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Weekly US coal production estimated at 18 million st, down 7.6%: EIA

Weekly US coal production totaled an estimated 18 million st in the week ended April 11, up 3.5% from the prior week but down 7.6% from the year-ago week, the Energy Information Administration said Thursday. Coal production in Wyoming and Montana, which is mostly made up of production from the Powder River Basin, totaled an estimated 7.8 million st during the week, down 6.8% compared with last year. Year-to-date coal production in Wyoming and Montana is estimated to total 114.4 million st, down 3.8% compared with the same period last year. In Central Appalachia, weekly coal production totaled an estimated 2.3 million st, down 16.3% from last year. Year-to-date coal production is estimated to total 34.4 million st, down 9.3% from last year. Weekly coal production in Northern Appalachia totaled an estimated 2.6 million st, down 4.9% from last year. Year-to-date coal production is estimated to total 37.6 million […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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Appeals Court Skeptical of Case Against EPA Climate Rule

ENLARGE A plume of steam rises from a cooling tower at the American Electric Power coal-fired plant in Winfield, W. Va. Photo: Bloomberg News WASHINGTON—A federal appeals court panel suggested Thursday that it may be too early for a court challenge to an Obama administration proposal to cut carbon emissions from U.S. power plants. The case against the Environmental Protection Agency, up for oral argument at the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, is the first test of how well the central component of President Barack Obama’s climate agenda can withstand legal scrutiny. The rules aren’t yet final, however, a development the courts almost always require before allowing challenges to a regulation. “All we have in front of us is a proposed rulemaking,” said Judge Tom Griffith, a judge appointed by Republican President George W. Bush . Judge Griffith also said that ruling on […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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House GOP wants more Atlantic leases in offshore drilling plan

Obama administration’s latest offshore drilling plan proposes just 14 leases. Photo by Kyle Waters/Shutterstock WASHINGTON, April 16 (UPI) — The House Natural Resources Subcommittee on Energy and Mineral Resources held an oversight hearing Wednesday on the Obama administration’s Outer Continental Shelf (OCS) Oil and Gas Leasing Program for 2017-2022. The U.S. Interior Department released a draft proposal in January for access to federal waters for exploration and drilling. While an Atlantic Ocean area was included for the first time, the proposal was met with frustration by Sen. Lisa Murkowski , R-Alaska, as the proposal came on the heels of the closure of parts of Alaska’s wilderness area to energy companies. "The Obama Administration often touts that it is committed to promoting oil and gas production on federal lands, including the Outer Continental Shelf," said Energy and Mineral Resources Subcommittee Chairman Doug Lamborn, R-Colo. "However their draft five year lease […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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The BP Oil Spill Cleanup Isn’t a Disaster

Source: Getty Images In early March a 30,000-pound mat of oily gunk washed up on East Grand Terre, a barrier island in the mouth of Louisiana’s Barataria Bay. It was an ugly reminder of the blowout at BP’s Macondo well, a disaster that spewed millions of barrels of crude into the Gulf of Mexico starting on April 20, 2010. As BP crews collected the muck, the company issued a five-year report, Environmental Recovery and Restoration , stressing that the spill didn’t do lasting damage to the ecosystem. The 40-page report described the deleterious effects as “limited in space and time, mostly in the area very close to the wellhead.” BP’s U.S. spokesman, Geoff Morrell, told reporters that the state exacerbated contamination on East Grand Terre with a 2010 beach-replenishment initiative that wound up “burying the oil under layers of sand.” Louisiana officials saw it otherwise. “Oh, yeah, this is absolutely […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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U.S. oil curve flattens as drillers hedge, storage fears ebb

NEW YORK (Reuters) – The U.S. oil market has firmed up into its best shape this year, as ebbing fears of an inventory overflow and renewed hedging in far-distance futures flattens the forward curve – another possible sign that a months-long rout is really over. On Wednesday, the discount for June U.S. crude oil futures on the New York Mercantile Exchange versus December jumped 47 cents to settle at $3.21 a barrel, the tightest spread in nearly five months and less than half what it was a month ago. The discount of December 2015 to December 2016 tightened by 58 cents to settle at $2.73 a barrel, its smallest since November. The narrowing spreads will likely be a welcome sign for oil bulls and members of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), who often look at the shape of the curve as a clearer indication of fundamentals. U.S. […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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The Oil Industry’s ‘Man Camps’ Are Dying

Roughnecks in a man camp before their shift outside Watford City, N.D. Photographer: Bryan Denton/Corbis At the peak of the fracking boom a few years ago, Jeff Myers converted his South Texas hunting camp into rental oilfield housing. Little wonder: The industry had an almost insatiable hunger for the grunt laborers—the roughnecks—to work the fields, and employers were happy to spend whatever it took to house and feed them. Today that boomtown demand—and $100-per-barrel prices—is a bittersweet memory, and occupancy at Myers’s once-packed Double C Resort has dropped to 10 percent as job cuts take hold. “There aren’t going to be any winners down here,” he says. “Everybody’s going to have to adjust.” America’s oilfield “man camps”—as the industry calls them—are turning into ghost towns as drillers cut back the free housing, food, and air travel once used to lure shale boom workers. The mini-settlements that sprang up throughout drilling […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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Total’s Refinery Revamp Underscores Industry Pressures

ENLARGE French energy company Total SA said on Thursday it plans to pump more than $600 million into two struggling refineries and cut 180 jobs. Photo: Reuters PARIS—French energy company Total SA said on Thursday it plans to pump more than $600 million into two struggling refineries and cut 180 jobs, in a sign of the coming pressures on European refiners. Total said it will invest about $428 million to upgrade its Donges refinery in western France and pour $214 million into transforming the La Mède refinery near Marseille into a biofuel plant. At La Mède, the company will cut staff to 250 from 430 through early retirements and transfers. The changes come at a moment of transition for European refiners who have experienced good times for the past several months after years of losses. Spain’s Repsol SA, Portugal’s Galp Energia and Italy’s Eni SpA have all reported strong […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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The Renewable Revolution

Don’t hold your breath, but future historians may look back on 2015 as the year that the renewable energy ascendancy began, the moment when the world started to move decisively away from its reliance on fossil fuels. Those fuels — oil, natural gas, and coal — will, of course, continue to dominate the energy landscape for years to come, adding billions of tons of heat-trapping carbon to the atmosphere.  For the first time, however, it appears that a shift to renewable energy sources is gaining momentum.  If sustained, it will have momentous implications for the world economy — as profound as the shift from wood to coal or coal to oil in previous centuries. Global economic growth has, of course, long been powered by an increasing supply of fossil fuels, especially petroleum. Beginning with the United States, countries that succeeded in mastering the extraction and utilization of oil gained […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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Putting the Real Story of Energy and the Economy Together

What is the real story of energy and the economy? We hear two predominant energy stories. One is the story economists tell: The economy can grow forever; energy shortages will have no impact on the economy. We can simply substitute other forms of energy, or do without. Another version of the energy and the economy story is the view of many who believe in the “Peak Oil” theory. According to this view, oil supply can decrease with only a minor impact on the economy. The economy will continue along as before, except with higher prices. These higher prices encourage the production of alternatives, such wind and solar. At this point, it is not just peak oilers who endorse this view, but many others as well. In my view, the real story of energy and the economy is much less favorable than either of these views. It is a story […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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Oil Historian Yergin Sees Prices Locked in ’W’ Formation

Oil historian and economist Daniel Yergin has a forecast for where the price of crude is headed: all over the place. The much debated shape of the oil-price curve will take the form of a W as crude is whipsawed by mixed signs from a rattled U.S. shale boom, while Saudi Arabia refuses to balance a global supply glut, Yergin said in an interview on Tuesday. As spending cuts are forecast to begin easing production from shale next month, the fate of world oil markets is largely in the hands of a myriad of U.S. wildcatters, all with different strategies and an unusual ability to respond quickly to changed circumstances. Ramping down will be quicker and easier than stepping up production as prices recover, said Yergin, vice chairman of IHS Inc. Increased supply will renew downward pressure on prices and volatility will be exacerbated by storage and investment decisions, […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple