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Oil drops to $55 as Iran nuclear talks intensify

LONDON (Reuters) – Brent crude oil dropped towards $55 a barrel on Tuesday as Iran and six world powers entered a final day of talks over a nuclear deal that could see the energy-rich country increase oil exports to world markets. With a self-imposed deadline set for the end of the day, the United States, Britain, France, Germany, Russia and China ramped up the pace of negotiations with Iran in Switzerland over an outline deal on Tehran’s nuclear programme. Disagreements on enrichment research and the pace of lifting sanctions remained as hurdles that could scupper a deal to end a 12-year standoff between Iran and the West. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov told reporters in Moscow he believed the talks had a good chance of success. "The chances are high. They are probably not 100 percent but you can never be 100 percent certain of anything," Lavrov said. Western […]

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Iran Talks Weigh on Oil Price

Dow Jones Newswires By Georgi Kantchev LONDON–Oil prices extended their slide on Tuesday as investors awaited the outcome of the Iranian nuclear talks, which could pave the way for more Iranian crude flooding the already oversupplied global market. Iran and six global powers set Tuesday as the deadline to agree on a framework agreement that would outline the main elements of a deal constraining Iran’s nuclear program in exchange for lifting international sanctions. May-dated Brent crude fell 1.6% to $55.41 a barrel on London’s ICE Futures exchange. On the New York Mercantile Exchange, light, sweet crude futures for delivery in May traded at $47.81 a barrel, down 1.8% from Monday’s settlement. Russia’s foreign minister, who left the nuclear talks in Switzerland on Monday, is planning to return on Tuesday afternoon in a sign that an agreement might be close. Many in the oil market fear that if the sanctions […]

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Natural Gas Bounces Off Seven-Week Low — Update

By Nicole Friedman NEW YORK–Natural-gas prices ticked higher Monday as traders looked ahead to a last bout of cold weather. Futures for May delivery settled up 0.5 cent, or 0.2%, at $2.644 a million British thermal units on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Futures fell to a seven-week low Friday as market participants expected the onset of spring to reduce demand for the heating fuel. Although spring has officially begun, some below-normal weather is still expected in the eastern U.S. in the next two weeks. Natural gas consumption rises when temperatures drop, as consumers turn up gas-powered indoor heating and power generators burn more natural gas to meeting electric-heating demand. "There’s still a bit of weather-based demand in this market," said Aaron Calder, analyst at Gelber & Associates, in a note. However, robust production is expected to keep a lid on price gains this spring, analysts say. U.S. natural-gas […]

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These Charts Show Clearly Why Oil Prices Crashed

The geopolitics of oil are complicated, but last year’s oil crash isn’t. There’s one reason above all others for the drop in prices: The U.S. oil boom. Last year was the biggest spike in U.S. oil production since at least 1900, according to a new analysis by the Energy Department.  U.S. production jumped by 1.2 million barrels per day in 2014, to 8.7 million barrels per day. That was the biggest expansion in U.S. crude since record-keeping began in 1900 (which makes it a pretty good bet for the biggest expansion ever). Here’s a chart going back to 1960, published today by the U.S. Energy Information Administration .  Annual Change in U.S. Oil Production (1960-2014) Source: U.S. Energy Information Administration, Petroleum Supply Monthly The world’s oil supply is outpacing demand in the most uncomfortable way for the oil industry. Some blame OPEC, or Saudi Arabia specifically, for not slowing production. But as […]

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Iran, powers push for nuclear deal as clock ticks toward deadline

LAUSANNE, Switzerland (Reuters) – Iran and six world powers ramped up the pace at Tuesday’s negotiations over a preliminary deal on the Iranian nuclear program, as their self-imposed deadline approached and both sides warned it was crucial to overcome differences that could wreck an agreement. For nearly a week, the United States, Britain, France, Germany, Russia and China have been trying to break an impasse in the negotiations, which are aimed at stopping Iran from gaining the capacity to develop a nuclear bomb in exchange for easing international sanctions that are crippling its economy. But disagreements on enrichment research and the pace of lifting sanctions threatened to scupper a deal that could end a 12-year standoff between Iran and the West over Tehran’s nuclear ambitions and reduce the risk of another Middle East war. "We need to get this done now," a Western official told Reuters on condition of […]

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Preliminary Nuclear Deal Appears Close, but Tough Issues May Wait

Photo Foreign ministers and delegates on Tuesday in Lausanne, Switzerland, ahead of a deadline on negotiations to limit Iran’s nuclear program. Credit Fabrice Coffrini/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images LAUSANNE, Switzerland — With a deadline just hours away, negotiators from the United States, Iran and five other nations appeared on Tuesday to move closer to a preliminary political accord to limit Tehran’s nuclear program . There were signs, however, that several of the most difficult issues would be deferred for a final agreement in three months. In Moscow, Sergey V. Lavrov, Russia’s foreign minister, said that there was a strong chance of an accord and that he was flying to back to Switzerland on Tuesday, after leaving the day before, to rejoin the talks. “The chances are high,” Mr. Lavrov said. “They are probably not 100 percent, but you can never be 100 percent certain of anything. The odds are […]

