Free Republic

TEHRAN - Iran has left the development of two oilfields to the energy giant British Petroleum (BP), an informed source told the Tasnim News Agency on the condition of anonymity. The announcement is a follow-up to the September meeting between Iranian Oil Ministry officials and BP top managers, where the Iranian side headed by Amir Hossein Zamani Nia, the deputy oil minister for international affairs and trade, agreed to transfer the development of two oilfields to BP based on the new model of Iranian oil contracts, known as Integrated Petroleum Contract (IPC), which is due to be unveiled soon. ---snip---...

The official Washington line on Vladimir Putin’s military action is as follows: It is a mistake, demonstrating Russian weakness, sure to get the Russian military stuck in a “quagmire,” according to President Obama. Josh Earnest, the president’s press secretary, took that observation one further, comparing Putin’s policies to those of the Bush administration (the sickest of White House burns) by arguing the Russians “will not succeed in imposing a military solution” just as the U.S. did not succeed in imposing one in Iraq. Adopting the characteristic snark of his boss, at a later press conference Earnest assessed Putin not to...

A Norwegian Arctic newspaper editor who has extensively covered oil drilling in the region was sacked at the behest of the Russian intelligence service, according to Norway’s public service broadcaster. ....snip.... In what could develop into a scandal in the European Arctic, Nilsen was last week controversially fired as editor of the Barents Observer for having “acted disloyally” to the newspaper’s owners. The title is owned by Norwegian Barents Secretariat (NBS), a local government body that promotes good relations with Russia in a region where the two nations cooperate and compete over fishing, oil and military strategy. Remaining Observer staff,...

Saudi Arabia on Sunday made deep reductions to the prices it charges for its oil, hard on the heels of cuts last month by rival producers in the Gulf. With U.S. production still increasing despite lower oil prices, members of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries are battling to keep their share of the last growing markets in Asia. In a list of official prices sent to customers, state-oil company Saudi Aramco cut the price of its light-crude deliveries to Asia by $1.7 a barrel. As a result, it switched to a discount of $1.6 a barrel against the...

President Obama on Wednesday called on U.S. business, labor and political leaders to “refashion the social compact” and strengthen union powers across the country, arguing that the troubling trend of declining middle-class wages can be turned around by redefining the basic principles of workers’ rights. During a speech at a White House summit on working Americans, the president drew a direct link between drops in union membership and the stagnation of most workers’ wages. Mr. Obama also said that workers’ anxiety about their job security and whether they’ll be afford to feed their families contributes to “anti-immigration sentiment” and other...

President Barack Obama says labor laws should be strengthened and it should be easier for workers to join unions. Obama made the comments at a White House workers’ summit on Wednesday—just as there’s a rift with labor over a Pacific Rim trade agreement. …

There are high expectations for the next UN climate summit taking place in Paris in late November and early December. Obama is determined to get a “binding” international treaty to succeed the failed Kyoto Protocol. One of the major sticking points all along has been the reluctance of developing nations, especially China and India, to commit to significant emissions reductions which would reduce their economic growth. So China, India, and other nations were exempted from the Kyoto Protocol, and now China is the top emitter of greenhouse gases in the world. The strategy for the next treaty will be not...

Stiff competition, lack of business lead to bankruptcies, distress ___ A wave of bankruptcies and closures is sweeping across the oil patch, with dozens of hydraulic-fracturing companies at risk, industry experts say. Most of the companies that help oil-and-gas explorers drill and frack wells are small, privately owned and just a few years old. They are part of a flood of new entrants in the energy business—one that is drying up as oil prices languish below $50 a barrel. One of the latest casualties is Pro-Stim Services. Launched in 2011 with backing from Turnbridge Capital LLC, a private-equity firm, the...

On September 30, a federal judge struck down the U.S. Department of Interior’s regulations on hydraulic fracturing, a blow to the Obama administration’s efforts at putting standards on the drilling practice. A U.S. District Judge in Wyoming issued an injunction against the implementation of Interior’s rules. In March 2015, the Bureau of Land Management (part of the Interior Department) issued its final rule for fracking on public lands. According to BLM, there are over 100,000 oil and gas wells on federal lands, over 90 percent of which use fracking. “Current federal well-drilling regulations are more than 30 years old and...

Steve Everley is the National Spokesperson for EnergyInDepth.org. He addresses claims about earthquakes and frac’ing and the data showing the positive impact that frac’ing and development brings to property values.

A crucial process has been identified to explain the reason why dissolved organic carbon (DOC) levels in the deep oceans are constant despite a continuous supply from the surface ocean. This research has been published today in the journal Nature Geoscience and was conducted by scientists from the National Oceanography Centre (NOC) and The University of Southampton. Dr Jeff Hawkes, the lead author of this study, from the NOC said: "There has been a long outstanding question about whether hydrothermal vents are a source or sink of organic carbon to the oceans. We have shown that hydrothermal vent fluids contain...

A senior Saudi prince has launched an unprecedented call for change in the country’s leadership, as it faces its biggest challenge in years in the form of war, plummeting oil prices and criticism of its management of Mecca, scene of last week’s hajj tragedy. The prince, one of the grandsons of the state’s founder, Abdulaziz Ibn Saud, has told the Guardian that there is disquiet among the royal family – and among the wider public – at the leadership of King Salman, who acceded the throne in January.

When Venezuelan Oil Minister Juan Pablo Pérez Alfonso resigned in 1963, he blasted the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, at the time torn by internal rivalries, for failing to produce any benefits for his country. Half a century later, OPEC is still split and Venezuela is again unhappy, this time at the unwillingness of the organization’s top producer, Saudi Arabia, to rescue oil prices from a six-year low that’s dragging the battered Venezuelan economy into an even deeper crisis. On Sept. 10, Venezuela’s oil minister, Eulogio del Pino, tweeted appeals for OPEC and non-OPEC countries “to have a discussion on...

Green Jobs Fail-CA’s “Critters Before Humans” Water Policy-TX’s New Earthquake & Fracking Study

After months of declining to take a position on the Keystone XL pipeline, Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton says she opposes the construction of the project. "I think it is imperative that we look at the Keystone XL pipeline as what I believe it is: A distraction from the important work we have to do to combat climate change, and, unfortunately from my perspective, one that interferes with our ability to move forward and deal with other issues," she said during a campaign event in Iowa Tuesday. "Therefore, I oppose it. I oppose it because I don't think it's in...

Texas Railroad Commissioner Christi Craddick Discusses the Future of Fracking in Texas

On Thursday evening, we detailed a Reuters report which suggested that the influx of Russian technical and logistical support to Bashar al-Assad’s depleted army at Latakia might have breathed new life into the regime as it seeks to rout Islamic State and a whole host of other armed groups fighting for control of Syria. “Foreign Minister Walid al-Moualem said on Thursday Russia had provided new weapons and trained Syrian troops how to use them,” Reuters said, before describing what certainly sounds like an invigorated air campaign against the de facto ISIS capital at Raqqa. Importantly, al-Moualem also indicated that Syria...

Economist Ed Ireland who Chairs the Barnett Shale Energy Education Council shares his expertise on hydraulic fracturing or “fracking” and why we should not fear that it is possible for the U.S. to run short on energy if we export. Exports would be a boom for job creation and wealth creation for the middle class.

In the summer of 2014, a photographic exhibition on the conflicts in Ukraine and Syria appeared in Berlin and Brussels. Its advertising promised to present a “balanced, truthful picture.” The organizers meticulously disguised their identities. At the same time, they offered huge amounts of money to Western journalists without mentioning the conditions. The Kentrails research collective, an antifascist watchgroup, has researched the exhibition’s background and uncovered a propaganda network in which Russian right-wing extremists collaborate with the Kremlin-associated St. Petersburg “troll factory” in an attempt to impact the Western public.

Unveiling the AntiFracking Movement & How Fracking Brings Manufacturing Boom 9/14/15