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AAA: Gas prices rising, but pain less severe

U.S. gasoline prices are on the rise, but still low compared with last year, AAA says. Photo by John Angelillo/UPI WASHINGTON, Feb. 3 (UPI) — While it’s not uncommon for retail gasoline prices in the United States to spike 30 cents in February, motor club AAA said prices will remain at historic lows. AAA reports a national average price for a gallon of regular unleaded gasoline for Tuesday at $2.07, about 4 cents higher than last week. The price of gasoline has increased for eight consecutive days, but follows a steady decline that began at the end of September. The low price of oil, about 50 percent below June levels, is reflected at the gas pump and roughly half of all retail filling centers in the country are selling gas below the $2 mark. With refineries undergoing seasonal maintenance as they prepare to make a summer blend of gasoline […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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New dawn for U.S. solar power capacity

Analysis from Wood Mackenzie finds parallels between emerging solar power and the U.S. shale boom. UPI/Stephen Shaver HOUSTON, Feb. 3 (UPI) — Solar power progress in the United States is expected to advance to record levels as prices decline and technology improves, Wood Mackenzie finds. Energy consultant group Wood Mackenzie finds it’s getting cheaper to install solar power components. With this, new solar capacity has evolved from a niche renewable sector to something that’s pressuring conventional business models in the utility industry. "Just as shale extraction technologies reconfigured oil and gas markets, no other technology is closer to transforming power markets in a similar fashion than distributed and utility-scale solar," Prajit Ghosh, research director for American renewables research, said. The U.S. government is supporting solar development through its SunShot initiative, which aims to make the renewable technology competitive. The program aims to move solar power capacity from less than […]

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EPA Says Low Oil Prices Should Be Weighed in Keystone Decision

WASHINGTON—The Environmental Protection Agency said the government should factor in the recent trend of lower oil prices as part of its decision on whether to approve the Keystone XL pipeline. The EPA, in a letter sent Monday to the State Department, said the monthslong drop in oil prices should compel the department to “revisit” conclusions about U.S. oil consumption and greenhouse gas emissions it made in an environmental assessment published in January 2014, which found the pipeline wouldn’t significantly add greenhouse gas emissions to the atmosphere. The State Department oversees cross-border pipelines and is in the process of deciding whether the Keystone project should receive a permit. The letter by Cynthia Giles, EPA’s assistant administrator for enforcement and compliance assurance, said building the pipeline at a time of lower oil prices could prompt production of more oil from Canada’s oil sands deposits. The letter said the 2014 environmental assessment […]

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Cheap fuel drives US car sales to near record levels

DAGENHAM, ENGLAND – JANUARY 13: Cars are prepared for distribution at a Ford factory on January 13, 2015 in Dagenham, England. Originally opened in 1931, the Ford factory has unveiled a state of the art GBP475 million production line that will start manufacturing the new low-emission, Ford diesel engines from this November this will generate more than 300 new jobs, Ford currently employs around 3000 at the plant in Dagenham. (Photo by Carl Court/Getty Images) Falling fuel prices and a strong US economy pushed domestic new car sales back to near-record levels, as the latest figures for January surged past already optimistic expectations for most manufacturers. Two of the market’s most conspicuously fuel-hungry vehicles — General Motors’ vast Cadillac Escalade sports utility vehicles and Ford’s Mustang performance car — recorded sales more than double those for last January. Sales for Fiat Chrysler’s Jeep SUV brand were up 23 per […]

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US DOT missed self-imposed deadline to submit crude-by-rail regs for review

Washington (Platts)–3Feb2015/352 pm EST/2052 GMT Representatives of the rail industry Tuesday complained to the US Congress about the Obama administration’s slow pace in issuing its comprehensive crude-by-rail safety rule, as the Department of Transportation missed a self-imposed January 30 target to submit the regulation to the White House for final review. Joe Delcambre, a spokesman with DOT’s Pipelines and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration, told Platts the agency hopes to send the rule, including an overhaul of tank car safety standards, "very soon" to the White House Office of Management and Budget, which vets all regulations before they go into effect. The DOT in January had said in a rulemaking schedule update that it planned to submit the rule to OMB by January 30, and for the rule to be finalized by May 12. "The rulemaking is very comprehensive and involves interrelated issues that must be carefully assessed to ensure […]

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IHS sees second-half end of US output surge

HOUSTON, Feb. 3 02/03/2015 Expectations are moderating about growth of oil production in the US this year. A report by IHS says the US production surge may end by midyear as low oil prices crimp output from tight formations. “Growth is still expected in the early months of 2015, but that momentum will level off in the latter half of the year amidst prices at lows not seen since the 2008-09 Great Recession,” IHS said in a press statement. A study of 39,000 wells indicated month-to-month growth will cease in the latter half of 2015 if the price of West Texas Intermediate crude remains below $60/bbl. About one fourth of new wells in 2014 had break-even WTI prices below $40/bbl, according to the study. Slightly less than half the new wells had break-even prices below $60/bbl. Nearly 30% of new wells had break-even prices above $81/bbl. The study defined […]

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Anadarko CEO Sees Significant Cuts In Capex In 2015

URL: http://www.rigzone.com/news/oil_gas/a/137055/Anadarko_CEO_Sees_Significant_Cuts_In_Capex_In_2015 Anadarko’s capex in 2015 will be significantly lower than last year because of the recent collapse in crude oil prices, Chief Executive Al Walker says. HOUSTON, Feb 3 (Reuters) – Anadarko Petroleum Corp’s capital expenditures in 2015 will be significantly lower than last year because of the recent collapse in crude oil prices, the exploration and production company’s CEO told investors on a conference call on Tuesday. "We see ourselves in a period here of trying to build value, maintain flexibility and not grow in a low commodity price environment that we see as less than attractive," Chief Executive Al Walker said. Anadarko will release its capital plan and outlook on March 3. In 2014, Anadarko spent about $9.3 billion, according to its fourth-quarter earnings report. Last month oil prices tumbled to the lowest level in six years, hit by a world supply glut and weak demand. […]

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Bakken Boom Slows on Crude Pride Slump

Drilling activity in the Bakken is feeling the effects of a bearish crude oil market. The drop in crude oil prices in recent months has likely gone uncelebrated in the North Dakota town of Williston, or in the state as a whole, as exploration and production companies reduce or halt their drilling activity in the Bakken, that vast shale formation underlying North Dakota and neighboring Montana. But how much has the state’s drilling activity been affected, and how long is the slowdown likely to last? The abrupt arrival of sub-$50 oil prices has been a shock to the oil industry, and the subsequent decline in drilling activity in the Bakken could, if continued, prove painful for a state that had until recently been riding high as an oil producing state and an economic powerhouse. Between 2006 and 2013, North Dakota went from being the ninth-largest oil producing state to […]

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Russian Hard-Line Stance on Ukraine Prompts U.S. to Reconsider Policy

Pro-Russian rebels drive a mobile anti-aircraft system Strela-10 in Donetsk on Tuesday. ENLARGE Photo: maxim shemetov/Reuters WASHINGTON—Nearly a year after Russia began its military campaign in Ukraine, the U.S. and its European allies find themselves in a familiar predicament: struggling to devise a strategy to get Moscow to back off. While Western economic sanctions, combined with a steep drop in the price of oil, have inflicted heavy damage on the Russian economy, they’ve done nothing to temper the Kremlin’s support for eastern Ukraine’s separatist insurgency, U.S. officials acknowledge. “It’s fair to say that costs haven’t risen high enough for the Russian leadership to rethink their course of action,” a senior Obama administration official said. As Secretary of State John Kerry travels to Ukraine to meet with President Petro Poroshenko and other Ukrainian leaders this week, policy makers in Washington are re-examining their decision not to supply weapons to Ukraine […]

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Russia Sees Marginal Increase in Oil Output in 2015

Russia envisages a marginal increase in oil production in 2015 despite the global slump in prices, according to the Ministry of Energy’s latest projections. The oil price rout has battered Russia, one of the world’s biggest oil producers along with Saudi Arabia and the U.S., at a time when its economy was already suffering from sanctions imposed by the West over the conflict in Ukraine, as well as the depreciation of the ruble. Russia produced an average of 10.58 million barrels of crude a day in 2014, a level of output not seen since the end of the Soviet Union. The Ministry of Energy expects average daily output in 2015 to reach 10.6 million to 10.7 million barrels a day, “approximately at the same level” as last year, a ministry spokeswoman said. The spokeswoman said the government’s forecasts will be updated next week. Oil output in January reached 10.66 […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple