ANALYSIS-Russian oil output yet to peak, say drillers

(Reuters) - Global oil servicing firms are seeing strong growth in Russia as companies order advanced technology for depleted West Siberian fields in a move that may allow Russian output to grow further from current peak levels.

Russian oil output has grown by 70 percent since 1999 to exceed 10 million barrels per day and become the world's largest. It has defied repeated predictions it would fall as depletion of West Siberian fields outpaces production growth in East Siberia.

But oil servicing firms say the quest for the best equipment and technology may allow Russia to achieve even its ambitious targets to produce as much as 10.7 million bpd by 2030 if Arctic and offshore Caspian Sea fields are also put on stream.

Why We'll See $300 Oil by 2020

For decades, the theory of peak oil—or the idea that the world either has or will soon exhaust its ability to produce more oil—was derided as a doomsday scenario too unbelievable to ever come to pass. But $147 oil and one commodity crash later, and suddenly peak oil doesn't sound so strange after all.

In fact, mounting scientific evidence suggests that peak oil will not only be a reality, but may soon be upon us, says Charles Maxwell, senior energy analyst for Weeden & Co.

Scientists: BP dispersants have made spill more toxic

Amid growing concern about the use of dispersants in the Gulf of Mexico, a group of scientists working for law firms suing BP says their testing indicates that the dispersants being used to break up the oil are making this spill even more toxic to marine life.

U.S. Justice Staff Said to Urge Subpoenas for BP Managers

U.S. Justice Department attorneys conducting a criminal probe of the BP Plc well explosion in the Gulf of Mexico have recommended that a grand jury be convened and BP managers subpoenaed to determine if any laws were broken, a person familiar with the investigation said.

Niger Delta Militants Threaten to Resume Attacks on Oil Facilities

Nigeria's main militant group, the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND), is threatening to resume attacks on oil facilities in two weeks unless there is more progress in tackling the region’s problems. A spokesman for the group blames what he calls government inaction.

Venezuela approves Orinoco oil joint ventures

Reuters) - Venezuela has formally approved the creation of three joint ventures with foreign energy companies in the next step towards developing the OPEC nation's vast Orinoco extra heavy crude belt.

The Latin American country signed deals with several companies in February to exploit the reserves in the region, which are seen as some of the biggest deposits in the world.

Sri Lanka: Where there’s oil – There’s turmoil

We are almost certainly on the threshold of a new era of economic development and international diplomacy ushered in by the imminent discovery of oil. Drilling is due to start in the Mannar Basin next January. This opens before us exciting prospects of economic prosperity as well as daunting challenges posed by players in the arena of global political and diplomatic relations.

Mexico arrests Pemex oil official in bribery case

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - Mexican police have arrested an official at state oil monopoly Pemex on suspicion of trying to sell an exploration contract for around $19,000, the attorney general's office said on Thursday.

Kabul rioters burn SUVs, yell 'Death to America'

KABUL, Afghanistan — Afghan police fired shots on Friday to disperse hundreds of people protesting the deaths of civilians in an accident involving a U.S. Embassy vehicle, officials said.

A crowd of angry Afghans shouted "Death to America," hurled stones and set fire to two SUVs after the crash on a road leading to Kabul's airport, according to the capital's criminal investigations chief, Abdul Ghaafar Sayedzada.

A NATO official told AFP the vehicles involved in the crash belonged to the U.S. Embassy.

Greek gas pumps dry despite strike order

Serious fuel shortages persisted in Greece on Thursday, hurting businesses and the country's tourism industry, after an emergency order to force striking truckers back to work was stalled by red tape.

Large coal reserve base to be built in Wuhan

(China Knowledge) - Henan-based China Zhong Ping Energy Chemical Group Co will team up with the Wuhan municipal government to build a large coal reserve base in the city, according to a statement published on the website of the Department of the Commerce of Hubei Province.

China's Nuclear Power Building Boom

The demand for emission-free nuclear electricity in China is growing as quickly as its megacities and middle-class. Some analysts estimate that China will need to build as many as 300 new nuclear power plants by 2050 -- a nuclear building boom so ambitious that it threatens to tax the world's supply of uranium to its limits. China currently has 17 nuclear reactors under construction or in the planning stages and 11 in operation. For comparison, the United States depends on 104 active reactors to provide about 20 percent of nation's electricity.