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Poll: Clear majority supports nuclear deal with Iran

By a nearly 2 to 1 margin, Americans support the notion of striking a deal with Iran that restricts the nation’s nuclear program in exchange for loosening sanctions, a new Washington Post-ABC News poll finds. But the survey — released hours before Tuesday’s negotiating deadline — also finds few Americans are hopeful that such an agreement will be effective. Nearly six in 10 say they are not confident that a deal will prevent Iran from developing nuclear weapons, unchanged from 15 months ago, when the United States, France, Britain, Germany, China and Russia reached an interim agreement with Iran aimed at sealing a long-term deal. Overall, the poll finds 59 percent support an agreement in which the United States and its negotiating partners lift major economic sanctions in exchange for restrictions on Iran’s nuclear program. Thirty-one percent oppose a deal. Support outpaces opposition across nearly all demographic and political […]

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Iran’s Supreme Leader Holds Key to Nuclear Deal

Former Deputy Assistant Defense Sec. KT McFarland joins the News Hub and discusses the ongoing Iran nuclear talks along with the effectiveness of the proposed terms. Photo: AP LAUSANNE, Switzerland—With a key deadline just hours away, U.S. and European officials said nuclear negotiations were imperiled by deep uncertainty over whether Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei would sign off on the necessary concessions for a deal. All parties to the talks have set March 31 as the date for concluding a framework agreement that would outline all the main elements of a deal constraining Iran’s nuclear program in exchange for lifting international sanctions. The Obama administration and its negotiating partners have said technical discussions on a final, comprehensive agreement will continue through June. But after more than 18 months of direct negotiations, Western officials said there are signs Mr. Khamenei hasn’t empowered his negotiators to give ground on the […]

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Saudi-led strikes again hit Yemen overnight

ADEN (Reuters) – Air raids by a Saudi-led coalition again hit Houthi militia targets across Yemen on Monday night, striking the group’s northern stronghold of Saadeh, the capital, Sanaa, and the central town of Yarim, residents and media said. "There were huge blazes in the mountains outside Sanaa. It looks like they hit a missile depot and it was on fire for half an hour or so. Then there was anti-aircraft fire until dawn," a Sanaa resident said. The strikes, which began on Thursday, are aimed at stopping the Houthis from taking more territory and pressing them and former president Ali Abdullah Saleh to negotiate a power-sharing deal with President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi. The Houthis are from a Yemeni Shi’ite sect and are allied to Iran, Saudi Arabia’s main regional rival. The Saudis and other Sunni Muslim countries in the region fear the advance of the Houthis will ultimately […]

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More Iran oil post-sanctions, aimed at Asia, may hurt Iraq

DUBAI/NEW DELHI/HONG KONG (Reuters) – A possible surge in Iranian oil exports from an end to sanctions will reboot a struggle between top Middle East producers for Asian buyers, with Iraq looking the most vulnerable. The latest twist to the saga of aggressive marketing is the world oil glut and low prices, likely to fall more with added Iranian crude, making Tehran’s battle for market share tougher. "You cannot produce without demand. There is a limit in any market and also long-term contracts between Gulf oil producers and Asian refiners," said a Gulf oil source. "That’s why it is hard to imagine big volumes just eating into the market share just like that. Even if the Iranians offered discounts and sold on the spot market, there is a limit." Under sanctions Iran became adept at offering discounts, easy credit and free shipping to keep in the game, recalling Iraq’s […]

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Seeking new revenue, Iraq revamps Basra oil marketing

Tankers dock at the Al-Basra Oil Terminal, the principal export point for Iraqi oil. (BEN LANDO/Iraq Oil Report) Recommend 315 people recommend this. Sign Up to see what your friends recommend. Iraq is preparing to upgrade the way it markets and exports oil from Basra in an effort to maximize revenues and combat a crippling financial crisis.The country has typically sold a single grade of crude, "Basra Light," from all of its southern export outlets. But now Iraq is planning to market a second grade, "Basra Heavy," which will allow the country to sell oil from more fields without compromising the quality of most exports."We announced that we will sell two [grades]," said Fala…

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Nigeria’s Buhari closes in on historic election victory

ABUJA (Reuters) – Nigerian opposition contender Muhammadu Buhari, an ex-general who first won power three decades ago in a military coup, closed in on a historic election victory on Tuesday, maintaining a hefty lead in the vote count in Africa’s most populous nation. According to a Reuters tally collated from 33 of Nigeria’s 36 states, the 72-year-old Buhari had more than 14 million votes, testament to the faith Nigerians have put in him as a born-again democrat intent on cleaning up Nigeria’s corrupt politics. Buhari’s support compared to 11 million for President Goodluck Jonathan, whose five years at the helm of the richest country in Africa have been plagued by corruption scandals and an insurgency by Islamist Boko Haram militants. One of Jonathan’s big support bases in the oil-producing Niger Delta is yet to report but the gap is so large that most analysts said it was impossible to […]

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Nigeria: Oil Giant Total Sells Nigerian Oil Field Stake for $569 Mn

French oil giant Total said Monday that it has sold its stake in a Nigerian oil field to a local company for $569 million (523 million euros). Total’s sale of its share in the onshore Oil Mining Lease 29 to Aiteo Eastern E&P comes after the French group made two similar divestments in Nigeria. The three transactions reached a sum of $1 billion. "These transactions … reduce our exposure to non-operated blocks onshore Nigeria, and allow us to focus on our core, operated developments," said Patrick de La Chevardiere, Total’s Chief Financial Officer. The group added that the divestment is "in line with the Federal Government of Nigeria’s aim of developing Nigerian companies in the sector". Energy groups have been slashing their investments in a bid to shore up earnings, as crude prices have collapsed by about 60 percent since June.

