Category:

TransCanada Nebraska Ruling Seen as Delaying Keystone

TransCanada Corp. (TRP) ’s Keystone XL pipeline route through Nebraska was ruled illegal by a state court judge in a decision seen as setting back the project by as long as a year as U.S. officials consider needed approval. The ruling sends the pipeline back to Nebraska for review as the Obama administration studies whether to approve the northern portion of the international project. “This gives the U.S. State Department and Obama an out,” said Bob Schulz, a University of Calgary business professor, who predicted there will be an appeal of the ruling. “Why would they decide if they don’t have to decide? I think he’s going to push it back another year.” Judge Stephanie Stacy in Lincoln, the state’s capital, today struck down legislation that shifted the power to approve the pipeline route to Governor Dave Heineman, a Republican, from the state’s Public Service Commission. Legislation depriving the […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
Category:

Keystone pipeline approval in limbo after Nebraska ruling

A Nebraska court on Wednesday voided the governor’s decision to allow the Keystone XL pipeline to pass through the Midwestern state, creating another snag for the controversial project to link Canada’s oil sands with refineries in Texas. Nebraska Governor Dave Heineman last year supported legislation that cleared the way for TransCanada Corp’s $5.4 billion pipeline to cross parts of his state. But some landowners objected to the legislation, saying it disregarded their property rights. On Wednesday, the District Court of Lancaster County sided with landowners, a move that makes inevitable additional months of delay to the project, already more than five years in the planning. The Nebraska Public Service Commission, or PSC, is the proper state agency to decide pipeline matters, Judge Stephanie Stacy wrote in a lengthy ruling, declaring the governor’s decision "unconstitutional and void." State officials and a lawyer for landowners agreed a new […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
Category:

Greenpeace Pours Coal Outside French Presidential Palace

Activists from environment group Greenpeace Wednesday poured five tons of coal in front of the gates of Elysee Palace in a protest against Franco-German energy policy ahead of a meeting between French President Francois Hollande and German Chancellor Angela Merkel. Greenpeace parked a truck in the rue du Faubourg Saint-Honore and started to pour the coal on the street outside the French president palace a little before 0600 GMT. The police quickly intervened and ordered the 10 activists to leave while cleaning staff evacuated the coal and the truck from the street, said Sebastien Blavier, who is in charge of nuclear matters at Greenpeace France. The truck also contained two barrels with 2,000 liters of water that Mr. Blavier said was pumped from a groundwater deposit near a nuclear plant northern France and is mildly radioactive. Greenpeace didn’t pour the water in the street. Officials at […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
Category:

Peak Oil is Real and the Majors Face Challenging Times

Surging Oil Industry Brings Opportunity To Rural California The idea that global oil production was nearing its peak , only to plateau and then decline was a common view in the energy world for many years. The geophysicist M. King Hubbard predicted in the 1950’s that US oil production would peak in the 1970’s, a forecast that held true until technology allowed companies to economically extract oil and gas from tight geologic formations like shale. The recent surge in US liquids output – crude plus natural gas liquids (NGLs) – quieted the peak oil community. A well-known, largely peak oil-focused website – The Oil Drum – shut down in 2013, an event some considered the death knell of the peak oil theory. But not so fast says Steven Kopits from energy business analysis firm Douglas-Westwood. Total global oil supply growth since 2005 – 5.8 million barrels per day – […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
Category:

Brent Crude Trades Close to 2014 Highs on Libya Unrest

Brent crude is trading close to 2014 highs Wednesday, supported by renewed unrest in Libya, while U.S. crude is at four-month highs. Brent crude for April delivery on London’s ICE futures exchange traded down 25 cents, or 0.2%, at $110.21 a barrel. On the New York Mercantile Exchange, light, sweet crude futures for delivery in March traded up 35 cents, or 0.3%, at $102.78 a barrel.  Libyan production "was at a mere 375,000 barrels a day on Tuesday, according to the National Oil Corp. and one of the country’s militia groups threatened to remove the parliament from power if it doesn’t dissolve itself," wrote Tamas Varga of PVM, an oil brokerage, in a note to clients. U.S. crude held gains made Tuesday on predictions of more severe cold weather next week. The freeze has increased demand for heating fuels, supporting the price of crude oil. There have also been […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
Category:

Amid nuke talks, Iran digs in for long sanctions

Even as Iran negotiates on a nuclear pact in exchange for an end to sanctions, the country’s top leader is taking precautionary steps in case the talks fail. As the nuclear talks entered a second day Wednesday, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has ordered the government to create an "economy of resistance" to counter the sanctions. The program requires the government to diversify Iran’s exports, reduce dependence on sales of raw materials and promote knowledge-based high-tech industries. A nuclear deal reached in November with six world powers has eased some sanctions but the core remains in place, including measures targeting Iran’s oil exports, the pillar of its economy. Iran and the six countries began talks for a final deal in Vienna on Tuesday. Khamenei says he doubts talks will succeed. —- Associated Press writer Ali Akbar Dareini contributed from Tehran. © 2014 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
Category:

Saving dying lake is priority for Iranian leader

The first cabinet decision made under Iran’s new president, Hassan Rouhani, wasn’t about how to resolve his country’s nuclear dispute with world powers. It was about how to keep the nation’s largest lake from disappearing. Lake Oroumieh, one of the biggest saltwater lakes on Earth, has shrunk more than 80 percent to 1,000 square kilometers (nearly 400 square miles) in the past decade, mainly because of climate change, expanded irrigation for surrounding farms and the damming of rivers that feed the body of water, experts say. Salt-covered rocks that were once deep underwater now sit in the middle of desert. Experts fear the lake — famous in years past as a tourist spot and a favorite stopping point for migrating flamingos, pelicans and gulls — could disappear within two years if nothing is done. "The lake is gone. My job is gone. My children are […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
Category:

Libyan militias extend ultimatum to parliament

Two powerful militias that earlier demanded that Libya’s interim parliament step down or face arrest now say the country’s political factions have 72 hours to resolve their crisis, while the United Nations urged Wednesday that the deadlock be resolved by holding new elections. The demands issued Tuesday by the Al-Qaaqaa and al-Sawaaq militias, which some politicians likened to an attempted coup, brought the restive North African country’s long-running political showdown to a head. Parliament is split between Islamist and non-Islamist blocs. Its mandate was to have expired this month, but the Islamists led a motion to extend its mandate by another year. Under street protesters’ pressure, the parliament voted to hold early elections in the spring. But many are angry that parliament, widely viewed as a failed institution, should hold power until then. The two militias at first said that parliament had until 9 p.m. […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
Category:

Bombs Strike Southern Beirut, Killing at Least Five

Two powerful explosions struck a busy area in southern Beirut near an Iranian cultural center on Wednesday, killing at least five people and wounding dozens in the latest in a series of bomb attacks on civilians here as violence continued to spill over from the war in neighboring Syria. The Abdullah Azzam Brigades, an offshoot of Al Qaeda, claimed responsibility, saying that it would continue such attacks until the Iranian-backed Lebanese militant group Hezbollah withdrew its forces from Syria, where they are supporting the government’s fight against Syrian rebels and foreign-backed jihadist groups. “We tell our people in Syria that Iran’s party won’t enjoy security in Lebanon until you restore security in Syria,” the group said in a statement posted on its Twitter account. Until Hezbollah pulls out of Syria and Sunni militants are released from Lebanese jails, it said, “We will continue targeting Iran and […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple