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Baker Hughes: US drilling rig count jumps to 1,777

Land rigs accounted entirely for the sharp 23-unit increase in the US drilling rig count during the week ended Jan. 17, Baker Hughes Inc. reported. The US now has 1,777 rigs working. Rigs drilling offshore and in inland waters each were unchanged from a week ago, remaining at respective totals of 57 and 20. Oil rigs grew by 15 units to 1,408 while gas rigs gained 8 units to 365. Rigs considered unclassified remained at 4 total, unchanged from last week. Horizontal drilling rigs claimed 15 more units to reach 1,173 as directional drilling rigs relinquished 5 units to settle at 219. For the second consecutive week, Canada experienced a large rise in its rig count, leaping 88 units to 565. A vast majority of those units were oil rigs, which rose 79 units to 379. Gas rigs increased 9 units to 186. Canada now has 36 fewer rigs […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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Obama's climate plans get mixed review during Senate hearing

climate director at the Natural Resources Defense Council said President Obama’s effort to address climate change needs support but others weren’t convinced. Obama’s "historic climate action plan will set us on the right track to cut dangerous pollution that threatens our health and well-being," Daniel Lashof said at a U.S. Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works hearing Thursday. The panel heard testimony on Obama’s plans to cut pollution and tackle climate change and got a mixed reaction. Sen. David Vitter of Louisiana, the ranking Republican on the panel, said the president’s climate plan would lead to the closure of power plants and lead to higher energy costs for consumers. He said the plan undermines U.S. economic recovery, would keep certain energy reserves off limits to energy companies and add another layer of "red tape" to federal regulations. More than a dozen environmental […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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Obama’s climate plans get mixed review during Senate hearing

climate director at the Natural Resources Defense Council said President Obama’s effort to address climate change needs support but others weren’t convinced. Obama’s "historic climate action plan will set us on the right track to cut dangerous pollution that threatens our health and well-being," Daniel Lashof said at a U.S. Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works hearing Thursday. The panel heard testimony on Obama’s plans to cut pollution and tackle climate change and got a mixed reaction. Sen. David Vitter of Louisiana, the ranking Republican on the panel, said the president’s climate plan would lead to the closure of power plants and lead to higher energy costs for consumers. He said the plan undermines U.S. economic recovery, would keep certain energy reserves off limits to energy companies and add another layer of "red tape" to federal regulations. More than a dozen environmental […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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Oil! New Texas boom spawns riches, headaches

Not long ago, Richard Dockery was a real estate and insurance broker in this town of 1,800 residents, putting together small land deals and cobbling together a nest egg for retirement. Today, Dockery, 47, lives in a new, 2,400-square-foot home that he bought with cash and will have his 23-year-old daughter’s medical school bills covered before she steps into her first classroom. Once a month, a six-figure check in his name arrives in his mailbox from an energy company — royalties earned by leasing his property to oil companies and co-owning wells. It’s one of several that appear in his box each month that, added up, equal roughly the annual salary of a midlevel NBA player. "It’s crazy," Dockery says. "And I’m small fry. There are literally thousands of people out here who are millionaires, and some who are going to be billionaires. It’s […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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Russia concerned by Ukrainian fracking

The Russian Natural Resources Ministry said Friday it was concerned hydraulic fracturing in neighboring Ukraine could pollute regional water supplies. The ministry issued a statement Friday saying it was concerned about the prospects for shale natural gas development in neighboring Ukraine. Hydraulic fracturing, known also as fracking, uses large quantities of water mixed with potentially harmful chemicals to get at oil and natural gas deposits locked in shale formations. Environmental groups have expressed concern some of that water could eventually spoil drinking water supplies. Deputy Environment Minister Rinat Gizatulin said there are real concerns about contamination because potential drilling sites may be in close proximity to aquifers. He said Friday a letter was sent to his Ukrainian counterparts calling for a bilateral meeting to address the issue. Chevron and Royal Dutch Shell are among the energy companies interested in developing Ukrainian shale. The government […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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Peak Oil Is Irrelevant