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Statoil finds more gas offshore Tanzania

Norway’s Statoil announced new gas discovery offshore Tanzania. The company said it will catch its breath now to peruse next steps. File Photo by UPI/Shutterstock/James Jones Jr. STAVANGER, Norway, March 30 (UPI) — Tanzania may be ripe for future offshore natural gas development, though time is needed for appraisal after the latest find, Norway’s Statoil said Monday. Statoil announced the discovery of roughly 1 trillion and 1.8 trillion cubic feet of natural gas in the Mdalasini-1 well off the Tanzanian coast. Marking the end of the first phase of operations there, the company said its eight discoveries to date combine for approximately 22 trillion cubic feet of gas reserves. Nick Maden, a regional vice president for the company, said in a statement the company views Tanzania as a high prospect gas opportunity, "but there will be a pause in the drilling to evaluate the next steps and to mature […]

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Exclusive: India makes first crude oil purchase for strategic reserve

LONDON (Reuters) – India has bought the first oil for its strategic petroleum reserve (SPR), trade sources said on Monday, marking the start of a round of purchases by the world’s fourth-biggest oil consumer to build up emergency stockpiles. Oil prices have almost halved in the past year due to excess global production, leaving traders looking for any signs of new demand to help absorb the surplus. The sources said state-refiner Indian Oil Corp bought a 2 million barrel cargo of Iraqi crude from Chinese trader Unipec, which will load in May for shipping to the first stage of India’s SPR on the country’s east coast. In addition, state-refiners IOC and Hindustan Petroleum Corp Ltd will buy another three Very Large Crude Carriers between them for the Vizag SPR storage site in the southern state of Andhra Pradesh. While the first 8 million barrels for Vizag are relatively small […]

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Elon Musk May Have Scooped Tesla’s Big Announcement

Elon Musk is about to announce a new product that’s not a car. He said so in a mysterious Tweet designed to induce the highest level of nail-biting suspense. But the Elon Musk of two months ago may have told us exactly what we should expect.  “We are going to unveil the Tesla home battery, the consumer battery that would be for use in people’s houses or businesses fairly soon,” Musk said during an earnings conference call in February. He said the product unveiling would occur within the next month or two. Here’s his teaser from today, which drove up shares of Tesla 3.5 percent: Tesla is building the world’s biggest battery factory in Nevada — a $5 billion project that Musk says will reduce the price of battery storage by 30 percent. Combining solar panels with backup capacity could allow homeowners to avoid buying electricity from utilities. If the prices come […]

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Top U.S. Court Questions EPA Emissions Rule for Power Plants

(Bloomberg) — U.S. Supreme Court justices signaled they are divided over Obama administration rules that would cut emissions from 460 coal-fired power plants in an effort to curb birth defects, heart disease and premature deaths. During arguments Wednesday, justices questioned Environmental Protection Agency controls on mercury and acid gases from the plants owned by Southern Co., American Electric Power Co. and other utilities. Lawyers for power companies and some states said the agency didn’t adequately consider costs before imposing rules estimated to cost $9.6 billion a year. “It’s classic arbitrary and capricious agency action,” Justice Antonin Scalia said, referring to a legal standard the court can use to block an agency rule. The Obama administration says it considered costs in how it set the rules but wasn’t required to do so at the initial stage of deciding whether to issue regulations at all. That argument was questioned by Scalia […]

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Texas City Pulls Plug on Fossil Fuels With Shift to Solar

(Bloomberg) — A city in the heart of the oil state of Texas is set to become one of the first communities in the U.S. to wean its residents off fossil fuels. The municipal utility in Georgetown, with about 50,000 residents, will get all of its power from renewable resources when SunEdison Inc. completes 150 megawatts of solar farms in West Texas next year. The change was announced Wednesday. It will be the first city to completely embrace clean power in the state, which is the biggest U.S. producer and user of natural gas. More will follow as municipalities seek to insulate themselves from unpredictable prices for fossil fuels, said Paul Gaynor, SunEdison’s executive vice president of North America. Burlington, Vermont, made a similar move with its purchase of a hydroelectric plant last year. “This will be the first of many,” Gaynor said in a telephone interview. “The city […]

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Texas natural gas, oil production down in latest reporting periods: regulator

Texas’ average rig count and production of oil and gas fell in the latest available reporting periods, the state’s oil and gas regulator said Monday. Texas’ latest average rig count, as of March 20, was 464, down from 598 on February 13, the Railroad Commission of Texas said, citing Baker Hughes statistics. The March rig count represented about 45% of all active land rigs in the US. In March 2014, the commission reported an average rig count of 854. In the commission’s final production estimate for January, the state produced 81 million barrels of oil and 536.3 Bcf of natural gas. The commission’s final production estimate for December was 83.7 million barrels of oil and 553.2 Bcf of natural gas. The commission’s final January 2014 production estimate was 69.9 million barrels of oil and 566.5 Bcf of natural gas. The estimate of Texas’ natural gas in storage in March […]

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EIA inaugurates monthly crude-by-rail shipping information

The US Energy Information Administration is providing monthly data of crude oil shipments by rail for the first time. The new crude-by-rail movements will be integrated with its existing monthly petroleum supply statistics, which already include crude movements by pipeline, tanker, and barge, EIA said. The crude-by-rail data provide a clearer picture of an oil transportation mode which has rapidly grown recently, and is of great interest to policymakers, the public, and the rail and oil industries, EIA Administrator Adam Sieminski said. “EIA expects that the new data it has developed using information provided by the US Surface Transportation Board (STB), along with data from other third-party sources and our own survey data, will provide key insights into oil-by-rail movements, including shipments to and from Canada,” he said. “We welcome the cooperation of the STB as well as Canada’s National Energy Board in making these data accessible.” EIA will […]

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U.S. may skirt oil storage crisis as drivers hit the road

NEW YORK (Reuters) – A month ago, it seemed inevitable: a massive global oversupply of crude oil production would overwhelm storage tanks in Oklahoma and fill supertankers off Singapore. Now, there are growing signs that the U.S. oil market can avoid the doomsday scenario in which it runs out of room to stockpile surplus crude, a development that oil traders worried would send crude prices into another tailspin. One reason is that refiners, spurred by high profit margins, are rushing to buy crude and churn out more fuel in response to an unexpectedly swift rise in U.S. road travel and soaring Chinese demand for fuel-hungry sport utility vehicles. Furthermore, shale oil drillers have hit the brakes on new wells faster than many anticipated. This could throw years of unyielding growth into reverse as early as May. Oil prices are starting to reflect these changes. U.S. crude has rebounded from […]

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Calls For Immediate Shutdown Of Illegal California Injection Wells As Regulators Host ‘Aquifer Exemption Workshop’

While California legislators are calling for immediate closure of the thousands of injection wells illegally dumping oil industry wastewater and enhanced oil recovery fluids into protected groundwater aquifers, regulators with the state’s Division of Oil, Gas and Geothermal Resources (DOGGR) were holding an “Aquifer Exemption Workshop” in Long Beach on Tuesday. Just 23 out of the 2,500 wells DOGGR officials have acknowledged the agency improperly permitted to operate in aquifers that contain potentially drinkable water have so far been closed down — 11 were closed down last July and 12 more were shut down earlier this month. Given the urgency of the situation, it certainly does not look good that DOGGR made time to hold a workshop to outline “the data requirements and process for requesting an aquifer exemption under the Safe Drinking Water Act,” when it has given itself a two-year deadline to investigate the thousands more wells […]

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Russia continues Asian pivot

President of Russian bank VTB wants listing on Chinese stock market. File Photo by Stephen Shaver/UPI. MOSCOW, March 30 (UPI) — With Russian energy interests pivoting east, the head of Russian bank VTB said Monday he was looking to get listed on the Chinese stock exchange. Andrei Kostin said, on his way to an Asian investment forum, that his bank was requesting a rating from China’s Dagong Global Credit Rating Co. "We are heading in that direction," he said. "It is the right decision given the current situation." Rating is one of the preliminary steps toward entering the Chinese stock exchange as a listed company. The Chinese rating agency in early March gave Russian energy company Gazprom Neft a AA credit rating, denoting a stable outlook for its debt portfolio and long-term production potential. Parent company Gazprom received one of its best outlooks in the industry, a AAA, despite […]

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Revisiting the Shale Oil Hype: Technology versus Geology

The press has been all abuzz the past few weeks speculating on what the drop in oil prices will mean for U.S. shale oil (tight oil) production. Pundits have been falling over themselves quoting various estimates of the breakeven cost of production in this play or that, and rushing to be the first to declare a peak in the Bakken, Eagle Ford, Niobrara or wherever.  The Baker-Hughes rig count, which comes out every Friday, has become a must-read for people who probably had never heard of it a few months ago. Even the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA), based on estimates, suggests production is declining in three big shale oil plays. The industry, on the other hand, has been more circumspect. They point to productivity gains being made in drilling and completion technology that lower costs, and suggest they are developing a backlog (aka “fracklog” ) of wells that […]

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The global oil price drop may last for the next couple decades

The global oil price drop may last for the next couple decades thumbnail Stanford economist Frank Wolak says the drop in oil prices and demand reflects heightened energy production in North America, better technologies and the declining market power of the OPEC countries. Global oil prices may stay low for the next 10 or 20 years, according to Stanford economist Frank Wolak . The most likely medium-term outcome is $50 to $70 per barrel, according to Wolak. He is the Holbrook Working Professor of Commodity Price Studies in the Department of Economics at Stanford University. And while geopolitical and environmental issues may unexpectedly arise that turn oil prices upward, Wolak said many factors point to lower oil prices for the foreseeable future. Crude oil prices fell from a high of $115 a barrel in June 2014 to a low of $45 in January of this year. The lower prices […]

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Geopolitics and Oil Prices: Between A Rock and a Hard Place

Oil traders appear to be hedging themselves against a possible deal between the West and Iran on the nuclear question but doing so misses the increasingly complex forces at play today in oil geopolitics. A Saudi analyst with close ties to the Saudi government issued a clear and effective description of the new Saudi government’s foreign policy doctrine in today’s Washington Post, and it clearly indicates a warning about a wider Sunni-Iranian war across the Middle East. If Tehran and Moscow were counting on the kingdom to be disorganized in the face of a succession transition, this new op ed should shed any doubts about the new government’s seriousness of purpose. The Saudi royal family rallied around a clean and clear succession announcement last January and it looks likely the same unified internal coalition is ready and willing to implement a coordinated oil and military strategy against Iran. The […]

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Oil prices drop on possible Iran deal, dollar

LONDON (Reuters) – Oil prices fell on Monday as officials from Iran and six world powers discussed a possible deal over Tehran’s nuclear programme that could bring an end to sanctions and allow an increase in Iranian oil exports. The two sides have until the end of Tuesday to come up with an agreement at talks in Lausanne, Switzerland. Officials close to the talks have said progress has been made and many investors believe a deal is in the making. Few expect the talks to end without some sort of agreement. "Regarding Iran, there are two possible outcomes: a framework deal or an extended deadline," Bjarne Schieldrop, chief commodities analyst at SEB Markets in Oslo, told the Reuters Global Oil Forum. Brent crude was down 40 cents at $56.01 a barrel by 0938 GMT as the market began to price in a deal with Iran. U.S. crude was down […]

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Oil Prices Fall as Iran Deadline Nears

Dow Jones Newswires By Georgi Kantchev LONDON–Oil prices started the week in the red ahead of the looming deadline for Iran’s nuclear talks, while supply disruptions due to Saudi airstrikes on Yemen looked increasingly unlikely. Brent crude for May delivery fell 0.7% to $56 a barrel on London’s ICE Futures exchange. On the New York Mercantile Exchange, light, sweet crude futures for delivery in May traded at $48.16 a barrel, down 1.5% from Friday’s settlement. The oil market awaited the outcome of a Tuesday deadline for talks between Iran and six world powers over its nuclear program. A possible relaxation of the sanctions against the country could pave the way for increased Iranian oil exports. "If a framework agreement is reached, we would expect an immediate bearish knee-jerk reaction in the markets, with oil prices quickly losing on the order of $5," Société Générale said in a report. But […]

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Once-bullish fund managers start to capitulate on oil prices

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Last fall, when the price of oil started dropping, fund manager Craig Hodges figured crude would rebound in 2015 and began buying shares of companies he thought would be unfairly hit, including construction company Primoris Services Corp and Eagle Materials Inc, which produces sand used in fracked wells. Hodges, who runs the $2.1 billion Hodges Small Cap fund, is now starting to concede that oil prices will stay low for as long as a year or more because of a global glut. Even the air strikes Thursday in Yemen by Saudi Arabia and its Gulf Arab allies, which prompted a one-day 5 percent boost to the price of oil, presented "a traders move" and doesn’t signal a sustained move up, Hodges said. Oil fell 6 percent today to about $48 a barrel. Instead of looking for a bounce back this year, Hodges is now on the […]

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Reuters Poll: Oil prices to stabilize as demand rises

(Reuters) – Oil prices should stabilise in the second half of this year and rise in 2016 and 2017 as consumers respond to a period of much cheaper fuel, a Reuters poll of analysts showed on Monday. The survey of 34 analysts predicted North Sea Brent crude LCOc1 would average $59.20 a barrel in 2015, up from around $55 so far this year. The forecast is up just 20 cents from the projection in last month’s Reuters survey. [O/POLL] Brent is expected to rise to $72.10 in 2016 and $78.70 in 2017, the poll showed. Oil prices fell more than 60 percent between June 2014 and January, and although they have recovered a little since then, they are still around half their level a year ago. This has encouraged motorists to make more use of their cars and let factories and other businesses boost fuel consumption. London-based consultancy Energy […]

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Iran nuclear deal to see $20 oil if Tehran floods crude market

Iran nuclear deal to see $20 oil if Tehran floods crude market thumbnail Flights to Tehran from Dubai have been crammed in recent months with Western executives flooding into the Iranian capital ahead of a potential lifting of economic sanctions. Potentially one of the Middle East’s biggest economies, Iran has been frozen out by the West over its refusal to give up its aspirations to become a nuclear power. But a binding deal that would bring the Islamic state in from the cold appears tantalisingly close as negotiators thrash out terms in talks being held in Lausanne, Switzerland, over the weekend. In terms of commodities, the biggest impact that a resumption of normal economic relations with Iran will open up is in the oil industry. Tehran is a sleeping oil giant, which has been frozen out of international markets and denied access to key technology and investment that could […]

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Iran Backs Away From Key Detail in Nuclear Deal

Photo Foreign ministers from other world powers joined Secretary of State John Kerry in an effort to reach the outlines of a nuclear accord with Iran by a midnight Tuesday deadline. Credit Pool photo by Brendan Smialowski LAUSANNE, Switzerland — With a negotiating deadline just two days away, Iranian officials on Sunday backed away from a critical element of a proposed nuclear agreement, saying they are no longer willing to ship their atomic fuel out of the country. For months, Iran tentatively agreed that it would send a large portion of its stockpile of uranium to Russia , where it would not be accessible for use in any future weapons program. But on Sunday Iran’s deputy foreign minister made a surprise comment to Iranian reporters, ruling out an agreement that involved giving up a stockpile that Iran has spent years and billions of dollars to amass. “The export of […]

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U.S. Says Shipping Uranium Out of Iran Is Still Part of Possible Nuclear Deal

Photo The European Union’s foreign policy chief, Federica Mogherini, left, Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif of Iran, center, and the head of the Iranian Atomic Energy Organization, Ali Akbar Salehi, on Monday in Lausanne, Switzerland. Credit Fabrice Coffrini/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images LAUSANNE, Switzerland — American officials said on Monday that they were still negotiating with their Iranian counterparts on one of the main issues remaining in their efforts to reach a deal on Iran ’s nuclear program — how to dispose of Iran’s big nuclear stockpile — and that shipping the atomic fuel out of the country was still a possibility. The American officials were pushing back against public statements made on Sunday by Iran’s deputy foreign minister, Abbas Araqchi, that seemed to rule out an accord under which uranium would be sent abroad. Those comments represented an apparent change in position by the Iranian negotiators, who had […]

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World powers mount final push to secure Iran nuclear deal

With just two days to go until a crucial deadline expires, diplomats are preparing to mount a final push to secure a nuclear deal with Iran, even as key elements of negotiations show signs of unravelling. Six foreign ministers of the P5+1 — the five permanent members of the UN Security Council plus Germany — gathered for the first time late on Sunday evening in the Swiss city of Lausanne to find a common position ahead of Monday’s continuing talks . “Starting tonight there will be a very serious push from the six,” one senior western diplomat told the Financial Times on Sunday. “One thing I have noticed is that when the six are together in front of the Iranians, usually we behave in a remarkably consistent manner.” Tense discussions with Iran had reached a deadlock over the weekend on the key issue of sanctions relief. Iran demands the […]

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Obama Ramps Up Lobbying on Iran as Deadline Looms

ENLARGE Iran’s atomic energy chief, Ali Akbar Salehi, second left, and Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif, second right, during negotiations in Lausanne, Switzerland, on Sunday. Photo: Brendan Smialowski/Press Pool As negotiations with Iran on a nuclear deal come down to the wire, the White House is ramping up a yearlong campaign to persuade lawmakers and the public to support an agreement. In recent days, officials have tried to neutralize skeptical Democrats by arguing that opposing President Barack Obama would empower the new Republican majority, according to people familiar with the discussions. Meanwhile, the Obama administration has lined up Republicans to try to tamp down a likely political battle over any deal with Iran and scientists to defend an agreement on its technical merits. Perhaps most significant, White House officials have begun to express privately a willingness to accept legislation that gives Congress some oversight of the nuclear deal if […]

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Iran Riches Coveted by Big Oil After Decades of Conflict

Kharg Island oil production. (Bloomberg) — Outside the boardroom of BP Plc’s headquarters on London’s swanky St. James’s Square, a display case houses the geological data from Masjid-i-Solaiman, Iran’s first oil well. The discovery of crude in 1908 laid the foundations for the company that would become British Petroleum and opened one of the richest opportunities that Western oil companies have ever enjoyed in the turbulent Middle East. Since then, the industry’s history in Iran is intertwined with CIA-backed coups, colonial exploitation and the anti-Western resentment surrounding the 1979 Islamic Revolution. Now, as Iran and the U.S. enter 11th-hour negotiations to reach a nuclear deal and ease sanctions, the Middle Eastern country is emerging again as a potential prize for Western oil companies such as BP, Royal Dutch Shell Plc, Eni SpA and Total SA. The Chinese can also be expected to enter the race, while U.S. companies, more […]

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Setbacks and progress as Iran, six powers meet to end nuclear impasse

LAUSANNE, Switzerland (Reuters) – The foreign ministers of Iran and six world powers met on Monday in a final push for a preliminary nuclear accord less than two days before their deadline as Tehran showed signs of backing away from previous compromise offers. For days Iran, the United States, Britain, France, Germany, Russia and China have been holding negotiations to break an impasse in negotiations aimed at stopping Tehran having the capacity to develop a nuclear bomb in exchange for an easing of international sanctions that are crippling its economy. But officials at the talks in the Swiss city of Lausanne cautioned that attempts to reach a framework accord could yet fall apart. [ID:nL6N0WV09H] German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier said there had been "some progress and some setbacks in the last hours". "I can’t rule out that there will be further crises in these negotiations," he told reporters in […]

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Libyan oil output at 564,000 bpd, expected to rise in coming days: NOC

CAIRO (Reuters) – Libya’s oil production is currently 564,000 barrels per day, a spokesman for the National Oil Corp (NOC) of Libya said. "We expect oil output to rise in the coming days," Mohamed El Harari said, adding that Libya’s natural gas production stood at more than 2 billion cubic feet. (Reporting by Feras Bosalum, writing by Ulf Laessing; editing by Jason Neely )

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Iraq, IOCs eye changes in oil contracts to mitigate impact of falling crude

Iraq’s Oil Ministry and international oil companies are moving toward a shared vision on contract changes that will mitigate the impact of low oil prices and increase profits but will not be production sharing contracts, Iraqi oil minister Adil Abd al-Mahdi said on Sunday. The ministry has asked IOCs that have signed technical service contracts to recommend changes to the deals. The contracts are currently more expensive to the state, the minister said. In addition, they have a very quick cost-recovery process, which places a burden on the state at a time of low oil prices, he added. The cost recovery and remuneration fee payments are made in oil, which essentially means Iraq owes double the amount of oil to IOCs than it did a year ago when prices were twice today’s level. IOCs have complained of lagging in-kind nomination schedules, and both sides are worried of what the […]

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Fighting, airstrikes throughout Yemen as dialogue remains distant

ADEN (Reuters) – Yemeni fighters loyal to the Saudi-backed President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi clashed with Iranian-allied Houthi fighters on Sunday in downtown Aden, the absent leader’s last major foothold in the country. Hadi loyalists in the southern port city reported a gun battle in the central Crater district in which three people were killed, and said they recaptured the airport, which has changed hands several times in the last five days of fighting. The Health Ministry, loyal to the Houthi fighters who control the capital, said Saudi-led air strikes had killed 35 people and wounded 88 overnight. The figures could not be independently confirmed. The Houthi fighters, representing a Shi’ite minority that makes up around a third of Yemen’s population, emerged as the most powerful force in the Arab world’s poorest country last year when they captured the capital Sanaa. Saudi Arabia has rallied Sunni Muslim Arab countries in […]

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Yemen strikes will continue until Hadi can rule: Saudi spokesman

RIYADH (Reuters) – Air strikes in Yemen led by Saudi Arabia will continue until Yemeni President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi, who left the country on Thursday, is able to rule, a Saudi military spokesman said on Sunday. Riyadh announced early on Thursday that it and nine other Sunni Muslim countries had commenced air strikes against the Shi’ite Houthi militia, who are allied to the kingdom’s main regional foe Iran. Iran, which denies helping the Houthis, has strongly condemned the offensive. "We will set the conditions necessary to allow the president and his government to run the country," said Brigadier General Ahmed Asseri, spokesman for the coalition. "The Yemeni army was almost dismantled (by internal fractures after a 2011 uprising) … one of the conditions is for them to take over. We will continue to attack the militias, we will keep them under pressure, until the conditions become very favorable for […]

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Fighting in Aden as Yemen’s Houthis make gains

ADEN (Reuters) – Iran-allied Houthi militiamen pushed into the northeastern outskirts of the Yemeni port city of Aden on Monday amid heavy clashes with loyalists of President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi, sources on both sides said. Artillery and rocket fire struck the area on the approaches to the city, Hadi’s fighters said, after the Houthis made a fresh advance from the east along an Arabian Sea coast road. Aden is Hadi’s last bastion of control in Yemen and remains besieged despite a fifth day of Saudi-led air strikes aimed at checking the Houthi gains. North of Aden, residents in the city of Dhalea said Houthi fighters backed by allied army units loyal to former president Ali Abdullah Saleh shelled militia opponents with tanks and artillery. Five civilians were killed in heavy street fighting, they said. Saudi Arabia, backed by regional Sunni Muslim allies, launched an air campaign to support Hadi […]

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Saudi Arabia wants nuclear weapons

Saudi Arabia wants nuclear weapons thumbnail Saudi Arabia will not rule out building or acquiring nuclear weapons , the country’s ambassador to the United States has indicated. Asked whether Saudi Arabia would ever build nuclear weapons in an interview with US news channel CNN, Adel Al-Jubeir said the subject was “not something we would discuss publicly”. Pressed later on the issue he said: “This is not something that I can comment on, nor would I comment on.” The ambassador’s reticence to rule out a military nuclear programme may reignite concerns that the autocratic monarchy has its eye on a nuclear arsenal. Western intelligence agencies believe that the Saudi monarchy paid for up to 60% of Pakistan’s nuclear programme in return for the ability to buy warheads for itself at short notice, the Guardian newspaper reported in 2010. The two countries maintain close relations and are sometimes said to have […]

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Fukushima — A litany of failures costing hundreds of millions

Fukushima — A litany of failures costing hundreds of millions thumbnail Four years after the earthquake and resulting tsunami that killed 18,000 people and destroyed the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plan in Japan, the tragedy is far from being over. Despite the litany of failures in cleaning up the mess, Japan carries on. The daunting task of cleanup at the Fukushima nuclear power plant site, where three of six reactors melted down, and one other is badly damaged, has been an ongoing chore that seems to have no end. And to add insult to injury, Japanese government auditors revealed this past week that over one-third of the $2.0 billion of taxpayer money earmarked for the cleanup has been wasted. But believe it or not, tourists are beginning to return to the area as radiation fears have faded, perhaps due to positive information being issued to the public by government […]

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Exclusive: Exxon eyes 850,000 bpd goal for Beaumont refinery expansion -sources

HOUSTON (Reuters) – Exxon Mobil Corp is considering scaling up plans for a multibillion-dollar expansion of its Beaumont, Texas, oil refinery to make it one of the largest in the world, according to sources familiar with the plans. Since at least last summer, Exxon has been quietly contemplating a major project to expand Beaumont in what would be the biggest U.S. refinery investment since the shale revolution, which has transformed the country into a growing producer and handed refiners a profit windfall of cheap crude. Initially the company was considering doubling the current 344,600-barrel-per-day (bpd) capacity by 2020, Reuters reported last year. Now it may go as high as 850,000 bpd by the end of the decade, according to the sources, a figure that would make it the largest U.S. plant and fourth-largest in the world. The latest details of the expansion plan, on which it has not made […]

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In Texas oil town, early signs of economic strain as drilling slows

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Sales tax receipts in the thriving oil town of Midland, Texas, fell this month, only the second decline in five years and one of the first signs of how low oil prices are beginning to ripple beyond oil company bottom lines and into the wider economy. Midland’s sales tax revenues, which reflect commercial and residential spending, dipped to $5.119 million in March from $5.126 million in March 2014, according to data from the Texas Comptroller released last week. The fall was slight, but it was just the second year-over-year decline since April 2010, when an oil production boom was just beginning to transform Midland. It also marks a stark and potentially protracted turnaround from recent years: last year in March, when oil prices soared above $100 a barrel, sales tax receipts increased 11 percent. "These numbers are more significant to me than anything else," said […]

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Big Oil Pressured Scientists Over Fracking Wastewater’s Link to Quakes

In November 2013, Austin Holland, Oklahoma’s state seismologist, got a request that made him nervous. It was from David Boren, president of the University of Oklahoma, which houses the Oklahoma Geological Survey where Holland works. Boren, a former U.S. senator, asked Holland to his office for coffee with Harold Hamm, the billionaire founder of Continental Resources, one of Oklahoma’s largest oil and gas operators. Boren sits on the board of Continental, and Hamm is a big donor to the university, giving $20 million in 2011 for a new diabetes center. Says Holland: “It was just a little bit intimidating.” Holland had been studying possible links between a rise in seismic activity in Oklahoma and the rapid increase in oil and gas production, the state’s largest industry. During the meeting, Hamm requested that Holland be careful when publicly discussing the possible connection between oil and gas operations and a big […]

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U.S. oil production growth in 2014 was largest in more than 100 years

Source: U.S. Energy Information Administration, Petroleum Supply Monthly U.S. crude oil production (including lease condensate) increased during 2014 by 1.2 million barrels per day (bbl/d) to 8.7 million bbl/d, the largest volume increase since recordkeeping began in 1900. On a percentage basis, output in 2014 increased by 16.2%, the highest growth rate since 1940. Most of the increase during 2014 came from tight oil plays in North Dakota, Texas, and New Mexico where hydraulic fracturing and horizontal drilling were used to produce oil from shale formations. In percentage terms, the 2014 increase is the largest in more than six decades. Annual increases in crude oil production regularly surpassed 15% in the first half of the 20th century, but those changes were relatively less in absolute terms because production levels were much lower than they are now. Crude oil production in the United States has increased in each of the […]

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Supply or Demand? Peak Oil with Richard Heinberg and James Hamilton

3 Comments on "Supply or Demand? Peak Oil with Richard Heinberg and James Hamilton" Davy on Sat, 28th Mar 2015 10:10 am  Why don’t these academic greenie weennies divest out of the car culture and show real backbone? Why don’t they admit that no matter how much they want to have their cake and eat it there are no free lunches? Why don’t they admit or try to understand that BAU is carbon and without carbon there is no BAU. Then while they are at it admit without BAU there is no Stanford. This is just another greenie joke of feel-goodism that will go nowhere. If you want to change things then lobby government to restrict liquid fuels enough to put the economy in a tailspin so we can begin the power down that will involve huge changes to bad attitudes, lifestyles, and economic activity. This power down will […]

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Why Oil Could Be Facing A 20-Year Bear Market

In the past, the usual “oil crisis” was caused by self-serving news items of an oil shortage, causing soaring prices. Just 2-3 years ago, the fear mongers said that the world had “seen peak oil,” meaning that oil production would be on a long term decline and there would be big shortages. Instead, oil production is now at a high The current crisis is one of plunging oil prices and a glut as far as the eye can see. Oil production, after prices have fallen over 60%, is at a new high. As we predicted late last year, oil producers are making up for plummeting income by pumping even more. Rig counts in production are plunging, but these are from the low production wells. The high producers are still pumping away. In fact, the latest rig count even shows that there is little additional reduction in producing rigs. The […]

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