The growth of electric vehicles won’t make much impact on the global demand for oil November 22, 2016 Chevy is about to release its all-electric Bolt. Tesla will soon put its Model 3 on sale. More than a dozen additional EV models will be launched in the next few years. Battery costs are falling fast, making EVs close to becoming cost-competitive with the internal combustion engine. Yet, oil demand will continue to rise, [...]
Microsoft is using wind to power an entire datacentre November 18, 2016 Microsoft Corporation has always been known for their image of environmental protection but this may be their biggest validation to date. The tech company announced on Monday they are in the process converting their datacenter in Cheyenne Wyoming to rely entirely on wind energy. Microsoft will be using three wind farms, two in Kansas owned [...]
How far will Trump’s war on climate change go? November 17, 2016 In a world of post-truth democracy, it is fitting that President-elect Donald Trump's new director of the Centre for Energy and Environment “is not a climate scientist. I'm just… the informed layman.” It would be truly fascinating and terrifying to take a peek at what Myron Ebell is reading. On the one hand, he believes [...]
Wall or no wall: Trump needs the Mexican oil industry November 15, 2016 Two of Donald Trump’s main pledges during the presidential race were building a wall along the border with Mexico, and making the U.S. energy-independent. Now that the election is over, these issues are coming to the fore. First, the president-elect said that the wall, which he mentioned on the campaign trail and in numerous debates, [...]
Why oil and gas are big winners from Trump’s presidential victory November 10, 2016 The global financial markets began to crash last night as a Trump victory became more likely, although they regained ground as the results started to clear up. Nevertheless, to say that there is a lot of uncertainty about what happens next is a massive understatement. Asian markets plunged, commodity prices fell, and emerging market currencies [...]
Opec remains positive on output cut as oil crashes to $44 November 4, 2016 With markets rattled and oil prices tanking after being bombarded on a variety of fronts, Opec has attempted to bring some calm to the market regarding its optimism that it will be able to reach some kind of a deal. But will the market buy it? Oil prices this week took a tumble on the back [...]
BP and Shell optimistic the market is turning November 2, 2016 BP and Royal Dutch Shell reported their latest financial figures for the third quarter and both companies showed some improvement, a sign that the oil markets are starting to find their footing. A few days ago, some of the other oil majors released third quarter earnings, revealing the ongoing damage being done to the balance [...]
ISIS’ oil income is down $1m a day – now they’re trading wheat to grow new revenue streams October 27, 2016 Since the Iraqi army drove out Islamic State forces from the oil-rich towns of Shargat and Qayyarah last month, ISIS has lost its ability to produce oil and profit from crude oil sales on the black market—but ISIS is proving to be highly adaptable, and able to find new markets quickly; this time in agriculture. [...]
Occulus Rift, but for energy: how virtual reality could shake up utility firm performance October 25, 2016 Humans have a hard time with processing numbers. The fact is that our brains are much better at processing images and colours. Give a human a relatively simple math problem like dividing two large numbers by one another and it can take them several minutes to work out the answer. By contrast, humans are great at understanding [...]
Investors suddenly think that we’ve seen the worst of the oil price slump October 19, 2016 Oil speculators and a few major investment banks have suddenly turned bullish on crude prices, betting that the rally above $50 per barrel has more room to run. "Global oil inventories (industry and government) increased by 17 million barrels to 5.618 billion barrels in 3Q16. This is the smallest build since 4Q14, confirming that inventory [...]