Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: crude oil, oil production, oil supply, peak oil, Saudi Arabia, Saudi Arabian oil production, Schumer
But Senator — to what degree will desperate-sounding ‘comments’ from US officials like yourself counteract those hypothetical emphatic promises? Seems like Shoom is scrambling for relevance.
Schumer called on Saudi Arabia to repeat its intention to make up for supply losses, arguing the comments will drive down gas prices, which are tethered to global oil prices.
“If the markets believe this is real, the price will come down even further. So we are asking the Saudis to repeat this promise,” Schumer said.
“The more explicit they are, the more emphatic they are, the more they ensure the markets that they are for real here,” he continued, “the more the markets will calm down more permanently and the more the price will come down.”
via Schumer: Saudi Arabia's plan to increase oil supply will lower gas prices – The Hill's E2-Wire.
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: 'Bike Thief', Casey Neistat, New York Times, Pravda, Van Neistat
I recently spent a couple of days conducting a bike theft experiment, which I first tried with my brother Van in 2005. I locked my own bike up and then proceeded to steal it, using brazen means — like a giant crowbar — in audacious locations, including directly in front of a police station. I wanted to find out whether onlookers or the cops would intervene. What you see here in my film are the results.
via ‘Bike Thief’ – NYTimes.com.
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: Brent, Fatthouh, futures prices, James Hamilton, Kilian, Mahadeva, NYMEX, oil prices, speculation, spot prices, WTI
A paper by Fatthouh, Kilian and Mahadeva (pdf)
Abstract: A popular view is that the surge in the price of oil during 2003-08 cannot be explained by economic fundamentals, but was caused by the increased financialization of oil futures markets, which in turn allowed speculation to become a major determinant of the spot price of oil. This interpretation has been driving policy efforts to regulate oil futures markets. This survey reviews the evidence supporting this view. We identify six strands in the literature corresponding to different empirical methodologies and discuss to what extent each approach sheds light on the role of speculation. We find that the existing evidence is not supportive of an important role of speculation in driving the spot price of oil after 2003. Instead, there is strong evidence that the co-movement between spot and futures prices reflects common economic fundamentals rather than the financialization of oil futures markets.
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: Badger Daylighting, COGC, EOG Resources, fracking, fracking waste, Garden Creek 7-14H, Garden Creek O7-14H, Grove, hydraulic fracturing, radioactive fracking sand, radioactive fracking waste, radionucleides, Weld County, WTF
With articles like this, you’ve got to wonder.
Hydraulic fracturing involves the use of millions of gallons of water, chemicals and sand.
Occasionally, some of that sand is radioactive.
Oh. You don’t say.
The state is investigating a possible inappropriate dumping of fracking-related radioactive sand into an unpermitted pit at an EOG Resources oil well in northern Weld County northwest of Grover.
The radioactive sand dumping occurred March 8 during a state field inspection of an oil well known as the Garden Creek 28-07H well, the Coloradoan’s search of state oil well inspection records revealed.
via State investigating radioactive sand dumping related to fracking | The Coloradoan | coloradoan.com.
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: COGC, Colorado Oil and Gas Commission, drilling regulations, EOG Resources, fracking, fracking sand, Garden Creek 07-14H, Niobrara, oil production, radioactive fracking sand, tight oil, Weld County
A sensitive area due to shallow groundwater. According to a site assessment, groundwater is 20 feet below the surface.
http://ogccweblink.state.co.us/results.aspx?id=415806
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: Asia, Chris Nelder, Foucher, global oil consumption, Norway, OECD, oil demand, petroleum consumption, petroleum demand, world oil consumption
Sam Foucher chart via Chris Nelder’s latest:
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: Asian oil demand, Chindia, Chris Nelder, demand destruction, efficiency, energy, fat gets trimmed, fuel efficiency, global oil consumption, OECD, peak oil, transportation
Chris Nelder explains a critical dilemma facing American consumers. As total available oil exports decrease (at a rate that would bring them to absolute zero in about four years), inefficient westerners will be outbid by the new Asian “middle class” for these diminishing supplies.
Of course, exports can fall to zero in theory only, not in practice. In reality, high prices will kill the most inefficient, unsubsidized demand first—in the U.S. and Europe. Next, demand will be curbed in net exporting countries, first via the removal of domestic fuel subsidies, and then by world prices. The demand of the four billion people in Asia will be the last to go because they use it most efficiently.
via Oil demand shift: Asia takes over | SmartPlanet.
Translation: The fat gets trimmed. The fat is here.
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: Athabasca, carbon emissions, metric tons of carbon, oil sands, peatlands, tar sands
…
They also say that the peatlands under consideration are currently holding on to 11-47 million metric tons of carbon that will be released into the atmosphere as part of the mining process. And then, because the mining companies plan to return the land to dry forest instead of the original peatlands, the area will lose the ability to sequester carbon in the future; this they say will add up to about 5,700-7,200 mt of carbon each year, which they say should be looked at as a net gain of carbon emissions each year.
via http://www.physorg.com/news/2012-03-university-team-canadian-oil-sands.html
Abstract:
Oil sands mining and reclamation cause massive loss of peatland and stored carbon.
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: Iraq, Iraqi civil war, Iraqi oil production, Lukoil, Norway, oil production, Russia, Statoil, West Qurna, West Qurna-2
As Norwegian Statoil bugs out.
Lukoil aims to invest around $2 billion in the West Qurna-2 oil field in Iraq this year, Bloomberg News reports. A company spokesman told Bloomberg that $200 million was invested there in 2011.
The oil company, the largest private energy company in Russia, also announced plans to start construction on a new oil pipeline and spell out details for its drilling program.
via Lukoil unveils investment plans for Iraq – UPI.com.
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: B-Cycle, bicycle sharing, bike share programs, denver, Kaiser Permanente
Denver’s public-private bike share program, B-Cycle, is back for the season, with expanded hours and (so it’s been said) a few new locations. Maybe one around here.
http://denver.bcycle.com/WhatisDenverBcycle.aspx
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: Chevron, Chevron Nigeria Limited, Funiwa 1A, gas leak, Koluma, Nigeria, Nigerian natural gas production, Nigerian oil production, off-shore, oil production, relief well, rig fire
In familiar fashion, there is some difference of opinion about whether the well is still leaking. A relief well was drilled but didn’t do the trick.
Chevron Corp released a statement declaring that the raging fire had gone out by itself. “The site of the Funiwa 1A natural gas well offshore Nigeria ceased burning on Friday, March 2. The well stopped flowing on its own,” the statement said. “CNL (Chevron Nigeria Limited) has detected no natural gas flowing from the well since the fire ceased burning and is monitoring the area continuously.”
Nigerian communities local to the area have confirmed that the fire has indeed gone out, but claim that the gas is still leaking at a steady rate, and has killed many fish and polluted the area.
Matthew Sele, from the town of Koluma just near to the offshore rig, said that, “The fire has been put off since Friday, but the gas emission is worse. Raw gas is continuing to bubble in the air and is making it hard for people to breathe.”
via Chevron's Nigerian Rig Fire Finally Goes Out on its Own.
(This is about five days old.)
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: bitumen, Canada, crude oil, economic threshold, energy, marginal price, oil, oil sands, Suncor, syncrude, tar sands, unconventional oil
More commonly, less accurately known as oil sands.
From Canada’s Energy Future (pdf), a 2011 report from the National Energy Board.
The threshold will be highly dependent on the price of natural gas.
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: energy, net available exports, oil consumption, oil exports, oil production, peak oil, Yemen
Via the EIA’s Yemen page, which seems to rely heavily on Oil & Gas Journal.
Filed under: maps | Tags: Abwar, Djibouti, Gulf of Oman, Oman, Red Sea, Saudi Arabia, Yemen
via U. Texas:
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: brine, earthquakes, fracking, fracking waste, hydraulic fracturing, ODNR, Ohio, seismic events, waste-water injection, Youngstown
Linked by too-strong circumstantial evidence.
The 12 Youngstown quakes, ranging in magnitude from 2.1 to 4.0, all occurred in a cluster less than a mile from the well and about 2,500 feet below the well itself, according to the Ohio Seismic Network, a division of the ODNR.
The quakes began in March 2011, just three months after the well went into operation. The last quake occurred on Dec. 31, a day after the ODNR has ordered – and then watched – the shutdown of the well. State geologists and regulators had inspected the well 35 times from April 26 to Dec. 15, trying to connect the quakes with the injections.
“Geologists believe it is very difficult for all conditions to be met to induce seismic events,” the report noted. But “a number of coincidental circumstances appear to make a compelling argument for the recent Youngstown-area seismic events to have been induced.”
via Waste-water injection well caused 12 earthquakes in Ohio, investigation shows | cleveland.com.
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: Anantnag, army vehicle hits cycist, India, Srinagar
An Indian army vehicle burns after being set alight by protesters as the body of a 19-year old youth lies covered with a sheet on a road in Anantnag town, some 55 kilometers (35 miles) southeast of Srinagar, India, Saturday, March 10, 2012. Police say thousands of angry people have burned an Indian army vehicle after it hit and killed a bicyclist in the Indian-administered portion of Kashmir.
See: Photo from AP Photo.
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: Exxonmobil, Iraq, Iraqi oil production, KRG, Kurdish oil, kurdistan
Kind of like the proverbial jilted lover.
“The government is waiting for Exxon’s answers to decide its final position towards the company and its deals with Kurdistan. The deadline expires in the coming few days,” Abdullah said.
Exxon Mobil late last month disclosed its plans to explore for oil in Iraq’s Kurdistan in the company’s annual report, breaking months of silence over the investment that has outraged Baghdad.
via Iraq Sets Deadline for ExxonMobil – Exploration.
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: mountain biking, MTB, off-road bicycling, singletrack, The Art of Mountain Biking
If you dare, over here.
The book is called The Art of Mountain Biking: Singletrack Skills for All Riders.
Industrialized Cyclist Notepad 