Free Republic

Myles UdlandJanuary 15, 2015Good morning! It is a new week and crude oil is making new lows.(snip)(snip)

Environmentalism: Re-upping on delusional climate-change fantasies, "Governor Moonbeam" asked in his inauguration speech Monday for the Golden State to meet half its energy needs with renewable energy by 2030. Gov. Jerry Brown, who leads the state that hosted Solyndra, embraces bird-chopping wind turbines and builds crispy critter-producing solar panel farms, is a leading advocate of renewable energy and environmental protection. As pollution from coal-fired plants and industries in China wafted across the Pacific, he took a deep breath at his fourth inauguration as the state's chief executive and doubled down on green energy's failed promise by tasking California to fight...

Just had a fair shake here at Central and Forest lane. Anyone else?

en Chorn had a good vacation in Minnesota last month, making it to a Vikings game, a hockey game in Duluth and getting engaged. But while he was gone, the price of oil hit him personally. “While on vacation, I got a call from someone who’s covering for me and said, ‘Hey your rig’s being laid down,’” said Chorn, who does geology work on rigs for Sunburst Consulting. He’s had a slow six weeks since then. The oil price drop will impact fringe regions in the Bakken the most, experts said, because the oil there costs more to extract. “I...

Scientists are beginning to question the ramifications of a giant Delaware-sized methane hot spot high up in the air. The “giant plume” is the largest collection of greenhouse gas in the air above the U.S. and is likely the result of natural gas leaks. It’s located over a stretch of desert in Southeast New Mexico, and NASA scientists have studied the methane cloud as a potent climate changer for the past three years. When it first appeared, scientists questioned its existence. “We couldn’t be sure that the signal was real,” NASA researcher Christian Frankenberg told the Washington Post. But NASA...

OPEC is pointing the finger at speculators as well as Non-OPEC countries, but especially US shale producers for the crude price crash. Let's explore that idea in a series of charts. But first let's take a look at the allegation. The Wall Street Journal reports Gulf Oil Exporters Blame Non-OPEC Producers for Glut. Gulf oil officials on Sunday defended OPECÂ’s decision last month to keep its production ceiling intact, blaming producers outside of the group for the glut of oil on the market that has depressed prices. Speaking at an energy conference in Abu Dhabi, Saudi Oil Minister Ali al-Naimi...

... While the U.S. does not export crude oil, its increased production has curbed imports, resulting in excess supply. Although the fracking boom has helped to increase supply and steal market share from the Middle East, it is the Saudi response to the increased production from North American shale that has sent the price of oil tumbling. In September 2014, in the face of falling oil prices, Saudi Arabia chose to increase oil production by half a percent. Days later on Oct. 1, they discounted oil exports to leading Asian customers. These actions set off a rapid decline in international...

Texas has blessed the world with an incredible Christmas gift: plummeting oil prices. Both the production and the technology of fracking were substantially innovated and pioneered in the Lone Star state. The ramifications here at home and abroad are profound and incredible example of how innovation, property rights,and economic freedom trump the ugly agendas of statism. The gift of Texas oil is a gift that keeps on giving and stands in contrast to the lumps of coal dished out by the Federal government:...Gift 1:A true economic stimulus. The drop in oil prices from over $100 a barrel to less than...

Just five years ago, almost no one outside the natural gas industry had heard of fracking, even though the basic technologies were not new; today, the shale gas revolution has transformed America’s energy markets, with profound effects for economic growth, competitiveness, security, and environmental quality. In a nation still deeply concerned about its energy future, this extraordinary success story should prompt the question: Can we do it again? The answer is yes​—​if we correctly understand both the model for innovation that shale gas exemplifies and an opportunity that now exists to emulate the shale model. That opportunity involves exploiting a...

Energy is the master resource, the lifeblood of ours and the world’s economy “It is a sad day when a state chooses to listen to the fear, uncertainty, and doubts spread by anti-fossil fuel agitators rather than making a decision for economic strength that would benefit schools, communities, and many of its poorest citizens—especially when the vilified technology, hydraulic fracturing, has been used safely and successfully for more than 60 years and has brought prosperity to other formerly struggling regions.” Responding to the announcement by New York Governor Andrew Cuomo that the state would ban fracking, Ms. Noon joined others,...

The comedian Chico Marx famously asked, “Who you gonna believe, me or your own eyes?” That’s the question I feel like Governor Andrew Cuomo is posing to New Yorkers with his decision to ban hydraulic fracturing in the Empire State’s portion of the Marcellus Shale. The governor and his allies – most notably the acting state health commissioner, whose report served as justification for Mr. Cuomo’s decision – say the move will protect New York’s air, land, and water. For years now, New Yorkers have been besieged by apocalyptic claims made by anti-oil and gas activists – many of them...

