The Divergence Of Rig Count, Oil Price And Production Explained

Summary Since June, oil prices have plummeted 30% on concerns of a worldwide supply glut. Paradoxically, during this same period, the oil rig count has climbed by 74 rigs or 7%. This article analyzes this relationship between rig count and oil price to predict in which direction the rig count will move next. It also […]

Feds allow Shell to drill for oil in Arctic Ocean

The federal government on Monday gave Royal Dutch Shell the final permit it needs to drill for oil in the Arctic Ocean off Alaska’s northwest coast for the first time in more than two decades. The Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement announced that it approved the permit to drill below the ocean floor after […]

The Boundaries and Future of Solution Space

We’re doing something a little different. Nicole wrote another very long article and I suggested publishing it in chapters; this time she said yes. Over five days we will post five different chapters of the article, one on each day, and then on day six the whole thing. Just so there’s no confusion: the article, […]

$10 Oil Up Ahead?

Oil prices hit their 2009 lowest this outgoing week, as the market is badly shaken by the renminbi’s devaluation in China, and the non-stop increase in pumping in both OPEC and North America. Kristian Rouz — Global crude prices dropped to their 6-year lows during past three months, although summer is traditionally a peak season on the demand side […]

Venezuela’s food shortage keeps getting worse

As dawn breaks over the scorching Venezuelan city of Maracaibo, smugglers, young mothers, and a handful of kids stir outside a supermarket where they spent the night, hoping to be first in line for scarce rice, milk, or whatever may be available. Some of the people in line are half-asleep on flattened cardboard boxes; others […]

What is the price of oil telling us?

Market fundamentalists tell us that prices convey information. Yet, while our barbers and hairdressers might be able to give us an extended account of why their prices have changed in the last few years, commodities such as oil–which reached a six-year low last week–stand mute. To fill that silence, many people are only too eager […]

Kunstler: True Believers

There is a special species of idiot at large in the financial media space who believe absolutely in the desperate and tragic public relations bullshit that this society churns out to convince itself that the techno-industrial high life can continue indefinitely, despite the mandates of reality — in particular, the fairy tales about oil: we’re […]

Mad Max: Fury Road

In a stark desert landscape where humanity is broken, two rebels just might be able to restore order: Max, a man of action and of few words, and Furiosa, a woman of action who is looking to make it back to her childhood homeland.

Population and climate instability will lead to severe food shortages by 2050

The food industry has become much more efficient in the last few decades as a result of globalization, but also a lot more vulnerable to shocks. Climate change will lead not only to increased temperatures, but the extreme weather it causes in North, South America and Asia are likely to also lead to global food […]

Approaching A Global Deflationary Crisis?

Anyone with any sense for global economic trends ought to be worried. The signs are everywhere of a serious deflationary crisis. It is obvious that Chinese growth is falling. The prices for energy and the raw materials that feed the growth economy keep falling. The demand for Chinese exports is down too. Stock Markets in […]

US Loosens Longtime Ban on Oil Exports

Energy companies eager to export American crude oil scored a victory Friday when Washington agreed to allow them to trade oil with Mexico, in a further erosion of the four-decade ban on selling U.S. crude overseas. The U.S. Commerce Department told members of Congress it intends to approve an application by the national oil company […]

Austerity and Degrowth – Dealing with the Economic Crisis and the Ecological Crisis Together

This article arises from increasing frustration and irritation about the way that the debate about Greece, and in general about austerity, is framed. My frustration is not only with the policy thugs who are implementing austerity, but also, to a degree, with their critics – which includes the failure of most of the critics of […]

Malthusians v. Cornucopians

Reading Ronald Bailey’s The End of Doom, I was reminded that the debate between prophets of a looming apocalypse and self-styled cornucopians has a long history, the modern version of which can be traced to the writings of Thomas Malthus in the eighteenth century warning that humanity’s ability to reproduce would outstrip its ability to […]

Peak Oil Is Near Not Because of Dwindling Supply, But Disappearing Demand

Given the stagnation in household incomes across the wealthier global economies, oil is facing pressure as never before to remain competitive given the plethora of cheaper – and more reputationally acceptable – alternatives. JL Amory Lovins comments in Medium: Demand is going away — not incrementally but fundamentally. Like whale oil in the 1850s, oil is becoming […]

Why an Oil Glut May Lead to a New World of Energy

The plunge of global oil prices began in June 2014, when benchmark Brent crude was selling at $114 per barrel. It hit bottom at $46 this January, a near-collapse widely viewed as a major but temporary calamity for the energy industry.  Such low prices were expected to force many high-cost operators, especially American shale oil producers, out […]

MIT’s groundbreaking mini fusion reactor

It’s an old joke that many fusion scientists have grown tired of hearing: Practical nuclear fusion power plants are just 30 years away — and always will be. But now, finally, the joke may no longer be true: Advances in magnet technology have enabled researchers at MIT to propose a new design for a practical […]

Iran is hiding more oil at sea than we realized

One of the biggest mysteries in the oil market surrounds just how much oil Iran is hoarding at sea. That’s a key question because Iran’s nuclear deal with the West could lift crippling sanctions, and pave the way for tons of Iranian oil to hit the market. A surge in Iranian exports would only deepen […]

Russian Foreign Minister Curses Saudis, Calls Them Imbeciles

Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov prompted a wave of social media buzz this week after being filmed swearing under his breath during a press conference in Moscow with his Saudi counterpart. Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov prompted a wave of social media buzz this week after being filmed swearing under his breath during a press […]

Doomsday predictions come and gone

There’s never been a shortage of gloomy predictions about apocalypses to come. Here’s a rundown of recent cataclysms that never came to pass. The preppers of Horning’s Mill might seem an oddity in comparison to the millions around the world living without emergency shelters, stockpiles of supplies and plans to escape if a doomsday arrives, […]

The War Against Change

Last week’s post explored the way that the Democratic party over the last four decades has abandoned any claim to offer voters a better future, and has settled for offering them a future that’s not quite as bad as the one the Republicans have in mind. That momentous shift can be described in many ways, […]

IEA Sees Oil Glut Persisting Despite Soaring Demand

World oil demand is expanding at its fastest pace in five years thanks to rebounding economic growth and low prices, but global oversupply will last through 2016, the West’s energy watchdog said on Wednesday. The International Energy Agency said in a monthly report that it was steeply raising its demand growth outlook for this year […]

Oil at $30 Is No Problem for Some Bakken Drillers

The lowest crude prices in six years might not be enough to put the brakes on the U.S. energy renaissance. Some parts of North Dakota’s Bakken shale play are profitable at less than $30 a barrel as companies tap bigger wells and benefit from lower drilling costs, according to a Bloomberg Intelligence analysis. That’s less […]

Humans Have Used Up A Year’s Worth Of The Earth’s Resources In 8 Months

Less than eight months into 2015, humans have already consumed a year’s worth of the Earth’s resources. Ecological Debt Day, or Earth Overshoot Day, falls on Thursday and marks the point in the year when “humanity’s annual demand for the goods and services that our land and seas can provide — fruits and vegetables, meat, […]

The Oil Price: How Low Is Low?

With West Texas Intermediate (WTI) and Brent close to their January 2015 lows some readers are wondering how these lows compare with historic lows when the oil price is adjusted for inflation (deflated). BP just happen to provide an oil price series that is adjusted for inflation (Figure 1). The data are annual averages and […]

World Population Will Nearly Double by 2100

The world population is 7.3 billion presently. It will surpass 11 billion by the end of the century, according to UN Population Division projections The world population is growing at an unprecedented rate. It will nearly double as much as we have today by 2100. Currently, the world population is 7.3 billion. It will be […]

Switzerland lifts sanctions against Iran

Neutral Switzerland will officially lift on Thursday sanctions against Iran that had been suspended since January 2014, the government announced on Wednesday, citing a deal last month between Tehran and six big powers to curb Iran’s nuclear program. “The Federal Council (government) wishes today’s steps to be seen as a sign of its support for […]

Brazil Offshore Subsalt Holds 176 Billion Barrels Of Oil, Gas

Brazil’s Subsalt Polygon, an offshore area that has already yielded some of the world’s largest recent oil finds, may hold enough undiscovered petroleum and gas to supply the world’s current oil needs for more than five years, researchers said. The Polygon, which covers most of Brazil’s Santos and Campos offshore sedimentary basins, contains at least […]

Nuclear fusion reactor in just five years?

The greatest fusion reactor in our neighborhood sends energy free for the harvesting from about 8 light-minutes away, where it safely burns and flares without any help at all from the small, blue marble that orbits it once a year. But expansion of photovoltaic technologies to capture that solar power has had a hard time […]

Oil wars: OPEC is winning

OPEC’s strategy to pump like crazy despite collapsing oil prices seems to be finally paying off: The U.S. oil industry is showing cracks. Oil supply from non-OPEC countries is set to slow dramatically next year and slip into its first contraction since 2008, the International Energy Agency said Wednesday in its monthly oil market report. […]

Peak Oilers Shut Up Forever Please

Princeton University geologist Ken Deffeyes predicted that global oil production would peak on Thanksgiving Day, 2005. In 2005, daily global oil production averaged 85 million barrels per day. Daily petroleum liquids production in July was 96 million barrels per day. For the past six months global oil prices have been falling steeply. Today West Texas […]

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