Steve LeVine: How long will the Chinese put up with coal?

Woodmac's report concludes that China's appetite for LNG will swell for the next decade, requiring the gas equivalent of 380,000 barrels a day of oil imports, but that this demand will be cut in half in the 2020s. Why? Woodmac doesn't say China will give up on gas, but rather that it's going to develop its own domestic resources -- specifically shale gas, using hydro-fracturing technology invented in the United States. In this scenario, China's gas supplants its use of industrial oil, but not too much coal, which will continue to be far and away the fuel of choice for the production of electricity.

GM to boost Chevy Volt production

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- General Motors announced Friday that the automaker has raised its planned production of the Chevrolet Volt electric car to 45,000 in 2012.

Originally the automaker planned to produce 30,000 Volts in its second year of production.

Gazing at the globe through a glass half full

I’m settling into my summer reading: I’ve read Matt Ridley’s The Rational Optimist and I’ve now moved on to a note just out from Baillie Gifford called Rational Optimism.

I found myself rather taken by Ridley’s book – largely because I think I might be something of an optimist myself. I’m mildly concerned about peak oil. But I also think it pretty likely that any long-term crisis over a shortage of fossil fuels will be thwarted by something along the lines of Ridley’s “vast solar power farms” in Algeria and some “pebble-bed passive safe modular nuclear reactors”. As my husband mutters every time an oil doomster comes to dinner, the Stone Age didn’t end because they ran out of stones.

Industrial Graft-Vs-Host Disease and the Throw-Away Economy

It has been noted among many Peak Oil advocates that in the future, as the cost of a) producing consumer goods, b) shipping them from the other side of the planet, or c) both, rise with the price of oil, people will turn repeatedly to repairing that which they already own.

Unfortunately, when it comes to many (most?) of the small consumer items we take for granted, this may be somewhat wishful thinking.

How Can We Reduce Oil Consumption & Still Ship Goods and Ourselves Around the Globe?

Two things which I think are worth keeping front and center when discussing how we wean ourselves off our petroleum addiction: Travel between nations is good; trade between nations is good. It's easy to point out specific incidences where less-than-savory outcomes resulted from trade and travel, but on the whole both are beneficial for human culture. What we need to address is how are we going to move our goods and ourselves around in less energy intensive ways, so that both are less harmful to the planet (and therefore ourselves).

Trapped in an age of false plenty

In the 1920s, in southern US states like California and Florida, it wasn't uncommon to see solar water heaters on the roofs of homes. Not that there were a lot of people eager to be green back then, it was simply an inexpensive way to heat water.

Then natural gas wells were drilled, and pipes were laid, and new homes were built with the pipes running right up into the hot water heaters. And the rooftop water heaters vanished.

Why?

Because natural gas was cheaper? Of course not. How could anything you pay for be cheaper than free sunlight? But natural gas was more efficient, and it didn't require home builders to put up the rooftop heaters, and roofs probably looked a bit prettier without pipes running across them.

The watermelon party

Two years ago as the world's economy collapsed, The Economist devoted an entire issue to the idea of so-called steady state economics.

The issue featured two academics who were already stars of the environmental movement, Tim Jackson and Herman Daly.

First results from Transition Together evaluation

‘Transition Together’, the street-by-street behaviour change programme developed by Transition Town Totnes and now being piloted in 10 other communities, has just completed analysing the data that has come back from the first 4 groups, comprising 32 households in Totnes. They have completed all 7 of the sessions set out in the workbook, and the data offers a fascinating first look at whether the process works or not. The results from the other 31 groups currently underway are expected this Autumn. Here, Fiona Ward of Transition Together shares the results that have emerged.

Unnatural Science

Clearly I’ve been out of some loop for too long, but does everyone take for granted now that science sites are where graduate students, researchers, doctors and the “skeptical community” go not to interpret data or review experiments but to chip off one-liners, promote their books and jeer at smokers, fat people and churchgoers? And can anyone who still enjoys this class-inflected bloodsport tell me why it has to happen under the banner of science?

Hammering away at an ideology, substituting stridency for contemplation, pummeling its enemies in absentia: ScienceBlogs has become Fox News for the religion-baiting, peak-oil crowd.

Fossil Fuel Subsidies Are 12 Times Support for Renewables, Study Shows

Global subsidies for fossil fuels dwarf support given to renewable energy sources such as wind and solar power and biofuels, Bloomberg New Energy Finance said.

Governments last year gave $43 billion to $46 billion of support to renewable energy through tax credits, guaranteed electricity prices known as feed-in tariffs and alternative energy credits, the London-based research group said today in a statement. That compares with the $557 billion that the International Energy Agency last month said was spent to subsidize fossil fuels in 2008.

“One of the reasons the clean energy sector is starved of funding is because mainstream investors worry that renewable energy only works with direct government support,” said Michael Liebreich, chief executive of New Energy Finance. “This analysis shows that the global direct subsidy for fossil fuels is around ten times the subsidy for renewables.”

Disguised Blessing

Oil is nobody's poster child at the moment, what with the spill off China's Dalian port an aching reminder of the much larger calamity on the U.S. Gulf coast and persistent fouling of places like Nigeria. This can be a dirty business, even before the fossil fuel is burned and we experience whatever the effects of that are.

Yet there is good news on the oil front--the gloomiest pricing scenario has not happened. Remember July 2008, when spot crude exceeded $140 a barrel? Serious people were contemplating a $200 level, and some in the "peak oil is here" camp--that's the theory that the world has already begun to exhaust its reserves and, thus taken by surprise, will enter a panicky price spiral--were talking $300. In fact, the spot price has barely touched $83 in 22 months.

Oil Falls, Poised for Weekly Decline, on Weaker Global Economic Concern

Oil fell in New York, poised for its biggest weekly decline in four, on concern that faltering global economic growth will curtail a recovery in fuel demand.

Crude pared yesterday’s 1.8 percent gain as Asian and European equities dropped before a report on U.S. gross domestic product. Oil has retreated 1.4 percent this week, its largest loss since the five days ended July 2. Prices may decline next week as U.S. inventories rise, according to a Bloomberg survey of analysts.

British Gas warns of rise in energy bills

British Gas, major provider of gas and electricity to UK homes, has said energy bills may rise although it "will try to delay" the hike as long as it can.

The warning comes just as the company is being pressurised by consumer groups to cut energy bills, after it reported a 98 per cent rise in profits to £585m over last year.

Gulf of Mexico Oil Imports Rise as Floating Storage Wanes

Oil imports into the Gulf of Mexico region surged to a record last week as the profits from floating storage evaporated, pushing traders to unload their cargoes and forcing crude futures lower.

The price advantage for traders who buy oil and store it at sea for a month instead of delivering it immediately has shrunk 90 percent since May. Floating storage in the Gulf dropped 24 percent in the week ended July 23, Bloomberg data show.

Rosneft, Others May Deliver Gasoline to Iran

Rosneft, Gazprom Neft and Tatneft may begin delivering gasoline to Iran in a month, the head of the Iran Commission of the Moscow Chamber of Commerce and Industry said Thursday.

Talks are being held on a “working level” and the first delivery may take place in late August or September, Rajab Safarov said in an interview.

China Declares Sovereignty in Southern Sea as U.S. Seeks Role in Disputes

China declared its “indisputable sovereignty” over the South China Sea and held naval drills in the waters, pushing back against a U.S. role in resolving disputes in one of the world’s busiest shipping lanes.

“China has indisputable sovereignty of the South Sea and China has sufficient historical and legal backing” to underpin its claims, Geng Yansheng, a Ministry of Defense spokesman, told reporters at a military compound outside Beijing today. It opposes efforts to “internationalize” the issue and will resolve differences through “friendly negotiation,” he said.

Big Oil posts better profits on higher fuel prices

NEW YORK — The major oil companies continue to climb back from the recession, with higher fuel prices driving up earnings.

After setting record profits in 2008, the oil industry tanked last year as the global economic downturn induced a dramatic drop in oil and natural gas prices. On Thursday, Exxon Mobil Corp. said it earned $7.56 billion in the second quarter, its best result since the last three months of 2008. Royal Dutch Shell Group posted a 15 percent gain in net income. A day earlier, ConocoPhillips said net income nearly tripled in the April-June period.

Exxon Mobil, PetroChina In Talks On China Gas Project -Source

BEIJING -(Dow Jones)- U.S. oil major Exxon Mobil Corp. (XOM) is in talks with PetroChina Co. to jointly explore and develop an unconventional gas block in the resource-rich Ordos basin in north China, a person who has direct knowledge of the matter told Dow Jones Newswires.

A successful conclusion to the talks would mark the entry of another global energy major into China's huge but undeveloped shale or tight gas sector, which China hasn't been able to develop due to a lack of technical expertise.

Total Reports 72% Increase in Profit After Raising Production

Total SA, Europe’s third-biggest oil company, reported a 72 percent increase in second-quarter profit after projects started last year were ramped up.

Profit excluding changes in inventories and the value of a stake in Sanofi-Aventis SA rose to 2.96 billion euros ($3.9 billion) from 1.68 billion euros a year earlier, the Paris-based company said today in a statement. That beat the 2.65 billion- euro mean estimate of analysts surveyed by Bloomberg.

Sunoco Rebounds on Refining

Independent refiner and marketer of petroleum products, Sunoco Inc. reported significantly better-than-expected second quarter 2010 results, driven by steady earnings from most of its business segments. Earnings per share, excluding special items, came in at $1.31, outshining the Zacks Consensus Estimate of 74 cents. The reported quarter result was substantially ahead of the loss per share of 27 cents in the second quarter 2009.

Pair of Atlantic Weather Systems Have Low Chance of Becoming Depressions

Two weather systems over the Atlantic and southeastern Caribbean have a “low chance” of strengthening into depressions or tropical storms, the National Hurricane Center said.

Russia To Export 5.5 Million Tons Urals From Primorsk In Aug

LONDON -(Dow Jones)- Russia plans to export 5.5 million metric tons, or around 1.3 million barrels a day, of Urals crude in August from its Baltic Sea port of Primorsk, which is lower than the 6 million tons planned for July, according to the loading program seen by Dow Jones Newswires Friday.

Formosa Oil Refinery Fire May Have Polluted Taiwan Fishery, Officials Say

A fire at Formosa Petrochemical Corp.’s residual processing unit this month may have polluted fishery near the plant, local government officials said.

Dead clams and fish have been found in an area of about 1,000 hectares (2,471 acres) since the July 25 accident, said Lai Chien-sheng, a section chief at the agriculture department of Yunlin county, where the plant is located. “We’re probing the cause of the deaths,” he said by phone today.

Regulators Warned Company on Pipeline Corrosion

BATTLE CREEK, Mich. — The company responsible for a massive oil spill here was warned in January by federal regulators about insufficient monitoring of corrosion on the pipeline that federal officials say leaked more than one million gallons of oil into a major waterway this week.

The owner of the pipeline, Enbridge Energy Partners, received several citations from federal regulators in recent years before the warning in January. Company officials said they had routinely tested the pipeline for corrosion.

Enbridge: Corrosion not clue in oil spill

Reports of corrosion on Enbridge Inc.'s local oil pipeline aren't necessarily clues to the cause of the company's possibly 1 million-gallon leak into the Kalamazoo River this week, Enbridge officials said Thursday.

The unseen damage of a leaking pipe

Thick, black oil covers patches of grass on Debbie Howard's property, which borders the Kalamazoo River for slightly more than a mile.

Flooding has brought oil from the river onto Howard's 60-acre property in Galesburg, next to the Fort Custer Recreation Area. The water receded but left a coat of oil in its wake, she said.

Report: Michigan ranks high in pipeline accidents

WASHINGTON -- Michigan is more familiar than most states with oil spills and other pipeline accidents, according to a report released Thursday by the National Wildlife Federation.

Michigan had 61 "significant incidents" over the past decade, the ninth-largest number in the country.

Spill halted, Enbridge’s reputation sullied

The Enbridge spill into Michigan’s Kalamazoo River has been contained, but it’s left a nasty sheen on the company’s reputation and its sprawling network of aging pipelines in North America.

US expert says China's worst oil spill is far larger than government has reported so far

BEIJING (AP) — China's worst known oil spill is dozens of times larger than the government has reported, and some of the oil was spilled deliberately to avoid an even larger disaster, an American expert said Friday.

China's government has said 1,500 tons of oil spilled after a pipeline exploded two weeks ago near the northeastern city of Dalian, sending 100-foot- (30-meter-) high flames raging near one of the country's key strategic oil reserves. It has not updated that estimate since a few days after the spill.

But Rick Steiner, a former University of Alaska marine conservation specialist, estimated 60,000 tons to 90,000 tons of oil actually spilled into the Yellow Sea.

Explosion, Fire at Storage Tank at Pemex's Madero Refinery Evacuates 2,000

About 2,000 people were evacuated by Mexican authorities after an explosion and fire at a coker unit gasoline storage tank at Petroleos Mexicanos’s Francisco I. Madero refinery on the Gulf of Mexico.

The blaze was under control at 6:30 p.m. local time yesterday, said a Pemex spokesman, who asked not to be identified in accordance with company policy. No other facilities at the refinery were damaged, he said.

Libya boosts reserves

Libya's proven crude oil reserves rose to 46 billion barrels in the first half of this year after adding 612 million barrels from new fields, according to reports.

House to Take Up Offshore Drilling Reform Bill

Three months after the catastrophic oil rig explosion that sent millions of gallons of crude spewing into the Gulf of Mexico, the U.S. House of Representatives was poised on Friday to debate legislation clamping down on the industry's offshore drilling practices.

BP's Hayward: 'I became a villain for doing the right thing'

Tony Hayward, who resigned as chief executive of BP in the wake of the Gulf oil spill, has said that he was turned into "a villain for doing the right thing."

In his first interview since deciding to step down, Hayward told the Wall Street Journal that he did everything possible after the Deepwater Horizon exploded, by taking responsibility for the spill and spending billions on the clean-up operation and efforts to stop the leak.

US gas stations: Stay BP or change name to Amoco?

NEW ORLEANS — BP gas station owners across the country are divided over whether the oil giant stained by its handling of the Gulf spill should rebrand U.S. outlets as Amoco or another name as part of its effort to repair the company's badly damaged reputation.

Sinopec Says BP Declined Its Offer to Buy Some `Good' Assets After Spill

China Petroleum & Chemical Corp., Asia’s biggest refiner, said BP Plc declined an offer by the Chinese company to buy some of its assets.

“We’ve talked to BP on some good assets, but they won’t sell,” Zhang Jianhua, senior vice president of the company known as Sinopec, said in an interview in Shanghai today, without naming the ventures. “We aren’t in any talks with BP right now.”

Blowout Beneficiary

BP's spill is scaring oil and gas majors out of the deep water. That's good news for shale gas pioneer Range Resources.

Gulf of Mexico Has Long Been a Sink of Pollution

HOUMA, La. — Loulan Pitre Sr. was born on the Gulf Coast in 1921, the son of an oysterman. Nearly all his life, he worked on the water, abiding by the widely shared faith that the resources of the Gulf of Mexico were limitless.

As a young Marine staff sergeant, back home after fighting in the South Pacific, he stood on barges in the gulf and watched as surplus mines, bombs and ammunition were pushed over the side.

He helped build the gulf’s very first offshore oil drilling platforms in the late 1940s, installing bolts on perilously high perches over the water. He worked on a shrimp boat, and later as the captain of a service boat for drilling platforms.

The gulf has changed, Mr. Pitre said: “I think it’s too far gone to salvage.”

‘Peak oil boost for our industry’: 2020 Vision

However, the Twenty Teens are predicted to herald the arrival of Peak Oil. This will finally bring home the message that our transport needs to change dramatically.

Has this province reached its peak?

In a sense, Alberta reached its peak oil moment years ago with the decline of conventional oil reserves followed by the demise of its natural gas sector. When previous booms went bust, the expectation of the good times cycling back was always fulfilled — a resiliency no longer guaranteed.

Given its dependence on the oilsands, Calgary’s one-horse standing’s been whittled down to a pair of hooves and the pony they’re under has become an international pariah.

T3 presents - Making Sense of the Financial Crisis in the Era of Peak Oil

Transition Town Tramore (T3) and Futureproof Kilkenny have come together to organise for Canadian Energy Consultant and Financial Blogger Nicole Foss to visit the South East and give a presentation entitled Making Sense of the Financial Crisis in the Era of Peak Oil.

Nicole's presentation will give a thorough overview of the problems being faced within the financial system, and explain how it relates to the problems being experienced in the energy production system.

Living off the land

Five years have passed since we left Sydney. It seems like five minutes, yet our city life feels like a hundred years ago. We left to become as self-sufficient as possible after learning about the coming age of shortages and chaos resulting from peak oil (see opposite). Six months after leaving Sydney behind, I wrote a book called Choosing Eden (published by Random House Australia) explaining the move to the little farm we grandly called Eden Forest Permaculture Sanctuary.

Improved Gulf power grid reduces blackouts

The new GCC electricity grid has put an end to power cuts in four countries in the northern Gulf but the lack of an agreed tariff is hampering more effective use of the US$1.4 billion (Dh5.14bn) network, a senior official says.

The grid, which was connected for the first time last year, has allowed Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and Qatar to better handle surges in demand on the hottest summer days.

Spain Nearing Accord With Solar Producers on Reducing Subsidies

The Spanish government and solar- power producers are moving toward an agreement aimed at reducing subsidies to the industry and reining in electricity prices without damaging the country’s renewable energy industry.

Spain to Investigate Solar Plants Over Subsidies, Government Official Says

Spain may force any solar plant owners who cheated on paperwork to gain higher subsidies to repay income earned through deception, a ministry official said.

California Clears Hurdle for Electric-Car Charging Stations to Sell Power

California regulators voted to make it easier for electric-car charging companies to sell power in the U.S. state that’s likely to be the biggest market for such vehicles.

Fight Gears Up on Biomass

There is evidently no form of energy, including renewable energy, that lacks opposition. A big spat right now centers on biomass power plants.

Bike may spark an electric revolution

Eqbal al Yousuf said his company planned to sell Phoenix’s first 150 electric pick-up trucks by the end of the year but mainly in the US where there were government cash incentives for buyers and American authorities were pushing for green vehicles to be used in the public sector.

Without the government support to reduce the cost and risk in the UAE, local consumers will be wary of spending the US$75,000 (Dh275,475) for such a pick-up, he said.

“Humans get scared of anything new. We get scared of the unknown,” Mr al Yousuf said. “And this technology here is unknown for a lot of people around the world. So without the government push, without the government support, even if it’s cost-effective, a lot of people will not go for it.”

Instead of four-wheel vehicles, Mr al Yousuf plans to sell Phoenix’s electric bicycles in the UAE as early as September, before they are rolled out in any other market. The first shipment will be for 500 bikes, he said. The $800 bicycles have a maximum speed of 26kph and a range of 31km on a full charge.

Government funding for electric cars cut by 80%

A government scheme to give motorists money off when purchasing electric cars has been cut by 80 per cent. Despite recent warnings from independent climate change groups that Britain must increase the amount of electric cars drastically if it wants to meet EU emission targets, the fate of low-carbon charging points hangs in the balance. Environmental groups, politicians and electric car-makers argue that cutting the incentive will reduce the amount of green jobs and harm the cars’ take up.

Energy Department tests energy-saving program

The Energy Department has picked Bethesda-based Marriott International Inc. to be one of the companies in a pilot program to help businesses, governments and other organizations reduce energy use in their buildings.

EPA rejects challenge to climate rules

The Environmental Protection Agency Thursday rejected an effort to keep it from regulating greenhouse gas emissions, saying that e-mails released in last fall’s “Climategate” scandal gave it no reason to reconsider the science of global warming.

In a sternly written opinion, EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson said she didn’t agree with requests from the GOP attorneys general from Texas and Virginia, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and other conservative groups that questioned the underlying science linking humans to global warming and also warned of the potential economic burdens from new climate rules.

Cutting soot emissions best hope for saving Arctic ice

According to a new study led by Mark Z. Jacobson of Stanford University in the US, the quickest, best way to slow the rapid melting of Arctic sea ice is to reduce soot emissions from the burning of fossil fuel, wood and dung.

His analysis shows that soot is second only to CO2 in contributing to global warming.