To get a sense of the deep disappointment felt by many here at the twin killings of two potentially lucrative dreams, hydraulic fracturing and a new luxury casino, one needed to look no further than the front-page headline of Thursday’s edition of The Press & Sun-Bulletin. It was two letters, in red type: “NO!” That cry could seemingly be heard all along New York State’s Southern Tier, which borders Pennsylvania and has long been one of the state’s most stubborn economic laggards. In recent years, both hydraulic fracturing — known as fracking — and casinos had been posited as potential...

Yes, oil closed below $60 on Friday, but the U.S. stock market closed up – way up from Tuesday’s close. The Fed’s action/non-action might seem the cause, but that looks like coincidental timing. With oil stocks like Chevron selling at both extremely attractive valuations and strong price support levels..., the market turnabout was waiting in the wings, only needing a gentle push to hit the stage in full action. What is noteworthy (and disturbing) is the ease with which commenters tossed about fear-inducing descriptors like “plunge,” “rout,” “crash” and “panic.” Following those emotional portrayals were the typical (and erroneous) visions...

America’s oil and gas boom was enabled by a huge pile of cheap financing. Many of the leading players in the boom, such as Chesapeake Energy and Continental Resources have for years been making capital investments at levels far surpassing the cashflow generated from operations. The mountain of debt advanced to drillers in recent years is estimated to be in the neighborhood of $500 billion — some $300 billion in leveraged loans and another $200 billion in high yield debt. That’s about 16% of the U.S. high yield debt market, quadruple its share a decade ago. That’s a lot, even...

"And right now, he's presiding over the collapse of his currency, a major financial crisis and a huge economic contraction," Obama said in the interview, which was recorded on Friday. "That doesn't sound like somebody who has rolled me or the United States of America. "

Amid the many explanations offered by New York governor Andrew Cuomo and his various lieutenants about their reasons for imposing a permanent ban on hydraulic fracturing in the state, one of them made me laugh out loud. “We lack the necessary data,” said New York’s health commissioner, Howard Zucker. I’ll discuss why that claim made me chuckle in just a moment. Before turning to that, let’s be clear: Cuomo’s decision is not surprising, and it’s not very significant either. It’s hardly surprising that a liberal Democratic governor in one of America’s most liberal states chose to ban fracturing. Indeed, in...

The gas age is good news Published on Saturday, March 16, 2013, updated Saturday, March 16, 2013 Methane hydrate joins shale gas and deep sea gas I have the following article in the Times on 15 March:   Move over shale gas, here comes methane hydrate. (Perhaps.) On Tuesday the Japanese government’s drilling ship Chikyu started flaring off gas from a hole drilled into a solid deposit of methane and ice, 300 metres beneath the seabed under 1000 metres of water, 30 miles off the Japanese coast.   The real significance of this gas flare probably lies decades in...

Crude oil production from U.S. wells is poised to approach a 42-year record next year as drillers ignore the recent decline in price pointing them in the opposite direction. U.S. energy producers plan to pump more crude in 2015 as declining equipment costs and enhanced drilling techniques more than offset the collapse in oil markets, said Troy Eckard, whose Eckard Global owns stakes in more than 260 North Dakota shale wells. Oil companies, while trimming 2015 budgets to cope with the lowest crude prices in five years, are also shifting their focus to their most-prolific, lowest-cost fields, which means extracting...

Thanks to an announcement from the state Department of Health today, New Yorkers will miss out on a multi-billion-dollar industry that has made other states rich. The decision, a ban on fracking, has little to do with sound science and much more to do with the political cowardice of New York’s leaders, the politicization of state agencies, and the political activism of radical environmentalists. The story begins about six years ago, when Governor David Paterson decided to refer a politically controversial decision about fracking to state agencies, ordering a study while instituting a de facto fracking ban. His successor,...

Three days after the newly elected Senate majority leader opened the door to negotiations on a natural gas drilling tax, industry leaders reiterated their stand that such a tax would harm the state's economy. Additional taxes would have a "crippling effect on jobs" said Stephanie Wissman, executive director of the Associated Petroleum Industries of Pennsylvania. "It threatens to stifle energy production and the jobs that go with it," Wissman said in a conference call with reporters Tuesday. The prospect of a severance tax on gas production in the lucrative Marcellus Shale - an issue dormant since Gov. Ed Rendell left...