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BG Group blames Egypt for poor performance

British energy company BG Group said Monday ongoing problems in Egypt were in part responsible for its decline in natural gas volumes. BG Group said Monday it declared force majeure in Egypt, meaning it’s unable to meet certain contractual obligations because of circumstances beyond its control. "We have elected to issue force majeure notices in Egypt reflecting the ongoing diversions of gas volumes to the domestic market," BG Group Chief Executive Officer Chris Finlayson said in a statement. The company said its financial performance was impacted by the "difficult operating environment in Egypt," as well as lower gas prices in the United States. It added the interim Egyptian government hasn’t honored agreements on the company’s share of natural gas from Egyptian fields, saying diversions into the domestic market during the fourth quarter of 2013 were higher than expected. The company said its 2014 production […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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Owner of Missing Oil Tanker Disputes Angolan Claims of Fake Highjacking

The Greek owner of an oil tanker that vanished off the coast of Angola said pirates hijacked the vessel and stole much of its cargo. Athens-based Dynacom Tankers Management Ltd., said late Sunday in a statement that it had re-established contact with the 75,000-tonne MT Kerala. The Liberian-flagged ship vanished Jan. 18, raising concerns in the industry that piracy in West Africa is spreading south from the Gulf of Guinea toward Nigeria, the continent’s biggest oil producer. The vessel was on charter to Angolan state oil firm Sonangol. "Pirates hijacked the vessel offshore Angola and stole a large quantity of cargo by ship-to-ship transfer. The pirates have now disembarked," the statement said, adding that the ship’s 27-member crew was safe. Angola’s navy has said the hijacking was staged. The tanker "cut off its communication system while at the entrance of the Luanda bay and followed a tugboat to Nigeria," […]

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Xinhua Insight: China dodges major shadow banking default

Chinese investors avoided a high-profile trust default on Monday, easing worries that the economy may be about to tip the first domino of shadow banking defaults. China Credit Trust reached a last-minute deal with investors to repay their investment in the three-billion-yuan (about 500 million U.S. dollars)product, deflating concerns that default would pound investor confidence in shadow banking and trigger credit crunches. "This offer comes as a compromise given rising concerns over a full default, but it is likely that investors have become more cautious on trust products in general," said Zhang Zhiwei, chief China economist at Nomura. The trust product, launched in February 2011, attracted some 700 private bank clients of the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China to invest in a private coal miner in north China’s Shanxi Province. Shanxi Zhengfu Energy Group went bankrupt […]

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China’s Premier Li Says Governments Should Use New-Energy Cars

Chinese Premier Li Keqiang said governments should take a leading role in promoting alternative energy-powered vehicles, according to a statement posted on the central government’s website yesterday. “New-energy vehicles, especially buses, can help improve urban problems of pollution and noise and therefore everyone should be encouraged to use it,” Li was cited as saying during a visit to a unit of automaker BYD Co. (1211) yesterday in the northern Chinese city of Xi’an. China plans to have 5 million alternative energy-powered automobiles by 2020. Li’s comments reiterate a policy to have local public authorities take the lead in using alternative-energy vehicles. China’s provinces and biggest cities have been given targets to cut concentrations of some air pollutants by 5 percent to 25 percent by 2017 compared with 2012 levels. An increasing number of Chinese cities have introduced emergency measures to fight smog. BYD Co., backed by Warren Buffett ’s […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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Japan's fuel imports contribute to record trade deficit

TOKYO, Jan. 27 (UPI) — Soaring fuel imports in the aftermath of Japan’s 2011 Fukushima nuclear disaster, amid a weaker yen, have contributed to the country’s record annual trade deficit, a government official said. Japan Monday reported a trade deficit of $112.07 billion in 2013, up 65.3 percent from the previous year. “Energy imports have been rising significantly since the nuclear accident,” causing per capita costs of around $293 in Japan, Kyodo News quoted Yoshihide Suga, chief Cabinet secretary as telling reporters. “It is important for us to ease such a burden as much as possible.” All 50 of Japan’s working reactors currently remain offline, pending safety checks. Japan relies on imports for more than 90 percent of its energy needs. Imports of liquefied natural gas to Japan last year rose 17.5 percent and imports of crude oil rose 16.3 percent. With those import costs expected to grow, amid […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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Japan’s fuel imports contribute to record trade deficit

