers or miners. But now, as a boom in natural-gas drilling reshapes the region, Western Democrats have found success recasting environmentalism as a […]

Pump prices rise to new high as oil extends gains

NEW YORK – More gas and oil records fell Monday as retail fuel prices struck new highs and crude settled above $127 for the first time, tightening the squeeze on drivers planning holiday road trips next weekend. Light, sweet crude for June delivery jumped 76 cents to settle at a record $127.05 a barrel on […]

Fuel prices ‘keep cars off road’

High prices of petrol and diesel are making UK drivers think twice about travelling by car, a survey suggests. The AA polled 17,500 members, and found 27% had cut back on other areas of spending, 16% had decided to travel less by car, and 21% had done both. Petrol prices have risen sharply this year, […]

Official: EPA chief was OK with Calif. request

Democrats reveal deposition that he changed view after White House talks WASHINGTON – The head of the Environmental Protection Agency initially supported giving California full or partial permission to limit tailpipe emissions … Documents withheld Also, EPA continues to withhold some documents that show telephone calls or meetings in the White House. The committee report […]

Bush Would Use Power of Persuasion to Raise Oil Supply

THE 2000 CAMPAIGN: (A Trip Down Memory Lane) Gov. George W. Bush of Texas said today that if he was president, he would bring down gasoline prices through sheer force of personality, by creating enough political good will with oil-producing nations that they would increase their supply of crude. ”I would work with our friends […]

Ethanol faces backlash over the rising cost of food

After years of generally favorable feelings toward ethanol as a “green” alternative to foreign oil, consumers are asking whether the corn-based gasoline additive is driving up food costs. And some in Congress are now calling for an end to federal ethanol subsidies, which sounds like fighting words to many Hoosiers. IndyStar

US-Led Capitalist System Headed for Collapse?

Oil prices continue to rise and rise, with no end in sight. Virtually all other commodities seem to be following to be the same suit. Some now say a new economic system is emerging from the ashes of the old and now crumbling financial structure. Failing to meet even the basic needs of the common […]

Fed pause promises financial disaster

On the heels of the most expansionary monetary policy in the post- Word War II period, pushing the US ratio of domestic credit to gross domestic product to an unsustainable 226% in 2007 as compared with 184% in 2000 and 142% 1980 respectively, the US Federal Reserve has adopted an even more aggressive expansionary policy […]

Somalia: Over 2.6 Million Could Go Hungry, UN Agency Warns

More than 2.6 million Somalis – comprising 35 per cent of the Horn of Africa nation’s population – need food assistance due because of the deteriorating humanitarian situation triggered by skyrocketing food prices, the weak currency and worsening drought, the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) cautioned today. Violence has also forced nearly 900,000 […]

Jump in food prices biggest in 18 years

Consumers had to shell out more for goods, services and especially food in April, according to a government report released Wednesday, but the rise was lower than expected. The Consumer Price Index, a key inflation reading, rose 0.2% last month, according to the Labor Department. That was lower than the 0.3% jump recorded in March […]

Far From Normal (Kunstler)

Those were the words that Fed chairman Ben Bernanke used to describe the financial markets (and by extension the economy) these heady spring days when everybody else with a rostrum, it seems, has pronounced the so-called liquidity crisis contained. There’s a great wish for American finance to return to business-as-usual — raking in fantastic fees […]

Arctic host to a new ‘Cold War’

Nowhere on earth provides more dramatic evidence of the earth’s changing climate than the Arctic. The sea ice is receding. Glaciers are melting. And even the coldest remotest parts of the region are becoming gradually warmer. Arctic explorer Pen Hadlow says: “I will always remember seeing a mother polar bear with a young cub just […]

Mexico’s Oiling Days Ending Soon

If we Americans think persuading our Congress to get serious about drilling for oil is tough, consider what the president of Mexico is going through. Even without a terror attack on its oil facilities, Mexico’s output is falling sharply and could end as soon as 10 years. Its president is setting an example by fighting […]

Russia’s oil exports down 3.3% to 448 mln bbls in Jan-March

Russia’s crude exports declined 3.3% year-on-year in the first quarter to 61.1 million metric tons (448 million barrels), the country’s top statistics body said on Monday. The State Statistics Service (Rosstat) said crude production in the country shrank 0.2% in the reporting period to 121 million metric tons (886 million barrels) while sales (refining) on […]

Current oil production meets demand-Saudi Arabia

The current level of oil production is fulfilling market demand, Saudi Arabia’s Oil Minister Ali al-Naimi said in remarks carried by state news agency SPA on Monday. “(Saudi Arabia) is permanently seeking to take into consideration the interest of consumers and producers and to achieve a balance between supply and demand,” SPA quoted Naimi as […]

Not Enough Oil Is Lament of BP

May 19 (Bloomberg) — Never have so many oil and gas companies spent so much to produce so little. That’s the challenge facing Exxon Mobil Corp., Royal Dutch Shell Plc, BP Plc, Chevron Corp., Total SA and ConocoPhillips, which will spend a record $98.7 billion this year on exploration and production, Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. […]

Andris Piebalgs: Nuclear and the EU’s Energy Policy

EU Energy Commissioner, Andris Piebalgs, maintains a good blog on his website. This week he addresses nuclear energy and its correlation with all three pillars of the EU energy policy; competitiveness, security of supply and sustainability. He also stresses his concern about oil prices. The Oil Drum: Europe

Has Peak Oil, as a meme, “tipped”?

Has Peak Oil, as a meme, “tipped”? Our latest oil price poll suggests that well over 70% of the sample (N>3000 now) thinks that oil will at least stay above $114 a barrel for the next two months–and almost half think it will hit $140 a barrel in that timeframe. Search volume on Google for […]

You’re running out of oil – Bush

PRESIDENT George Bush yesterday told leaders of the oil-rich states of the Middle East that they must face up to a future without their precious hydrocarbons. In a stark warning, he said their supplies were running out and urged them to reform and diversify their economies. The outgoing United States president told the World Economic […]

The Era of Cheap Crude Is Ending

…Oil is a limited resource. Limited in the sense of the amount that is available at any particular price at any particular time. The world is not running out of oil, but it is running out of immediately accessible inexpensive oil. It has become increasingly hard for oil producers to supplement supply by the 1.4 […]

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