Ten Years After Invasion, Iraq Continues to Import Oil Products

Former Iraqi oil minister Issam al-Jalabi says that although Iraq is an oil-rich country, it still imports petroleum products from abroad to meet its needs 10 years after the US-led invasion of the country. Jalabi, an international energy expert, told Azzaman that annual imports of oil derivatives reached $6 billion a few years after the occupation. He said […]

Afghanistan to begin first commercial oil production

Afghanistan expects to begin the first commercial oil production in its history in a little under two months. The country’s mining minister, Wahidullah Shahrani, has told the ABC processing will start at the Amu Darya basin in Afghanistan’s north in July. The project is operated by the China National Petroleum Corporation and is expected to […]

Are Natural-Gas Cars Next?

A consortium of North American energy producers plans to showcase half a dozen natural-gas-powered vehicles, including a BMW X3 SUV and a Ford Mustang coupe, in an effort to drum up interest in use of the fuel in passenger cars. America’s Natural Gas Alliance, a trade group representing more than two dozen North American oil […]

Arctic oil boom sparks the next great political and environmental battle

Things are heating up fast in the far north. The lands and sea of the Arctic — which have been ice-filled, inhospitable and treacherous for most of human history — are experiencing the effects of climate change more rapidly than anywhere else on Earth. All of the Arctic’s sea ice is expected to melt completely, […]

BP, Transocean Are Sued by Texas Over 2010 Gulf Oil Spill

Texas sued BP Plc (BP/), Transocean Ltd. and others involved in the 2010 oil spill, calling it the “worst environmental disaster” in U.S. history and becoming the fifth Gulf of Mexico state to file claims. The state accused the companies of violating Texas environmental laws, and is seeking damages for economic loss, including lost tax […]

Pemex Makes Third Ultra-Deep Find at Mexico Gulf Maximino Field

Petroleos Mexicanos, the world’s fourth-largest oil producer, made its third ultra-deepwater discovery on the Mexican side of the Perdido basin in the Gulf of Mexico. Tests at the Maximino field where the crude was found are still being made and volumes are being assessed, Luis Ramos, a strategic planning manager at the Mexican state-owned oil […]

A state-run monopoly is killing Mexico’s chances of oil independence

Any time a single company is responsible for nearly 10% of a country’s GDP, it’s a problem. Thanks to a lack of competition, Pemex, the Mexican oil company responsible for producing all of the country’s oil, has seen production fall steadily over the past decade. It’s a monopoly, man Since Pemex was nationalized 75 years […]

How to Meet the World’s Food Needs in 2030

In 2012 the global population reached 7 billion. The planet faced severe droughts, soaring commodity prices, and lagging food production. Are we staring down the Malthusian food and population disaster predicted in 1798? Or can innovation and technology come to the rescue? While the answer is too complex to know fully, it seems certain that […]

US should repeal its antique ban on the export of crude

Sooner or later, the US government must allow general export of crude oil. Sooner would be better than later. A couple of recent developments illuminate the need. First, crude oil exports are reported by the Energy Information Administration to have jumped in February to their highest level since April 2000. The amount wasn’t great: 124,000 […]

Avoiding the ‘Energy Abyss’

John Hofmeister doesn’t call it ‘peak oil,’ instead he calls it the ‘energy abyss,’ the point at which the global economy ceases to grow because the oil industry can no longer meet demand. Hofmeister is the former president of Shell Oil, the same Shell Oil that is preparing to drill the deepest hole yet drilled […]

Arctic nations adopt marine oil pollution preparedness agreement

The world’s Arctic nations formally agreed to cooperate on marine oil pollution preparedness and response at the Arctic Council’s May 15 meeting in Kiruna, Sweden. The agreement, which was the second legally binding pact negotiated under the council’s auspices, also encourages future national, binational, and multinational contingency plans, training, and exercises to develop effective response […]

Ohio’s well data shatters shale oil hopes

U.S. hopes for a new shale oil bonanza in Ohio, joining the prolific Bakken and Eagle Ford plays that have raised production to 20-year highs, were shattered on Thursday by the first hard evidence that the Utica formation was primarily gas-prone. Just two years ago, the Utica had the global oil industry buzzing as companies […]

Oil-price manipulation: the next Libor?

Some of the world’s biggest oil companies may have a new mess on their hands. The European Commission raided the offices of Shell, BP and Norway’s Statoil this week as part of an investigation into suspected attempts to manipulate global oil prices spanning more than a decade. None of the companies have been accused of […]

Oil price-fixing scandal heats up in Europe

The European Union’s executive arm, the Commission, confirmed it has raided the offices of a number of oil industry companies for possible price-fixing. Here are some questions and answers on the investigation. — Which companies were raided and why? The EU Commission did not say which companies it is investigating. However, some firms have confirmed […]

Canadian PM: Oil going to U.S. one way or another

A controversial oil pipeline to the U.S. Gulf Coast “absolutely needs to go ahead,” Canada’s prime minister said Thursday, and he warned that the oil will be transported through America one way or another. Stephen Harper addressed the Keystone XL project, a flashpoint in the debate over climate change, during a visit to New York […]

Israel Hints at New Strikes, Warning Syria Not to Hit Back

In a clear warning to Syria to stop the transfer of advanced weapons to Islamic militants in the region, a senior Israeli official signaled on Wednesday that Israel was considering additional military strikes to prevent that from happening and that the Syrian president, Bashar al-Assad, would face crippling consequences if he retaliated. “Israel is determined […]

David Stockman: “The American Empire And The End Of Sound Money”

In Chapter 12 of David Stockman’s new book The Great Deformation, the outspoken truth-sayer discusses the realities of the end of the gold standard – from the the Bank of England’s ‘default’ in 1931 to the 1960 London Gold panic (a shot across the Keynesian bow) and on to Nixon and Bretton Woods, Stockman explains […]

How Fukushima Contamination May Have Spread via Waterways

A new study offers fresh insights into how radioactive contamination from the Fukushima nuclear disaster may have spread through Japan’s interconnected waterways, reaching some freshwater fish hundreds of kilometers away. More In Fukushima Watch At Tepco, A Woman Takes the Levers of Power Fukushima Watch: Dead Rodents Cause Another Cooling System Halt at Stricken Plant Megaquake […]

Population growth and climate change explained by Hans Rosling

Let me show you the world, says Swedish academic Han Rosling as he demonstrates the dynamics of population growth, child mortality and carbon dioxide emissions. The challenge for the world is to get everyone out of extreme poverty and get the richest people to use less fossil fuels so that everyone can share their energy […]

Mexico Aims to Triple Natural Gas Imports from U.S.

The construction of a natural gas pipeline from southern Texas to central Mexico will allow for a tripling of imports from the U.S. to meet increasing demand from industry, an official from Petroleos Mexicanos has said…. WSJ

Counting the Calories and calories

Read Part 1, Read Part 2, Read Part 3, Read Part 4, Read Part 5 We Americans spend almost 50 percent of our household food budgets on eating outside the confines of our homes, and we derive more than 30 percent of our caloric intake from those meals and snacks.25 It only makes sense that researchers and market […]

“Apocalyptic Journalism” and Why We Need Reporters to Face the Reality of Our Crumbling Society

For those who believe that a robust public-affairs journalism is essential for a society striving to be democratic, the 21st century has been characterized by bad news that keeps getting worse. Whatever one’s evaluation of traditional advertising-supported news media (and I have been among its critics; more on that later), the unraveling of that business model […]

From Petrodollar To Petrogold: The US Is Now Trying To Cut Off Iran’s Access To Gold

The US is moving to broaden its ‘blockade’ efforts of Iran to the movement of pure gold into the Islamic Republic. The US-led embargo of Iranian crude succeeded in slowing the flow of petrodollars into the nation but as Foreign Affairs committee chairman Edward Cohen remarked, there is “no question that there is gold going […]

Israel Appears to Have More Natural Gas

Operators of two large Israeli natural gas fields said Thursday that another offshore field under exploration shows promise. The Karish field, off Israel’s northern coast, contains “significant signs of natural gas,” according to a statement from Delek Group Ltd., whose subsidiaries also control the large Tamar and Leviathan fields along with U.S.-based Noble Energy Inc. […]

What if there is Peak Oil?

The Spring 2013 Semester has just ended and I am beginning to see light in the tunnel. So I can restart writing my long-neglected blog.  Many things have happened in the four months since my last entry:  Thousands upon thousands of innocent people have died in wars and ethnic/religious strife. Most of these wars have […]

Everything Is Rigged, Continued: European Commission Raids Oil Companies in Price-Fixing Probe

We’re going to get into this more at a later date, but there was some interesting late-breaking news yesterday. According to numerous reports, the European Commission regulators yesterday raided the offices of oil companies in London, the Netherlands and Norway as part of an investigation into possible price-rigging in the oil markets. The targeted companies […]

Are Electric Cars Green? The External Cost of Lithium Batteries

One of the more fashionable concepts that one hears among people who regard themselves as environmentalists, is that the world would be much better off if only we could make the electric car mainstream.   Without having engaged in any kind of systematic survey among serious thinkers on the environment, I certainly feel this is the […]

John Michael Greer: The Pleasures of Extinction

One of the wry pleasures that’s repeatedly come my way since the beginning of this blog seven years ago is that of watching a good many of my predictions come true in short order. Now it’s true that I’ve also made a certain number of failed predictions over that time.  Back in 2007 and 2008, […]

The Peak Oil Crisis: Supply Shock

A new phrase, “supply shock,” entered the lexicon of the global oil business this week when the International Energy Agency reported that unexpectedly rapid growth in tight oil production from North Dakota and Texas is leading to profound changes in the global energy markets. U.S. oil production which grew by 800,000 barrels a day (b/d) […]

What Would it Take to Get to a Steady State Economy?

Humans live in equilibrium with other species in a finite world. In such a world, there is never really a Steady State. Instead, there is a constant ebb and flow.  One species may be dominant in an area for a while, and then another. If populations are closely matched in “ability,” then the ups and […]

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