Peak oil has been predicted since the 1950s to occur by various near-future dates, originally as early as 1965. The prediction that US oil production would peak in the 1970s was, in fact, accurate, but new discoveries – including North American sources involving fracking and tar sands – keep pushing the timeline outward. Some say we will always find new oil sources, though economic theory states they will also get inexorably more expensive. Recent discussions have revived the peak oil debate. A Business Insider articl e last spring claimed “it is probably safe to say we have slayed "peak oil" once and for all, thanks to the combination new shale oil and gas production techniques and declining fuel use.” It was counterpointed here . But I basically don’t care. All the talk of peak oil, that we are running out of fossil fuels and therefore need […]

Posted On : Published By : ASPO-USA
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BlackLight Power, Inc. Announces the Game Changing Achievement of the Generation of Millions of Watts of Power from the Conversion of Water Fuel to a New Form of Hydrogen

BlackLight Power, Inc. (BLP) today announced that it has produced millions of watts of power with its breakthrough Solid Fuel-Catalyst-Induced-Hydrino-Transition (SF-CIHT) patent pending technology in its laboratories. Using a proprietary water-based solid fuel confined by two electrodes of a SF-CIHT cell, and applying a current of 12,000 amps through the fuel, water ignites into an extraordinary flash of power. The fuel can be continuously fed into the electrodes to continuously output power. BlackLight has produced millions of watts of power in a volume that is one ten thousandths of a liter corresponding to a power density of over an astonishing 10 billion watts per liter. As a comparison, a liter of BlackLight power source can output as much power as a central power generation plant exceeding the entire power of the four former reactors of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, the site of one of the worst nuclear disasters […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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US Army colonel: world is sleepwalking to a global energy crisis

Earth insight badge An oil refinery in Canada An oil refinery in Canada. Has cheap oil gone forever? Photograph: Dave Reede/All Canada Photos/Corbis A conference sponsored by a US military official convened experts in Washington DC and London warning that continued dependence on fossil fuels puts the world at risk of an unprecedented energy crunch that could inflame financial crisis and exacerbate dangerous climate change . The ‘ Transatlantic Energy Security Dialogue ‘, which took place on 10th December last year, was co-organised by a US Army official, Lieutenant Colonel Daniel L. Davis, in association with former petroleum geologist Jeremy Leggett, chairman of the UK Industry Taskforce on Peak Oil and Gas . Participants, who addressed one another via video link, consisted of retired military officers, security experts, senior industry executives, and politicians from the main parties – including two former UK ministers. According to US Army colonel Daniel […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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Thousands of Gas Leaks Discovered Under Streets

Researchers from Duke revealed today that they had discovered nearly 5,900 gas leaks under the streets of Washington DC , including 12 that posed a serious risk of explosion. And it’s not just Washington: a gas industry whistleblower who is part of the team showed this was happening in cities all over America .” New research today says the nation’s capital, notorious for leaking state secrets, has thousands of leaks of another sort: methane from natural gas pipelines. More than 5,800 leaks from aging pipelines were found under Washington, D.C.’s streets by scientists from Duke University and Boston University, who dispatched a car equipped with measuring instruments across the city last January and February. Their findings appear in this week’s peer-reviewed journal Environmental Science & Technology. The researchers found 19 of the leaks had high concentrations of methane, a potent heat-trapping greenhouse gas […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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OPEC View of Supply Glut Hits Brent

Crude-oil futures moved in opposite directions in Asian trade on Friday with Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries projections of healthy international supply weighing down Brent crude prices. On the New York Mercantile Exchange light, sweet crude futures for delivery in February traded at $94.10 a barrel at 0634 GMT–up $0.14 in the Globex electronic session. March Brent crude on London’s ICE Futures exchange fell $0.23 to $105.52 a barrel. Brent extended losses after slipping overnight as OPEC said in a report demand for its oil fell by half a million barrels a day last year to 29.9 million barrels a day–and it expects demand to decline by a further 400,000 barrels a day in 2014. The value of OPEC’s reference basket–a measure of the prices of various grades of oil–fell 3% from 2012–breaking a three-year winning streak, the cartel said. In Iran President Hasan Rouhani on Thursday said […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple