Energy / Energy-General

• Oil & Gas Industry and Locals Battle Over Fracking in Colorado

  The battle for the future of oil and gas drilling in the United States is playing out in Colorado as both the industry and environmental groups step up efforts to beat back the other side. Both sides have claimed successes as public policy seesaws back and forth.Colorado boasts vast oil and gas resources. The Niobrara shale is thought to have nearly 2 billion barrels of oil. Just as places like the Bakken and Eagle Ford have boomed because of improved drilling technology over the last half decade or so, the Niobrara in Colorado has the industry rushing in. From 2007…

• 300mpg Diesel-Electric Hybrid Unveiled by Volkswagen

  The star of this week’s Qatar motor show will undoubtedly be Volkswagen’s “one-liter car,” the diesel hybrid XL1, which is able to achieve more than 300 mpg. The $60,000 XL1 is powered by an 800cc, two-cylinder turbodiesel powerplant (half a BlueMotion engine), producing 47bhp, supported by a 27bhp electric motor hat fuelled by lithium-ion batteries. The batteries can be charged from a domestic plug, allowing the car to travel 22 miles solely on electric power.  Over the past decade governments worldwide have been pressing the automotive industry for better gas mileage, better fuel economy in vehicles, and other sources of energy.…

• Are Hydrogen Fuel Cell Vehicles Dead On Arrival?

  The national vision by politicians, economists, industrialists and environmentalists to transition to hydrogen economy by 2030 seems deadlocked, with hydrogen fuel cells projected to represent a $3 billion market of about 5.9 GW by 2030, according to Lux Research, Figure 1.(1)The dream of fuel cell vehicles powered by hydrogen from zero-carbon sources such as renewable power or nuclear energy comes from estimates that the cost of avoided carbon dioxide would be more than $600 a metric ton – ten times higher than most other technologies under investigation.Yet today, there are only two fuel-cell vehicles (FCEV) available in the U.S. market…

• Why Angola may be the next OPEC Darling

  French energy company Total said it was sinking $16 billion into oil projects off the coast of Angola. The French major is following the bread crumbs offshore Angola and now the country aims to re-establish itself as a major oil player by courting investors to onshore fields. Total said it made a final investment decision to develop the deepwater Kaombo project off the coast of Angola. High costs had delayed the decision, though Total now says it could produce as much as 230,000 barrels of oil per day once operations begin in 2017. "Angola remains a priority country for Total" Yves-Louis Darricarrere,…

• Is Natural Gas No Better than Coal?

  A new study by scientists from Purdue and Cornell suggests that the methane emissions from shale gas could be much higher than previously thought. The study, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, looked at fugitive methane emissions in Pennsylvania by flying an airplane over drilling sites and collecting samples. What they found was a bit unnerving. “It is particularly noteworthy that large emissions were measured for wells in the drilling phase — in some cases 100 to 1,000 times greater than the inventory estimates,” said Purdue chemistry professor Paul Shepson. “This indicates that there are processes…

• Opportunity Strikes for Feuding Energy Powers

  The Russia-Ukraine crisis is creating an opportunity for two feuding Caspian-Sea energy powers, Azerbaijan and Turkmenistan, to become export partners.The latest signal that Azerbaijani-Turkmen relations might be heading for a thaw came on April 2, when Turkmen Foreign Minister Rashid Meredov paid an unexpected visit to Baku. The trip marked the first such mission by a high-ranking government official from either side since 2009.Bilateral relations between the two states have never been great during the post-Soviet era. The two have haggled over three Caspian oilfields – Azeri/Omar, Chirag/Osman and Kyapaz/Serdar – and the disputes have hindered officials from finalizing a…

• Who Really Won the Cold War Now?

  Since the fall of the Berlin Wall the West was under the illusion that it had won the Cold War. The Western powers had defeated communism, brought down the Iron Curtain, freed the peoples living under Soviet influence, brought the dreaded Berlin Wall down and saw the disbandment of the Warsaw Pact. NATO, the West, the US and democratic Europe had won. Or so it seemed.Yes, that is all true. Communism is a memory of the past, a bad memory too.  The other side lost, but judging from where Russia stands today, it does not exactly look like a loser.…

• Ukraine Falling to Economic Warfare and Its Own Missteps

  As protests in Ukraine’s eastern region turned violent on Sunday leading to the death of a Ukrainian security officer in a shootout with pro-Russian militia, Kiev threatens military action while Moscow flexes its geo-economic warfare muscles.Pro-Russian militia groups have seized government buildings and police headquarters in Ukraine’s eastern city of Donetsk and Slovyanks--where the shoot-out took place--and despite a Monday morning ultimatum by the Ukrainian government, these groups have shown no sign of giving in. There has been no movement by the Ukrainian military to make good on its ultimatum; indeed, the messages have been unclear and contradictory. Acting president…

• Ohio’s Department of Natural Resources Links Earthquakes to Fracking

  No single new energy source is more responsible for altering America’s energy landscape than natural gas produced by hydraulic fracturing of underground rock formations. “Fracking” has produced opposing camps of industry advocates versus environmentalists concerned that the technique uses chemicals harmful to the environment and can lead to increased seismic activity. In the wake of increased seismic activity in Ohio’s Poland Township in Mahoning County on 11 April Ohio’s Department of Natural Resources announced new, stronger permit conditions for drilling near faults or areas of past seismic activity. In announcing the new conditions ODNR Director James Zehringer said, “While we can never…

• Did Crude Oil Production Actually Peak in 2005?

  "Wait a minute," you must be saying. "Haven't we been hearing from the oil industry and from government and international agencies that worldwide oil production has been increasing in the last several years?" The answer, of course, is yes. But, the deeper question is whether this assertion is actually correct.Here is a key fact that casts doubt on the official reporting: When the industry and the government talk about the price of oil sold on world markets and traded on futures exchanges, they mean one thing. But, when they talk about the total production of oil, they actually mean something…