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Keystone Veto Signals to Pipeline Foes Obama May Reject Project

A worker walks through the TransCanada Corp. Houston Lateral Project pipe yard in Mont Belvieu, Texas. TransCanada proposed the original line to link the oil sands and U.S. refineries in 2006. It was approved with zero fanfare less than two years later on Feb. 28, 2008, under President George W. Bush. Photographer: Scott Dalton/Bloomberg (Bloomberg) — President Barack Obama’s veto of the Keystone XL bill is the latest sign to pipeline opponents that he’s prepared to reject a project he said won’t create many jobs or reduce U.S. oil prices. Obama rejected the Republican-backed bill because it interfered with a review being led by the State Department, though he hasn’t decided whether to approve a permit for the pipeline, White House spokesman Josh Earnest said Tuesday. Pipeline backers in Congress may seek to attach Keystone to other bills that the president supports. Republicans don’t have the votes to override […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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Barack Obama Has Issued Fewer Vetoes Than 75% of Presidents

Mr. Obama, shown here signing, rather than vetoing, legislation, was spared having to wield the veto pen when Democrats controlled the Senate 2009-2014. Getty Images President Barack Obama ’s veto of Keystone XL pipeline bill was just the third veto of his presidency and the first legislation he has rejected since 2010. Mr. Obama’s statement saying legislation that would have approved the pipeline project “has earned my veto” was a rarity for a president who has wielded his veto pen fewer times than any U.S. leader in more than a century. James Garfield , who never used the power of the veto and who was assassinated in 1881 after less than a year in office, was the last president to veto fewer bills than Mr. Obama. President Franklin D. Roosevelt set the high-water mark with a total of 635 vetoes. Mr. Obama’s predecessor, Republican  George W. Bush , vetoed […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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Striking Oil Workers’ Union Agrees to Talk to Shell This Week

(Bloomberg) — The United Steelworkers, representing 30,000 oil workers in contract negotiations, plans to talk this week with Royal Dutch Shell Plc, bargaining on behalf of oil companies amid the biggest U.S. refinery strike in 35 years. Shell and the union, with members at more than 200 U.S. refineries, fuel terminals, pipelines and chemical plants, agreed Friday to be in contact this week after reviewing proposals, USW International President Leo Gerard said at a conference in Atlanta on Tuesday. The stalled negotiations are prolonging a walkout that began Feb. 1 at seven refineries, expanded to nine a week later and added three more, including the nation’s biggest complex, over the weekend. Together, the plants account for almost 20 percent of the country’s refining capacity. It’s the first national walkout of U.S. oil workers since 1980, when a work stoppage lasted three months. A further expansion of the strike will […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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Oil-Rich Alberta Sees Mass Job Loss as Crude Prices Slump

(Bloomberg) — Alberta, the Canadian province holding the world’s third-largest oil reserves, expects 31,800 jobs to be lost for the remainder of the year as a crude price crash forces producers to reduce costs. Even with the job losses, overall employment will rise 1 percent in 2015 because of gains carried over from December, the provincial finance ministry said Tuesday in a statement. That compares with a 2.2 percent increase in employment last year. It would take a loss of 80,000 jobs before year-end to prevent employment from rising, the government said. “Our reliance on the roller coaster of oil prices is something we have to change,” Finance Minister Robin Campbell said on conference call. “Even if the price of oil bounces back today, we can’t go on this way.” Suncor Energy Inc., Cenovus Energy Inc. and other oil producers have already shed thousands of jobs this year as […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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Obama Limits on Alaskan Oil Threaten Pipeline Flow, Senator Says

(Bloomberg) — Alaska Republican Senator Lisa Murkowski said the Obama administration’s restrictions on oil production in her state threatens to dry up supplies that could flow through the trans-Alaska pipeline. President Barack Obama has proposed declaring 12 million acres of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge as wilderness, limiting offshore leasing in Alaska’s Beaufort and Chukchi Seas and block drilling in some portions of the National Petroleum Reserve. Those steps, announced Jan. 25, put much of the state off limits to new oil production, Murkowski said Tuesday. “The actions of this administration seem destined to shut down our trans-Alaska pipeline, weaken our economy, forcing our state to make steep budget cuts and really violating the promises that were made to us at statehood and since then,” Murkowski told Interior Secretary Sally Jewell at a hearing on the department’s budget. “As an energy producing state, this is what we do.” Without […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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U.S. gas prices rise for 29 straight days

Gasoline prices in a steady increase, with only two states reporting an average price at the pump below the $2 per gallon mark. File Photo by John Angelillo/UPI WASHINGTON, Feb. 24 (UPI) — The price per gallon for regular unleaded gasoline has increased 29 days in a row as of Tuesday because of U.S. refinery issues and commodity markets, AAA said. AAA reports an average national retail price for a gallon of gasoline at $2.31, up about a penny from Monday and 28 cents from one month ago. Gasoline prices dropped steadily during the latter half of 2014 as oil prices traded in a bear market, though it was Jan. 26 last time prices at the pump fell . The motor club said in a Monday report that some of the increase is tied to seasonal maintenance at U.S. refineries, which limits fuel production and crimps supplies. Refineries in […]

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Gazprom Threatens Natural Gas Deliveries to Ukraine

ENLARGE Gazprom Chief Executive Alexei Miller. He said Gazprom hasn’t received the latest prepayment from Kiev, and that only 219 million cubic meters—enough for two days of deliveries—remained of volumes already purchased. Photo: maxim shipenkov/European Pressphoto Agency The European Commission currently doesn’t expect a standoff between Russia’s and Ukraine’s gas companies to affect supplies to the European Union, a spokeswoman said Tuesday. “At the moment, gas flows to the EU are normal,” said Anna-Kaisa Itkonen, a spokeswoman for the EU’s executive. “We expect that the gas transit to the EU won’t be affected by the situation” in eastern Ukraine. The comment follows a warning by Russian state gas company OAO Gazprom that supplies to the EU were at a “serious risk,” after it said Ukraine had failed to make a payment for new shipments. Gazprom said that the remaining volumes that have already been prepaid would last for just […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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Winter’s Fuel Prices Are Heating Up

ENLARGE California drivers have been hit the hardest by the recent gasoline-price increases, with retail prices up 52 cents in 24 days and likely to top $3 a gallon this week. Here, a customer at a California gas station on Feb. 9. Photo: Getty Images Fuel prices are staging a surprisingly strong winter rally, putting an end to $2-a-gallon gasoline for now. The national average gas price at the pump has climbed for 28 consecutive days to $2.30 a gallon on Monday, according to AAA, and are at a 2½-month high in the futures market. Diesel futures are up 20.1% this year. Driving and home-heating costs are rising even as oil prices languish after dropping more than 50% since June. The selloff had pushed gasoline costs to levels unseen since 2009. Prices usually rise this time of year as many U.S. refineries shut to perform maintenance. Also driving the […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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Oil Bust Empties Out Private-Jet Parking Lot in Texas

In petroleum capitals such as Midland, a place long known for swaggering wildcatters who made and lost fortunes, personal jet travel becomes a bellwether when times get tight. Photographer: Thomas Black/Bloomberg (Bloomberg) — The oil boom last year was easy to see at the airport in Midland, Texas, the gateway to the biggest crude-producing region in the U.S. The 30 or so spaces for private planes were often filled. On one day in early February, a lone corporate jet sat on the tarmac, the empty spots a harbinger of the slowdown looming in a city that is 85 percent dependent on the oil and gas industry. In petroleum capitals such as Midland, a place long known for swaggering wildcatters who made and lost fortunes, corporate and personal jet travel has been a bellwether for the health of the energy business. That indicator took a turn down in January, when […]

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Gasoline Plunge Wipes Out Profits for U.S. Ethanol Makers

An ethanol plant runs at the Port of Stockton in Stockton, California, Friday, March 7, 2014. A deep water port located 75 miles from San Francisco, over 1 billion dollars of cargo passes through the facility every year. (Bloomberg) — Ethanol producers are cutting output after getting squeezed by the biggest drop in gasoline prices since 2008. Valero Energy Corp. and Green Plains Renewable Energy Inc., representing about 15 percent of U.S. capacity, have reduced operations as margins narrowed. At a typical mill in Illinois that makes ethanol from corn, profit margins have almost totally disappeared, compared with $1.33 a gallon a year ago, according to AgTrader Talk, a Clive, Iowa-based consulting company. Gasoline and crude fell more than 50 percent from their peaks in June as the U.S. shale boom helped global oil production outpace demand. While that was good for consumers, saving each American household $750, it […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple