Global Biofuels Industry Will Be Far More Difficult than Previously Thought

LONDON, Sep 08, 2008 (BUSINESS WIRE) — Despite the emerging biofuels market, the creation of a global biofuels industry will be much more difficult to achieve than originally thought, according to findings of an Accenture (ACN: Accenture Ltd. study released today. Titled “Biofuels’ Time of Transition: Achieving high performance in a world of increasing fuel […]

Iraq expects to sign Shell gas deal within a month

BAGHDAD, Sept 8 (Reuters) – Iraq expects to sign a natural gas deal with Royal Dutch Shell (RDSa.L: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) within a month, the Oil Ministry said on Monday. Iraq’s cabinet on Sunday approved a preliminary deal between the energy giant and the state-run South Oil Company that covers the venture in […]

Australia: ‘Cinderella’ gas a new gold rush

AS the world desperately searches for new energy sources to replace oil, Queensland has suddenly found itself the subject of a global tug of war over its massive reserves of coal seam gas. Bob Bryan and Stephen Bizzell are a generation apart but they have both made millions from a new energy source transforming Queensland […]

Oil cos begin shutting Gulf output ahead of Ike

HOUSTON (Reuters) – Energy companies began shutting production on Monday as Hurricane Ike threatened to cross the U.S. offshore oil patch before output shut by Hurricane Gustav last week could be restored. The one-two punch from Gustav and Ike will likely carve deeply into U.S. energy inventories in the coming weeks, potentially raising fuel prices […]

What $300-a-Barrel Oil Will Mean for You

AN INTERVIEW WITH CHARLES MAXWELL: He correctly predicted the recent price spike — and he sees an eventual move to around $300 a barrel. CHARLES MAXWELL, WHO BEGAN HIS CAREER in the energy business in 1957 working for Mobil Oil, is no stranger to Barron’s readers. In an article he penned nearly four years ago, […]

Peak Oil Review – September 8

1. Production and Prices 2. The OPEC Meeting 3. Iraq 4. Russia and the West 5. Briefs 1. Production and Prices As last week began, Hurricane Gustav was threatening to tear up a substantial portion of the US

‘Omnivorous engine’ hopes to run on many fuels

The ‘omnivorous engine’ is no picky eater. Gasoline? Down the hatch. Ethanol? Butanol? It’ll slurp those up too. The creators of the omnivorous engine, engineers at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Argonne National Laboratory, seek to fashion an engine that can run on just about any type of spark-ignited fuel. “Just because an engine is […]

The character of Peak Oil

People have talked about running out of oil since the dawn of the petroleum era — often as if it would be experienced as a sudden collapse. Now most experts refer more accurately to ‘Peak Oil.’ While an ultimate peak in petroleum production is inevitable, I argue that the authors discussing it commonly make two […]

An urban legend to comfort America: demand for oil creates new supply

This is the third post in a series examining As I have described at length in previous posts, we know astonishingly little about our available energy resources, consumption patterns, and alternatives. To illustrate this, nobody has answered the question at the start of chapter II: what is our source of information about the monthly volume […]

‘Smart water’ may help boost production from oil wells by 60 percent

Researchers in Norway report that injecting a special type of seawater called “smart water” into certain low-yield oil wells may help boost oil extraction by as much as 60 percent. The study could help meet rising energy demands and provide consumers with some financial relief at the gas pump in the future, the scientists suggest. […]

Turkey moves to diversify gas supply after Russia row

ISTANBUL (Reuters) – Turkey is seeking to diversify its natural gas imports as increased tensions with its main supplier Russia has raised fears of a shortage in winter. Moscow has established a reputation as a reliable supplier to Ankara by increasing gas supplies to Turkey when Iran cuts its exports to meet domestic demand, a […]

Russia, Venezuela may hold joint naval maneuvers

MOSCOW, Russia (AP) — A Russian Foreign Ministry spokesman said that Moscow may hold joint naval maneuvers with Venezuela, a deployment that comes amid increasingly tense relations with the United States. Andrei Nesterenko said a squadron of Russian navy ships is to visit Venezuela before the year’s end. Nesterenko said that deployment had been planned […]

Democrats compromise on oil drilling

Congressional Democrats want tax breaks for big oil companies repealed in return for supporting expanded off-shore oil drilling. WASHINGTON (CNN) — Lawmakers return to Capitol Hill Monday to pick up where they left off in their bitter fight over energy legislation — whether to allow more off-shore oil drilling to help relieve the sky-high price […]

Oil Crisis Hiding in Plain Sight

Pump Prices and Crude Still Way Ahead of Year Ago Levels It It

Geopolitical Disruptions #2: Identifying the Feedback Loops

This post, the second in a series on Geopolitical Feedback Loops (see part 1 here), will outline the various geopolitical feedback loops that operate to disrupt oil and resource production. I’ve tried to link most of these feedback loops around a common theme of ownership dispute, illustrated below. There are several examples for each feedback […]

Russia aims to corner energy market: U.S. official

ROME (Reuters) – Russia aims to extend its control over energy deliveries to the West and it is important that European countries push forward on efforts to diversify routes for oil and gas supplies, a senior U.S. official said on Monday. As Vice President Dick Cheney visited Italy to seek support for Georgia after its […]

A future without oil

South Africa cannot pin its hope on a miracle to rescue it from the coming global oil crisis, and needs to take urgent and radical steps to avoid an “unprecedented” meltdown in the country’s economy and transport network. All the signals point to a rapid and irreversible decline in world oil production within the next […]

Global Implications of China’s Big Investment in Iraq and Afghanistan

This article assesses the significance of China’s recently announced investments in large copper and oil development in Afghanistan and Iraq respectively, with potential significance not only for development and peace in the two war-torn nations, but also for China’s global role and the US-China relationship. With foreign and domestic investment in both nations barely trickling […]

Solar powered system will help reduce ships emissions

Japans largest shipping line are developing a system of solar panels capable of generating 40 kilowatts of electricity for use on a 60,000 ton cargo ship, thus reducing the ships emissions. According to a report in ENN (Environmental News Network), Nippon Yusen KK, has teamed with Nippon Oil Corporation in developing the solar panels for […]

‘India’s coal reserves may exhaust by 2040′

Stressing the need to employ new mining technologies, a top PSU official said India is likely to run out of its 60-70 billion tonnes of coal reserves by 2040-41 if the demand continues to grow at the present pace. “The demand for coal will reach two billion tonnes mark by 2016-17. We need to grow […]

UK: Warning over growing fuel poverty

Almost a quarter of the population will be in fuel poverty by next year and those on low incomes will be especially badly hit, new figures have shown. A report published by the National Housing Federation shows that by the end of 2009 5.7 million UK households will be spending at least 10% of their […]

Azerbaijan at crosswinds of a new cold war

Azerbaijan’s presidential elections are a few weeks away and while most experts agree it is a sure bet that the current president, Ilham Aliyev, will easily win re-election, there is less certainty about the future orientation of the country, increasingly caught in the crosswind of a new US-Russia power struggle. In his tour of the […]

Australia not willing to give India uranium despite NSG support

India is unlikely to get Australian uranium in the near future even as pressure mounts on the Labour government to reverse its ban on uranium exports to India to meet its growing energy demand. Despite supporting New Delhi at the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) over the weekend, Australia has reaffirmed that it will not export […]

Back Talk: Elizabeth Royte

An interview with Elizabeth Royte, writer of BottlemaniaWhat’s the bottled water situation? In 2007 we drank about 50 billion bottles of water in the United States. It takes 17 million barrels of oil to make all the bottles we use in this country [for water], and the making of those bottles generates 2.5 million tons […]

Jason and the secret climate change war

A shadowy scientific elite codenamed Jason warned the US about global warming 30 years ago but was sidelined for political convenience Today the scientific argument about the broad principles of what we are doing to the Earth These reports involve a secret organisation of American scientists reporting to the US Department of Defense. At the […]

China marches past USA to stake a claim to Iraq’s oil

China has secured Baghdad’s first post-Saddam Hussein oil deal by reviving a 1997 concession to exploit reserves on the al-Ahdab field south of the capital. The two countries are expected to formally sign an agreement later this month that will earn the state-controlled China National Petroleum Corp (CNPC) a fixed price for every barrel it […]

Off-shore LNG terminals get poor marks from ocean advocacy group

TRENTON — An ocean advocacy group released a report Wednesday that lambasts liquified natural gas and three different proposals to build liquefied natural gas terminals off New Jersey’s shore. The report, which characterizes liquified natural gas, or LNG, as expensive, dirty and a threat to the nation’s energy independence, is meant to jumpstart Clean Ocean […]

Gulf oil and gas producers give Ike a serious look

NEW YORK (AP) Other producers were also watching Ike, which was about 90 miles northeast of Cuba and traveling fast. The storm could strike the U.S. coast by midweek. “Offshore oil and gas operators in the Gulf of Mexico who are re-boarding platforms and rigs and restoring production following Hurricane Gustav are now starting to […]

Lester R. Brown: Want a better way to power your car? It’s a breeze

Legendary Texas oilman T. Boone Pickens is half right. We do need to harness this country’s wind resources for a homegrown source of electricity, as he has been urging this summer in expensive television ads. And we do need to reduce the $700 billion we may soon be paying annually for imported oil. But part […]

Global resources essential

The price of a gallon of gas at your local pump is one of the best examples of competing interests in a world getting smaller every day. Why has the price of oil risen from $10 a barrel just nine years ago to the staggering price of $140? Sure we have inflation in this country […]

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