Oil exec pushes greener energy

In the wake of last year’s hurricanes, the United States narrowly averted a major disruption to its fuel supply on a scale “inconceivable in recent memory,” says Shell Oil Co. president John Hofmeister.

A year later, Hofmeister says he is disappointed that there has been “not one single policy change” to address the country’s energy supply system.

George Bush Won't Be Able to Limit Oil Imports

U.S. President George W. Bush signed a law on energy, four years in the making, on Monday. The law's goal is to reduce oil imports. Western analysts think that American imports will increase in any case. But Russian still won't be able to take advantage of the situation.

Kurds show signs of seceding from Iraq

With violence bloodying Iraq, Kurds in the peaceful north have been showing signs of going their own way, raising their own flag and even hinting they could secede in a dispute over oil wealth - moves that have alarmed Shiites and Sunnis.

Iran Cuts Oil Rights to 10%

TEHRAN - The Japanese government acknowledged Friday that Inpex Corp. has agreed to reduce its interests in the development of Iran's Azadegan oil field to 10 percent from the current 75 percent after days of talks over the stalled $2 billion deal.

Inept govt compounds $29bn Kashagan oil project woes

KUWAIT: Italian energy company ENI and its partners in developing the Kashagan oilfield in Kazakhstan said the project will run over its original $29 billion budget and will be delayed by two to three years beyond its 2008 completion deadline. It was inevitable that the Kashagan project would run over budget and into delays, because it is one of the most technically difficult energy projects ever attempted. However, these difficulties are being worsened by a demanding Kazakh government and an inept state-run project partner.

Nigeria’s oil reserves will not deplete, unless...

Official: Ukraine won't buy Russian gas

Ukraine will stop purchasing Russian natural gas beginning next year, instead opting for cheaper gas from Central Asian states, an energy official said Saturday.

Argentina: Government denies energy-saving plan

De Vido claims energy companies behind campaign to increase electricity rates. Scheme would reportedly ban nighttime soccer games.

"I categorically deny there will be any reprogramming for public activities or restrictions in shopping malls or anything of the sort.

"This is a campaign to put pressure on the government to increase rates in households, something we are not going to do," he added.

Mass suicides by Indian farmers... shape of things to come

The truth is slowly emerging. A Home Ministry report, monitoring deaths by suicide, says that roughly 100,000 farmers committed suicide over six years to 2003 in India. On 18th May 2006, Sharad Pawar, the Minister of Agriculture [MoA], Government of India, presented the data to the Upper House [Rajya Sabha] adding that investigations by state governments on agrarian distress show that the main “cause of suicide is indebtedness.” In the dehumanized statistical gimmickry, the utter devastation of the 100,000 households of dead farmers comprising women, children and elders was quietly buried under the soft thick carpet of the Indian Parliament.

Venezuela ships Nicaragua diesel in show of support

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez sent Nicaragua a shipment of cut-price diesel fuel on Saturday in a demonstration of his support for Nicaragua's leftist opposition leader, Daniel Ortega, before a November 5 presidential election.

Brussels Sooths Energy Crisis Fears of Bulgaria

Taking stock

...the stock market is one of the better predictors of economic health. As recently as early this year, for instance, the market's robust optimism foreshadowed the later sharp decline in crude oil prices that began in the late summer, and did so at a time when full-throated "Peak Oil" Cassandras still held centre stage with predictions of imminent line-ups at the pumps as a fact of daily life.

More recently, it seems the week hasn't gone by without the announcement of a major oil find in the Gulf of Mexico, offshore West Africa and Central Asia, among other dauntingly remote locales. Last summer, the world was rapidly running out of oil. Today, the industry, OPEC and government analysts here and abroad are calculating the size and likely impact of a mounting global surplus of crude and of heating oil and other petroleum products.

Crude Impact is a new film about peak oil:

"For more than a year, we traveled all over the world, interviewing people we felt best understood the history of oil's impact on our world and the issue of 'peak oil,'" he said. "'Peak oil' is the point in time where the quantity of oil extracted from the earth begins to irreversibly decline, and the ramifications of 'peak oil' are terrifying."

Oil Giants Put Energy Into Other Resources

Firms are dabbling in a diverse range of projects, including one in which microbes eat grease to help produce electricity.

Can Opec stop the oil price dropping?

The producers’ cartel wants to cut output as the price falls by about $20 from its peak. But such attempts may be in vain.

Brazil Ethanol Sales May Drop As US Begins Exports

The black stuff is being brought to heel but China keeps the engine running

The price mechanism does work for the oil market after all - if in a lumpy, uncertain, disjointed way. The huge run-up in the cost of the black stuff has eased and the talk of "on to $100" has faded.

Bull Market in Crude Oil Could Resume After U.S. Elections

Peak oil: Is the oil running out?

“Dear reader, civilisation as we know it is coming to an end soon.” This is how the Peak Oil: Life After the Oil Crash website introduces itself. Peak oil is the theory that the world’s oil supplies will soon reach their highest output, their peak, after which there will be a rapid decline in output. The website argues that “the consequences (if true) would be unimaginable. Permanent fuel shortages would tip the world into a generations-long economic depression. Millions would lose their jobs as industry implodes. Farm tractors would be idled for lack of fuel, triggering massive famines. Energy wars would flare.”

Huntington Beach, California, City Councilmember Debbie Cook talks about energy policy and the ASPO-USA 2006 Boston World Oil Conference, "Time for Action: A Midnight Ride for Peak Oil," scheduled for October 26-27, 2006, in Boston, Massachusetts.

Oil fuels policy dilemmas

In addition to a constrained foreign policy, our reliance on imported oil creates hidden economic costs. Apollo Alliance's Holland suggested the price we pay at the pump represents a fraction of the true cost of energy. He cited a recent report by the National Defense Council Foundation, a conservative national security think tank, which estimated that defending oil supplies in the Persian Gulf oil added $132 billion to the basic cost of securing our non-oil-related strategic interests there. This figure does not include the costs, economic and otherwise, of our current involvement in Iraq.