Saudi Arabia carries on drilling despite oil slump

Saudi Arabia is one of the very few countries which has increased its drilling for new oil and gas wells since prices began to slump in the middle of 2014. The number of rigs drilling for oil and gas around the world has fallen from a peak of 1,382 in July 2014 to just 920 […]

The United States became a net exporter of natural gas

By 2020, the country will be the third in the world in the export of liquefied natural gas after Australia and Qatar. The volume of natural gas exports from the United States for the first time in nearly 60 years exceeded its imports, The Wall Street Journal writes, citing data from the American research company […]

Russian oil producer pushes deeper in Arctic

Russian oil producer Gazprom Neft said it was starting sea trials for a vessel meant to support oil work, including spill response, in extreme Arctic climates. The company said the vessel Alexander Sannikov was formally launched in preparation of sea trials for late season 2018. It’s one of two icebreakers designed to operate in temperatures […]

Peak Oil in a Fact-Free World: the New “Oil Bonanza” in West Texas

Sometimes, I have the feeling of living in a fact-free universe where the laws of physics hold only if you believe in them. (image) So, the USGS comes out with a press release that the media immediately diffuse in terms of a great discovery: 20 billion barrels, somewhere in Texas in a place called “Wolfcamp”.  […]

E is for EROEI

Understanding EROEI – or Energy Return On Energy Invested – should be on every school curriculum, but isn’t. Simply put, it’s the amount of energy we as a species can play with. Back in the days when you could poke a hole in the ground and oil would gush out of it skywards, getting hold […]

Iran Agrees To Join In Upcoming OPEC Production Cut

With OPEC’s Nov. 30 meeting in Vienna just days away,  the oil minister of Iran, a member state once reluctant to help the cartel gouge gas prices, announced his readiness to join in and strengthen production cuts. “It is highly probable that oil and energy ministers of the member countries of Organization of Petroleum Exporting […]

T. Boone Pickens Was Wrong About Peak Oil, Non-Expert Joe Kernen Was Right

by Michael Lynch A recent piece on Forbes.com featured an interview with a fund manager Bruce Pile pointing out that Joe Kernen’s claim that T. Boone Pickens incorrectly predicted peak oil, resulting in an angry outburst from Pickens who proclaimed, “I’m the expert!” He insisted that the peak had occurred in 2005, but only shale had […]

Iran: Oil May Rise to $55 if All Producers Cooperate

Iranian Oil Minister Bijan Zanganeh expressed optimism on Saturday about an upcoming OPEC meeting and said crude prices could jump to $55 a barrel if an agreement is reached and non-OPEC producers cooperate. “We are receiving positive signals that increase the likelihood of agreement at the meeting … and I’m optimistic about the situation,” Zanganeh […]

A Comeback for Coal?

After unrelenting bad news driven by retirements of coal-fired generation and the persistence of cheap natural gas, a round of summer reverse switching may boost the prospects for coal over the next 18 months. While there is too much surplus coal inventory to drive significant production growth in 2016, stronger natural gas pricing sets the […]

IEA expects U.S. shale output rise if OPEC pushes oil to $60

U.S. shale oil producers will increase their output if oil prices hit $60 a barrel, meaning OPEC will have to walk a fine line if it curtails production to prop up prices, the head of the International Energy Agency (IEA) said. OPEC members are due to meet in Vienna at the end of the month […]

What the End of the Age of Oil Will Mean to the Global Economy

Imagine a world of 50% annual inflation, resource wars that span the globe and energy prices skyrocketing as oil reaches $200 a barrel. This is what the “peak oil” theory predicted. And it shaped the opinions of scientists, policymakers and the general population for decades. Recent history has shown, however, that the peak oil theory […]

US Army, Interior Dept Call For More Review On Dakota Pipeline

Federal authorities deferred a final decision on a controversial North Dakota section of the Dakota Access Pipeline on Monday in a statement that highlighted concerns about the “repeated” dispossession of tribal lands in the country’s past. The Departments of the Army and Interior, in a joint statement, said that while their previous decisions to grant […]

EIA revises 2017 crude production upwards

The U.S. Energy Information Administration has revised its crude production forecast for 2017 up slightly as the U.S. rig count continues to rise. The agency said in its latest short-term energy outlook that it expects U.S. crude oil production to average 8.7 million barrels per day (bpd) in 2017, up by 100,000 bpd from last month’s […]

The Largest Threat To North Sea Oil

The Brexit vote has not shaken up forecasts for North Sea oil and gas production, according to BMI Research, but a successful second bid for Scottish independence could slash output in the region. BMI Research’s core view on the UK’s primary oil and gas sector remains unchanged, with oil output estimated to reach 978,000 barrels […]

Kemp: OPEC Plays The Chicken Game While Oil Prices Fall

OPEC members are making the task of oil market rebalancing harder by maximising their production ahead of a ministerial conference at the end of November. OPEC output is actually increasing, putting downward pressure on oil prices, even while the organisation’s members are in talks designed to reduce output in future, with the intention of pushing […]

IEA Sees Global Market Awash With Oil In 2017 If No OPEC Cut

The oil market risks running another surplus in 2017 without an output cut from OPEC, as producers around the globe ramp up supply and demand growth falters, the International Energy Agency said on Thursday. In its monthly oil market report, the group said global supply rose by 800,000 barrels per day in October to 97.8 […]

OPEC Chief Says Russia’On Board’ With Deal to Limit Oil Output

Russia, the world’s biggest energy producer, is “on board” with an OPEC agreement to limit crude oil production to help re-balance the market, according to the group’s Secretary- General Mohammed Barkindo. Members of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries remain committed to an agreement they reached in Algiers in September to trim output, and cooperation […]

The 10 Million Barrels Club of Alberta

Before publishing the article The Most Prolific Oil Well in Alberta, I asked many friends in the industry if they could guess the size (in terms of cumulative oil production) of the largest oil well in Alberta. I heard estimates as low as 3 and as high as 10 million barrels. Many were shocked to […]

Russia Continues To Raise Its Oil Production

Goldman Sachs’ commodity analysts are a merciless bunch. Just the other day they warned that if OPEC fails to agree on a freeze, crude oil prices will dive back to US$40, adding that even if the agreement was reached, non-OPEC producers would continually ramp up their production, rendering any deal ineffective. Now, the same analysts […]

OPEC Officials Yet To Agree On How To Implement Supply Cut

OPEC officials meeting in Vienna to work out the details of their plan to reduce oil production failed to reach agreement after hours of talks on Friday, amid objections by Iran which has been reluctant to even freeze its output, OPEC sources said. The High Level Committee of experts will meet again in Vienna on […]

What does the future hold for oil markets?

For the past 37 years I have been involved in the oil and gas industry, a business as challenging as any in terms of politics, geography, economics and location – the industry is present in every part of the globe and every climate. The past 21 of those years have presented unique challenges and, as […]

Saudi Arabia, Gulf OPEC ready to cut oil output by 4 percent

Saudi Arabia and its Gulf OPEC allies are willing to cut 4 percent from their peak oil output, energy ministers from the Gulf countries told their Russian counterpart this week, sources familiar with the matter told Reuters. The offer was made at a closed-door meeting in Riyadh, where the ministers met on Sunday. But Russian […]

Here’s why the Age of Oil could end in 15 years – and what that means

Someday soon, we’ll run out of oil… and civilisation as we know it will come to an end. As fossil fuels become increasingly scarce, we should prepare for a world of $200 oil, 50 percent annual inflation, and global resource wars. At least this was the future suggested by “Peak Oil”, a theory that for […]

Offshore Production Nearly 30% of Global Crude Oil Output in 2015

Source: U.S. Energy Information Administration, based on Rystad Energy   Global offshore oil production in 2015 was at the highest level since 2010, and accounted for nearly 30% of total global crude oil production. Offshore oil production increased in both 2014 and 2015, reversing consecutive annual declines from 2010 to 2013. Production from onshore tight […]

Venezuelan Oil Is Largely Staying in Ground or Going Up in Smoke

PUNTA DE MATA, Venezuela—This fading oil town has an eerie glow at night, illuminated by dozens of oil wells burning off precious oil and gas for lack of functioning equipment to process it. Every month, Punta de Mata’s smoke columns grow higher, a staggering waste at a time when Venezuela, the holder of the world’s largest oil reserves, desperately needs […]

Oil Pipelines Are Easy To ShutDown

In less than a year seven oil pipelines in the US and Canada have been shutdown by climate activists, costing oil companies millions. Here’s how they did it.

World Bank Boosts 2017 Crude Oil Forecast To $55 Per Barrel

The World Bank raised its crude oil price forecast for 2017 to $55 a barrel on Thursday from $53 a barrel, as it expects an output agreement among the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) to help trim excess supply. Energy prices, which include oil, natural gas and coal, are expected to jump nearly […]

Energy Prosperity Comes in Many Forms

Ethane’s domino effect in Pennsylvania The shale energy revolution is famous for jump-starting natural gas production in Appalachia, with Pennsylvania and Ohio at the center of a drilling boom during the past decade from which thousands of people flourished from good jobs related to natural gas extraction. But putting people to work drilling and producing natural gas and […]

World Oil Production In Balance, U.S. Natural Gas Production Way Down

World oil production is in balance and U.S. marketed natural gas output fell for the first time since 2005. The EIA (U.S. Energy Information Administration) published its Short Term Energy Outlook (STEO) today. Here are the highlights. World oil (liquids) output for September was 96.47 mmbpd (million barrels per day) and consumption was 96.39 mmbpd. That […]

Bakken Production Down, OPEC Production Up

North Dakota has released August production data for the Bakken and also for all North Dakota. Bakken production was down 46,433 barrels per day to 930,931 bod, All North Dakota was down 48,695 bpd to 981,039 bpd. This is first time North Dakota has been below 1 million barrels per day since March of 2014. […]

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