TOKYO, Jan. 27 (UPI) — Soaring fuel imports in the aftermath of Japan’s 2011 Fukushima nuclear disaster, amid a weaker yen, have contributed to the country’s record annual trade deficit, a government official said. Japan Monday reported a trade deficit of $112.07 billion in 2013, up 65.3 percent from the previous year. “Energy imports have been rising significantly since the nuclear accident,” causing per capita costs of around $293 in Japan, Kyodo News quoted Yoshihide Suga, chief Cabinet secretary as telling reporters. “It is important for us to ease such a burden as much as possible.” All 50 of Japan’s working reactors currently remain offline, pending safety checks. Japan relies on imports for more than 90 percent of its energy needs. Imports of liquefied natural gas to Japan last year rose 17.5 percent and imports of crude oil rose 16.3 percent. With those import costs expected to grow, amid […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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Deep South Set for Rare Winter Storm Amid U.S. Frigid Front

A rare winter storm is forecast to bring heavy snow and icing to parts of the Deep South today as temperatures continue to drop across the U.S. behind an Arctic front sweeping the country. The storm will extend from the central Gulf Coast to the southern Mid-Atlantic coast today, the National Weather Service said in a bulletin at 3:16 a.m. New York time. A wintry mix is possible as far as southern Los Angeles. “Significant icing appears quite probable across portions of southern Georgia into coastal South Carolina and southeastern North Carolina ,” the weather service said. “A swath of light to moderate snows is likely further to the north and west, with heavy snows possible across northeastern North Carolina into the Hampton Roads region of Virginia.” Precipitation is expected to “slide off” of the coast tomorrow, while the Florida peninsula will see “some lingering showers,” according to the […]

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U.S. Ethanol Exporters Search for a Port

U.S. ethanol makers are banking on export markets as they grapple with Obama administration plans to cut U.S. consumption requirements, but the industry is hampered by a distribution structure built almost exclusively around the domestic market. Archer Daniels Midland Co. , Green Plains Renewable Energy Inc. and other ethanol producers are trying to boost sales to Brazil, Mexico, Asia and the Middle East, in part by cutting costs to make the corn-based biofuel more price-competitive overseas. Exports could reach one billion gallons this year, increasing their share of U.S. output to 7% from 5%, as lower corn prices help producers sell ethanol more cheaply to foreign buyers, according to the Renewable Fuels Association, a trade group. But the $44 billion industry’s efforts to expand could be limited, analysts say, because the bulk of U.S. ethanol plants are located in the Midwest to be close to the corn supply rather […]

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Hydrogen cars arrive in Washington — but are we ready for them?

How soon you’ll see them on the roads in our region remains to be seen, as auto manufacturers, fueling companies and policymakers look for ways to tackle serious challenges that now stand in the way — not the least of which is where do you refuel with hydrogen. “It’s coming, this is the next wave, and from what some of the manufacturers are saying, it’s an even better bet than some of the alternatives already on the market,” said Kevin Reilly, owner of Alexandria Hyundai and chairman of the Washington Auto Show . “Now all we need is the infrastructure to make it a viable option for drivers.” What are the advantages? Manufacturers such as Toyota, Honda and Hyundai — the latter of which will soon begin selling its first hydrogen-powered vehicle in parts of California where fueling stations already exist — say this new propulsion system tackles the […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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Peak Oil Denial: Nonsense Keeps Rolling Along # 6

At the risk of starting a cat fight where truth may too quickly become a casualty, why don’t we more forcefully challenge those who deny peak oil (and global warming) and who do so for reasons that generally ignore reality in favor of narrowly-defined interests? Those motivations will ultimately do nothing but promote more eventual harm by denying the truths to those who clearly need them the most…. Of course, we run the risk of getting bogged down in he said/she-said arguments that quickly devolve into the lowest forms of ‘debate’, but why let those types of offerings go unchallenged? They feed on themselves, and it is tiresome and time-consuming to have to rebut all the nonsense. But if we don’t, uninformed readers and listeners have no reason to at least consider the possibility that there may indeed be other facts out there […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple