Free Republic

Four decades ago this month, members of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) launched an oil embargo against the United States in retaliation for our steadfast support of Israel in her hour of need. As the Jewish State fought off the Soviet-backed Egyptian and Syrian armies in what would become known as the Yom Kippur War, the OPEC cartel’s actions sent the price of oil soaring and our economy into a recession. Sadly, 40 years later, we have not learned the appropriate lesson from that experience: We must disconnect our oil-dependent transportation sector from OPEC and the...

MIDLAND, Texas -— In a faded West Texas town dotted with vacant buildings and potholed streets is a sparkling storefront window and a curious display: rows of diamond-studded Rolex watches, awaiting buyers whose pockets are packed with oil money. The surge in oil drilling has drawn money and men like a magnet to run-down communities that haven't seen a boom since the 1980s. But leaders and residents here are increasingly mindful that the runaway riches tapped by hydraulic fracturing will eventually run out. And they are determined to live by a fondly remembered bumper sticker from the last bust: Please,...

The United States has overtaken Saudi Arabia to become the world's biggest oil producer as the jump in output from shale plays has led to the second biggest oil boom in history, according to leading U.S. energy consultancy PIRA. U.S. output, which includes natural gas liquids and biofuels, has swelled 3.2 million barrels per day (bpd) since 2009, the fastest expansion in production over a four-year period since a surge in Saudi Arabia's output from 1970-1974, PIRA said in a release on Tuesday. It was the latest milestone for the U.S. oil sector caused by the shale revolution, which has...

DAEGU, South Korea, Oct 14 (Reuters) – Coal will surpass oil as the key fuel for the global economy by 2020 despite government efforts to reduce carbon emissions, energy consultancy firm Wood Mackenzie said on Monday. Rising demand in China and India will push coal past oil as the two Asian powerhouses will need to rely on the comparatively cheaper fuel to power their economies. Coal demand in the United States, Europe and the rest of Asia will hold steady. Global coal consumption is expected to rise by 25 percent by the end of the decade to 4,500 million tonnes...

On a September morning near the line where Jim Wells and Duval counties meet, truck tracks mark the path to a new oil well like chicken scratch. More than a mile below the surface, ancient rock starts cracking. San Antonio-based Inland Ocean’s new well has drilled into a tight rock formation, which must be fractured before oil will flow — a process common across South Texas with the Eagle Ford Shale oil boom. The site is crowded with pumper trucks, cranes, sand trucks, tanks, a mixer and about a dozen pickup trucks. Around 6,000 barrels of water — 252,000 gallons...

As plans for a mega-port on Kenya's northern-most coast begin to take shape, new concerns are emerging that the project could damage already-strained relations between Sudan and South Sudan. Kenya's $25.5bn Lamu Port and New Transport Corridor Development to Southern Sudan and Ethiopia (LAPSSET) includes the construction of a 32-berth port, three international airports, and a 1,500km railway line. A new oil refinery, in nearby Bargoni, and an oil pipeline are also planned. The pipeline would run to Kenya's Eastern Province before splitting, with one branch running to South Sudan's capital, Juba, and another through Moyale in the north to...

The Gulf states are producing more oil than ever before, defying expectations that the US shale revolution would break their 40-year grip on the global oil market and diminish their importance to the world’s consuming nations. Surging production in North America is expected to eat into the market for oil from Opec. But the quartet of Gulf kingdoms that dominate the cartel of oil exporters have so far emerged unscathed. Instead, they have expanded their share of the world market as political and social factors have reduced production from a number other members. Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, the United Arab Emirates...

From the emotional headlines, you would think America is in dire straights from a government “shutdown.” But as usual the truth is masked by the headlines and can be found in the print of the details. In reality only 18% of the government is “shutdown” and the rest of it is humming along as usual. ... if you look at just one government agency that has a profound effect on the cost of living for all Americans, you can see there is a silver lining. The Environmental Protection Agency has deemed that over 93% of its employees are “non essential”...

This opinion piece presents the opinions of the author. It does not necessarily reflect the views of Rigzone. Regulation after regulation has been thrown at the oil and gas industry by federal and state agencies since 2009. All 13 federal agencies that regulate a portion of the oil and gas industry have tried in some way to make it more difficult to drill, produce and refine hydrocarbons in the United States. The Environmental Protection Agency has been the most visible in many respects with its new air emission regulations that define carbon dioxide (CO2) as a pollutant and sets emission...

Highlights EIA projects average U.S. household expenditures for natural gas and propane will increase by 13% and 9%, respectively, this winter heating season (October 1 through March 31) compared with last winter. Projected U.S. household expenditures are 2% higher for electricity and 2% lower for heating oil this winter. Although EIA expects average expenditures for households that heat with natural gas will be significantly higher than last winter, they are still lower than the previous 5-year average (see EIA Short-Term Energy and Winter Fuels Outlook slideshow). Brent crude oil spot prices fell from a recent peak of $117 per barrel...

The proposed Keystone XL oil pipeline from Canada to the U.S. would make "OPEC obsolete," billionaire energy entrepreneur T. Boone Pickens told CNBC on Wednesday. "Canadians say they have 250 billion barrels [of oil]. That's exactly what the Saudis claim they have," he said in a "Squawk Box" interview. "You're sitting there with the same amount of oil available to the United States from Canada … as Saudi Arabia." "But when you move the oil through the Strait of Hormuz everyday, it's 17 million barrels," Pickens said. "The Navy is shepherding a cartel daily through the Strait of Hormuz. And...

Kinder Morgan Energy Partners is tacking on 18 miles of lateral pipeline in the Eagle Ford Shale to carry crude and condensate from its DeWitt County, Texas station to a new facility it will build northwest in Gonzales County. The company’s $74 million pipeline addition would allow it to reach markets along the Houston Ship Channel and a pipeline that services a Phillips 66 refinery in Brazoria County. Kinder Morgan said Wednesday it struck a deal with a large producer in the Eagle Ford to extend the 178-mile pipeline in the South Texas shale play, but did not disclose the...

Public lands continue to draw attention in San Juan County. A series of public meetings in October will allow local residents to learn about several issues and make their voices heard. The US Fish and Wildlife Service has released an environmental assessment and an economic analysis of the Gunnision sage grouse proposals. ... Public comment on the studies will be accepted until October 19. It is expected that the US Fish and Wildlife Service will make a decision on designation by March 31, 2014. The federal agency is considering the designation of the sage grouse as an endangered species and...

Almost lost in all the news about the federal government “shutdown” (which has somehow left 83% of the government funded and functioning) over the last week are several new reports regarding the ongoing massive oil and natural gas Shale Revolution in the United States, First is a new projection from the US Energy Information Agency showing that the United States will likely become the world’s largest producer of petroleum products and natural gas hydrocarbons in 2013. Next is this report about the Eagle Ford shale, detailing that this play a) could become the largest onshore oil reserve ever discovered in...

An energy industry association criticized a petition launched by Rep. Raul Grivalva (D-Ariz), calling on Secretary of the Interior Sally Jewell and Agricultural Secretary Tom Vilsack to halt drilling and mining on public lands while U.S. government employees and visitors to national parks remain locked out during the federal government shutdown. “Shutting down private-sector productive activities on public lands, which return more revenue to taxpayers than the government spends administering the programs, is the wrong direction for the federal government at a time of fiscal difficulties,” said Kathleen M. Sgamma, vice president of government & public affairs with the Western...

October 8, 2013 News Release West Lafayette, Ind. -- The increasing production of shale oil and gas should benefit the U.S. economy by raising the nation's gross domestic product by an average of 3.5 percent annually through 2035, according to a report by Purdue University energy economists. "The economic impact of shale oil and gas is clear: It is a game changer for the U.S. economy," said Wally Tyner, the James and Lois Ackerman Professor of Agricultural Economics and one of the researchers. Shale oil and gas are found deep underground, below conventional oil and far below the water table....

North American oil production is showing no signs of slowing down and will likely continue growing even if prices fall to around $60 a barrel, more than $40 below today’s price, an analyst said at a Houston conference Tuesday. Tony Scott, manager of oil and gas analysis for Bentek Energy, said the $100-plus price means high returns for oil companies. With companies cutting their costs and improving their production methods, their work probably will remain lucrative at far lower prices, he said. U.S. benchmark light, sweet crude ended up 46 cents at $103.49 a barrel Tuesday on the New York...

In June 2012, BP Exploration (Alaska) Inc. made the startling announcement that it was dropping its ambitious plan to develop the offshore Liberty field using ultra extended-reach drilling from shore. In the 15 months since, it has been less than clear what alternate approach, if any, BP might take on Liberty. But now, the company’s direction is becoming evident. On the U.S. Bureau of Ocean Energy Management website devoted to Liberty, this statement has appeared: “BP Exploration (Alaska) is now proposing a stand-alone drilling and production processing island as the safest and most environmentally responsible course of development for the...

Drilling and production in Texas continues to rise, putting the state on track to be among the world’s largest producers of oil by the end of the decade, a Texas regulator told a Houston audience Monday. Texas Railroad Commission Chairman Barry Smitherman said that drilling permit applications are approaching their highest level in nearly 30 years at the same time as oil production continues to rise. “This year we are likely to issue more drilling permits for oil than we have since 1985,” Smitherman said at an event hosted by the Locke Lord law firm downtown. The three-member Railroad Commission...

A Democratic member of Congress is using the government shutdown to pressure the Department of the Interior to prohibit oil and gas exploration on federal land. Energy companies should not be able to use federal lands if those lands are closed to hikers and campers, according to Rep. Raul Grijalva (D., Ariz.), the co-chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus. Grijalva started an online petition to demand that Interior Secretary Sally Jewell and Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack “stop mining [on] public lands while visitors are locked out.” “Fossil fuel and logging companies shouldn’t have special access to our federal lands while...

Kinder Morgan Energy Partners said that operations are underway at phase one of its 185-acre Battleground Oil Specialty Terminal Co. project on the Houston Ship Channel. Twenty of the 51 storage tanks built during the first phase of construction are being placed into service this month, and the remaining tanks will come online during the next six months. A two-berth ship dock and 12 barge berths are also slated to be in service this month. “We are pleased commercial operations have begun which provide the market with a unique, deepwater terminaling solution that provides high-speed loading and improved barge and...

More than a third of all new natural gas wells since 2005 were drilled in Texas, and the state uses almost four times as much water for hydraulic fracturing as any other state, according to a study by a Texas environmental group. Operators in Texas drilled 13,540 wells in 2012, and have drilled more than 33,000 since 2005, according to an Environment Texas report, which focuses on potential hazards and pollution associated with the drilling technology. Hydraulic fracturing in the state has required more than 110 billion gallons of water since 2005, compared with 30 billion for second-ranking Pennsylvania. The...

Among other inconveniences, Washington's shutdown could make it harder to keep track of what is going on in a place just over 1,000 miles away from it: Cushing, Okla. Cushing, where several major pipelines meet, is where oil futures are settled physically. So stock levels there are watched closely. The Energy Information Administration releases those figures once a week, but the shutdown could soon prevent it from doing so, leaving the market in the dark. Here's betting, though, that Cushing's tanks are going to empty out some in coming weeks. All else equal, that is bullish for benchmark West Texas...

Source: U.S. Energy Information Administration Note: Petroleum production includes crude oil, natural gas liquids, condensates, refinery processing gain, and other liquids, including biofuels. Barrels per day oil equivalent were calculated using a conversion factor of 1 barrel oil equivalent = 5.55 million British thermal units (Btu). The U.S. Energy Information Administration estimates that the United States will be the world's top producer of petroleum and natural gas hydrocarbons in 2013, surpassing Russia and Saudi Arabia. For the United States and Russia, total petroleum and natural gas hydrocarbon production, in energy content terms, is almost evenly split between petroleum and natural...

Spain's government said Friday there is a limited risk of a big earthquake shaking the eastern coast after a string of small tremors linked to a vast offshore gas storage plant. In the past month, some 400 earthquakes have rattled the Gulf of Valencia, where a depleted oil reservoir is being used as a giant gas storage facility. The activity has frightened residents but so far caused no damage.

While President Obama continues to tilt for windmills, rising oil and gas production has showered his administration with unexpected benefits. Those producers inadvertently include his arch enemies—the Koch Brothers. How deliciously ironic it is that the oil industry – consistently scorned by this president – has been one of the most potent economic drivers of this recovery, the biggest contributor to an improving balance of payments picture and has provided Obama significant leverage in digging out of his difficulties in the Middle East. President Obama and fellow members of the flat earth society, who many years ago wrote off the...

This opinion piece presents the opinions of the author. It does not necessarily reflect the views of Rigzone. The head of the Energy Information Administration (EIA), the data collection arm of the Energy Department, projects that the U.S. will become the largest producer of crude oil and natural gas in the world this year if it hasn’t done so already. "This is a remarkable turn of events,” said Adam Sieminski, the head of the Energy Information Administration. “This is a new era of thinking about market conditions, and opportunities created by these conditions, that you wouldn't in a million years...

A surge in U.S. jobs has accompanied America’s new drilling boom, putting workers into the oil fields of North Dakota, Texas and other states, an economist told a Washington, D.C. energy summit on Thursday. For nearly two decades, direct jobs tied to oil and gas extraction stayed relatively flat, noted Andrew Lyon, a principal in PwC’s National Economics and Statistics group. But fast forward to 2005, and, suddenly, the trend line spiked up. Direct oil and gas extraction jobs nearly doubled between 2005 and 2011, according to Lyon, speaking at the U.S. Energy Association’ s 6th annual Energy Supply Forum....

Terrorist planned attack on nuclear warhead stockpile By Philip Delves Broughton November 17 2002 The Sun-Herald An Al Qaeda terrorist has confessed that he planned to drive a giant explosive device into a United States air force bunker in Belgium believed to contain nuclear warheads. News of the plot came as the US warned that a broadcast thought to contain the words of Osama bin Laden foreshadowed a likely attack. The FBI said national landmarks and the aviation, oil and nuclear industries were all possible targets. In an interview with a Belgian radio station, Tunisian Nizar Trabelsi, 31, a former...

The state’s oil and gas industry continued to strengthen in August, according to an index of key activity. “The Texas Petro Index continued its march into record territory in August,” said economist Karr Ingham, who developed the index. Strong crude oil prices and improving natural gas prices helped boost the index to 289.8, a record level that beat the old record, set in July, of 288.2. The latter number was revised upward from 287.7 because of ongoing revisions for the state’s oil production. Ingham prepares the monthly index for the Texas Alliance of Energy Producers, an industry association. He began...

Well, this week I’ve left the cold climates of Moscow for something a little warmer, and I find myself in Singapore. It’s been an exhausting two week trip, but what an opportunity, and it’s one of only several great upsides that make up for all the hard work! Last week I wrote a piece prompted by a reader who wanted some advice on how to choose between the multiple job offers he had received from companies in the oil & gas industry. The response was overwhelming to say the least: tons of LinkedIn requests and emails, so thanks very much...

U.S. Is Poised to Overtake Russia as Largest Oil-and-Gas Producer By RUSSELL GOLD and DANIEL GILBERT CONNECT The U.S. is poised to overtake Russia as the world's single largest producer of oil and natural gas combined this year, a startling shift that is reshaping energy markets and eroding the clout of traditional petroleum-rich nations. Shale-rock formations of oil and natural gas have fueled a comeback for the U.S. that was unimaginable a decade ago. Russia meanwhile has struggled to maintain its energy output and has yet to embrace the technologies such as hydraulic fracturing that have boosted U.S. reserves. The...

Mexico has one of the world’s most notoriously closed-off oil industries. The Mexican constitution makes it illegal for anyone but the state oil monopoly Petroleos Mexicanos (Pemex) to even own a barrel of oil. If you’re a farmer in Mexico and oil is discovered underneath your land, not one drop of the black gold is yours — it belongs to the state, to the people. As a result, Pemex is the only game in town. There are no private companies operating oilfields in Mexico, no risk-based production sharing contracts or joint ventures with any international oil companies. This could not...

This fall marks the fortieth anniversary of the Arab oil embargo, a painful episode in American history that had a profound effect on both the economy and psyche of the United States. It began in mid-October 1973, following the US decision to resupply Israel with weaponry after Egypt and Syria launched a surprise attack on Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the Jewish year. In response to President Nixon’s decision, the Organization of Arab Petroleum Exporting Countries, the Arab members of OPEC, declared an embargo and cut off oil supplies to the United States and its allies. In the three...

A decision this week by Shell to shutter its oil shale operation in Colorado to pursue other ventures in Jordan and Canada highlights the difficulties faced by developers in the state as they wrestle with uncertain rules under the Obama administration. Royal Dutch Shell was one of the most successful companies in the state in its efforts to develop a cost-efficient technique to extract oil from shale rock. But the final act of Ken Salazar as Interior secretary earlier this year to rewrite industry rules left companies in limbo with undeterminable royalty rates, and blocked them from obtaining leases for...

North America will become energy independent by 2020 because of booming oil and gas production, which will have consequences worldwide, according to an analysis from Wood Mackenzie. “The decline, and eventual reversal of North American net trade will have complex impacts on global energy flows, some of which are already becoming apparent,” said Paul McConnell, senior analyst for Wood Mackenzie’s global trends service, in a statement. The region that will feel the largest impact of declining North American demand for imports will be the Middle East, the Houston research firm said. “The Middle East is the most sensitive to changes...

Alberta’s carbon dioxide pipeline project has nailed down solid dates for construction as its main gas supplier, the new Redwater bitumen refinery, gets rolling. Enhance Energy needs to time its project to match the North West Redwater Partnership’s $6 billion bitumen-to-diesel refinery, which was officially kicked off last week on a large patch of former farmland. The refinery is a bit behind its original schedule, and is expected to open in mid-2016. For Enhance president Susan Cole, that sets her Alberta Carbon Trunk Line (ACTL) on a firm timeline. “We will be ready when North West begins, but we don’t...

New construction technology, stringent and continuously improving regulations, and years of industry experience make Canada's oil shipping industry well-equipped to accommodate increased tanker traffic on the West Coast should new pipeline projects proceed, concludes the leading independent consulting firm IHS CERA. In addition, should an incident occur, Canada has access to more than $1.3-billion in ompensation, exceeding what is generally available internationally, says the IHS CERA report, Assessing Marine Transport for Oil Sands on Canada's West Coast. "There have been a great many questions from the public asking what it would mean to ship more crude oil off Canada's West...

Understanding the "change of the stock change" While avid college football fans eagerly await the Tuesday morning update of team rankings, crude oil and petroleum product market watchers often focus on the Wednesday morning release of the U.S. Energy Information Administration's (EIA) Weekly Petroleum Status Report (WPSR). Although the WPSR provides comprehensive details about U.S. crude oil and key petroleum products covering all sectors of the primary supply chain, many analysts often focus exclusively on the crude oil inventory change data point, using falling or rising crude stocks as an indicator of the relative tightness or looseness of crude oil...

Houston-based Rock River Resources will build a small refinery and facility for shipping crude by rail in Utah, providing new transportation and local refining for the growing oil production in the state, the company announced Tuesday. The $320 million project will be built in three stages, with the rail facilities coming on line first, followed by a microrefinery in Green River, Utah. The microrefinery will have a capacity of 10,000 barrels a day and will process local crudes and condensates into fuel oil, diesel and jet fuel. “The location where we are in Utah, there are not rail lines for...

Turkey’s Barbaros Hayrettin Paşa seismic vessel, which has been conducting offshore oil and gas exploration in the eastern Mediterranean, could enter Cyprus’ exclusive economic zone in three weeks to continue exploration pending prime ministerial approval, Energy Minister Taner Yıldız has said. “The Barbaros Hayrettin Paşa is drilling off the coast of the Mersin-İskenderun-Antalya region. It will work there, for three weeks more. Later, we will speak with Prime Minister [Recep Tayyip Erdoğan] as to whether it will enter Cyprus’ exclusive economic zone. If the prime minister approves, the vessel could enter to the north or south of Cyprus because it...

What happens in Saudi Arabia is the government gets plausible deniability by running funding for Jihad from private, uber-wealthy Saudis through Islamic charities with legitimate sounding names. These Saudi charities then customarily send money to groups around the world, often local charitable organizations in places like Pakistan and the West Bank and Gaza. These local charitable organizations are of course fronts for Jihadist terrorist groups, such as HAMAS, Lashkar-e-Taiba, Al Qaeda and the Taliban. This is why dozens of Islamic charities worldwide have been implicated and shut down by the US Treasury, British authorities and other Western governments.

Environmental activists who protested at a Russian Arctic offshore oil platform last week will be prosecuted and could face piracy charges punishable by up to 15 years in prison, Russian investigators said on Tuesday. They said the "attack," in which Greenpeace activists tried scaling the Gazprom-owned Prirazlomnaya platform, Russia's first offshore Arctic oil platform, violated Russian sovereignty. "When a foreign ship full of electronic equipment intended for unknown purposes and a group of people, declaring themselves to be environmental activists, try to storm a drilling platform there are legitimate doubts about their intentions," the investigators said in a statement. The...

It’s now been just over five years since TransCanada first filed an application for a presidential permit to build a cross-border pipeline, but that hasn’t done anything to temper the radical eco-lobbies’ relentlessly combative campaign based on nothing more than untenable arguments and outrageous outrage. Points for their steadfast commitment, I suppose, but those points are completely negated by these out-of-touch green groups’ and millionaire donors‘ refusal to contend with the facts that the southern portions of the Keystone pipeline are already in operation or nearly complete, that the pipeline will be used to ship domestic oil too, and that...

Seven people have pleaded guilty to stealing money from an oil spill settlement fund, Alabama Attorney General Luther Strange announced Monday. Five of the defendants were charged with theft of property. They’re collectively ordered to pay more than $20,000 in restitution, officials said. The defendants were indicted by a Mobile County grand jury on accusations that they created fake documents to file fraudulent claims saying they had lost income because of the BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill in 2010. Defendants who were paid from the settlement fund have been sentenced to between one and five years in prison. Their sentences...

The proposed reform for Mexico’s energy constitution could be approved late this year or early 2014, with secondary legislation that will shape Mexico’s energy sector to be finalized in the second half of next year, according to a panel of industry experts at a recent Mayer Brown presentation in Houston on the proposed reform of Mexico’s energy sector. Should the legislative process move forward as planned, the first profit sharing contracts under the new regime would be issued for the bidding process in the second half of 2014, said Duncan Wood, director of the Mexico Institute at the Woodrow Wilson...

Our North-Western department has opened a criminal case on probable violation of the part 3 article 227 of the Russian Criminal Code "piracy committed by an organised group". The investigators have claimed that a group of people, probably associated with the "Greenpeace" international ecological organization approached the sea platform "Prirazlomnaya" on the ship "Arctic Sunrise" and attempted an illegal descent onto that platform. Their illegal action was foiled by officers of the Murmansk province's border-guarding department of the FSB. We must state that the ship 'Arctic Sunrise' used by the persons who attempted an illegal descent onto "Prirazlomnaya" was in...

Greenpeace activists arrested after trying to board a Russian oil rig are likely to face piracy charges, local media reports. Two New Zealanders are among the crew of the protest vessel Arctic Sunrise who were confronted and detained by armed members of the Russian coastguard on Thursday. Authorities said the rig was in an exclusion zone, but Greenpeace argues its boat was in international waters. All the activists will be prosecuted for the "attack" on the oil rig, an investigative committee told Russian media. In a statement the committee said it had opened a criminal case on suspicion of piracy....

WASHINGTON, September 19, 2013 ? Total U.S. petroleum deliveries (a measure of demand) edged down 0.7 percent from August 2012 to average 19.1 million barrels per day last month. These were the highest deliveries for the year but remained the lowest August level in 4 years. "August saw a continuation of trends that have been building for quite some time," said API Chief Economist John Felmy. "The incredible rise in American energy production, helped in part by softening demand, has allowed the United States to dramatically increase energy exports and reduce its energy imports." Demand for gasoline rose 0.4 percent...

Pipeline operators have been roaring into public markets in search of badly needed capital, diving into an untapped money pool as the country grapples with a lack of energy transportation infrastructure. Yield-starved investors, bouncing from low interest rates on bonds to a choppy stock market, have appeared happy to fork over the millions that midstream companies — most of them tax-advantaged master limited partnerships — have asked for in the past year. And based on the market’s momentum, the industry could see five to 10 more similar public offerings announced before the year is out, said Joe Dunleavy, a partner...