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The Interior Department announced Thursday that in the first three months of 2025, the federal government brought in nearly $40 million in revenue from oil and gas lease sales on public land. The development proves the worth of President Donald Trump’s vision to unleash American energy dominance, a top official said. "This quarter’s lease sales demonstrate Interior’s unwavering commitment to fostering American Energy Dominance, and we are grateful to those who produce energy on federal lands," Interior Secretary Doug Burgum said in a statement. "By building on the commonsense, pro-growth policies of the Trump administration, we’re ensuring public lands are...

President Donald Trump has a multi-faceted plan to restore U.S. energy dominance after four years of the Biden administration giving the fossil fuel industry the cold shoulder, oil executive Mike Sommers told FOX Business on Thursday. The American Petroleum Institute president and CEO was among the 15 industry leaders present inside a closed-door White House meeting with Trump this week. He detailed the contents of the talk on "Mornings with Maria." "The president said we're going to have an opportunity to finally open up some of these federal lands and federal waters that were restricted by the Biden administration. He's...

Department of Energy (DOE) Secretary Chris Wright unveiled his first secretarial order on Wednesday in a move to overturn many of former President Joe Biden’s green energy policies and restore “energy dominance” in America. Wright’s order aims to reduce energy costs in the U.S. and expand domestic energy production, according to a press release. The order outlines several of the DOE’s plans to improve the U.S. energy sector by tackling issues caused by several Biden-era energy regulations. The DOE’s order also outlines a plan to begin a comprehensive review of the agency’s Appliance Standards Program to make home appliances and...

The Senate on Monday confirmed Chris Wright, the CEO of fracking company Liberty Energy, to lead the Energy Department. The vote was 59-38. Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle indicated support for his nomination during his confirmation hearing, and he sailed out of the committee on a 15-5 vote. “He’s a scientist who has invested his life around energy. He is indeed an unrestrained enthusiast for fossil fuels in almost every regard, but he studied nuclear,” Democrat John Hickenlooper (Colo.) said during Wright’s confirmation hearing. “His first years of working were in solar. He has experience in wind.”

SAVANNAH, Ga. (WTOC/Gray News) - A Georgia man has been trying to get a refund for months after he says he ordered a drill from AliExpress but received a printed photo of one instead. Sylvester Franklin, of Savannah, decided it was time for some new tools, so he logged onto AliExpress and ordered a drill, among other items. He did not get what he paid for, WTOC reports. “They sent me this. A picture is what they sent me,” Franklin said. Instead of the actual drill, Franklin received a printed picture of the drill he ordered. He says more items...

It was one of Joe Biden’s first moves as president (and a message to the country on how he would rule): shutting down the Keystone XL pipeline, a 1,200-mile Canada-to-Nebraska crude project that would have employed thousands of workers and transported up to 830,000 barrels of oil per day. Now President-elect Donald Trump reportedly wants to send his own message and restart the project, and although bringing it back to life would present numerous hurdles, oil workers are reportedly ecstatic over the idea. "It's a breath of fresh air. We're running on cloud nine," former Keystone Pipeline worker Bugsy Allen...

President-elect Donald Trump’s transition team has prepared executive orders and proclamations that would withdraw the US from the Paris climate agreement and open up western lands for drilling and mining, according to a report. Trump’s energy and environment transition team – tasked with drafting these actions – includes his former Department of the Interior Secretary David Bernhardt and former Environmental Protection Agency administrator Andrew Wheeler, the New York Times reported on Friday. Trump, 78, pulled the US out of the Paris accord early in his first term, arguing that it was ineffective because it allows countries to voluntarily restrain their...

The world is getting more and more dangerous by the day. With NATO, the EU and Russia entangled in an European conflict that keeps escalating, it is very bad news that nuclear weapons are now the talk of the day. The Russian Federation forces have begun the ‘first stage’ of exercises to simulate preparation for the launch of tactical nuclear weapons. Ordered by recently reelected President Vladimir Putin, the exercises are reportedly linked to what Moscow calls ‘militant statements’ by Western officials that ‘create security threats for Russia’. Reuters reported: “Nuclear analysts say the exercises are designed as a warning...

The Russian borehole, called "the entrance to hell," drilled over 12 kilometers deep and encountered unexpected water. Near the Norwegian border somewhere in the depths of the Arctic Circle in Russia lies the deepest hole ever drilled, once called "the entrance to hell." The hole was a man-made creation through drilling, creating a depth of over 12 kilometers; which is the height of Mount Everest and Mount Fuji combined. According to the BBC, locals say the hole, located near the Kola Peninsula in northwest Russia, is so deep they can hear the screams of souls from hell. This hole is...

The Interior Department on Friday finalized a rule making it more expensive for oil and gas producers to drill on federally owned lands. Several of the provisions in the rule — like raising the rent the government charges to oil companies for using its land and increasing the government’s share of the profits from that oil — were set out in law by the Democrats’ Inflation Reduction Act. The Biden administration will additionally make it more expensive for drillers to abandon their oil wells after use instead of cleaning them up. The administration argues that current bonding rates do not...

A year after pleading no contest to criminal charges, one of Pennsylvania’s leading natural gas companies is poised to drill and frack in the rural community where it was banned for a dozen years for polluting the water supply. Coterra Energy Inc. has won permission from state environmental regulators to drill 11 gas wells underneath Dimock Township, in the state’s northeastern corner - the sweet spot of the largest natural gas field in the United States, according to well permit records reviewed by The Associated Press. Billions of dollars worth of natural gas, now locked in shale rock deep underground,...

Paris (AFP) – The International Energy Agency on Friday urged governments to urgently implement measures to cut global oil consumption within months following supply fears stemming from Russia's invasion of Ukraine. The IEA also called on the OPEC+ group of oil-producing nations led by Saudi Arabia and Russia to help "relieve the strain" on markets, while warning that the world faced the biggest shock to supply "in decades". With the threat that supplies of Russian oil could be cut even more, "there is a real risk that markets tighten further and oil prices escalate significantly in the coming months" as...

"WASHINGTON – Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) joined Sens. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.), Bill Hagerty (R-Tenn.) and Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.) to introduce the American Energy Independence Act of 2022, which reverses President Biden's shutdown of the American energy sector and returns American energy to full production." "Shortly after taking office, Biden canceled the Keystone XL Pipeline, blocked new oil and gas leases, (especially offshore) issued regulations designed to stymie domestic energy investment and advocated for measures that focus more on Green New Deal priorities than on American security. As energy prices soared at home, Biden turned to Russia and the global oil...

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Two months after U.S. President Joe Biden announced an unprecedented effort among major oil consuming economies to work together to bring down rising fuel prices, prices are again approaching multi-year highs. And Biden has few options to stop the rally. Global benchmark Brent crude passed $84 a barrel on Wednesday and leading analysts are forecasting that oil could pass $100 a barrel in the first quarter. Biden spearheaded a coordinated release of oil from strategic reserves with Japan, India, South Korea, Britain and China in November that helped quell prices - even though, in the end,...

The Biden administration is preparing to sell off more than 80 million acres of the Gulf of Mexico to oil and gas drilling companies in the largest federal offshore drilling auction in U.S. history—less than a week after the UN climate change conference COP26, where nearly 200 nations promised to reduce fossil fuel emissions. The annual Gulf of Mexico lease sale is planned for November 17 in New Orleans. The 80 million acres on sale is expected to produce around 1.12 billion barrels of oil and 4.2 cubic feet of natural gas over the next 50 years. The controversial auction...

Press Secretary Jen Psaki says Biden is asking OPEC to pump more oil

Aug 31 (Reuters) - The Biden administration announced plans on Tuesday to open millions of acres for oil and gas exploration as the White House sought to comply with a court order requiring it to resume lease auctions. The move, which includes some 80 million acres of water in the Gulf of Mexico along with potentially hundreds of thousands more onshore, represents a setback for Democratic President Joe Biden's plans to fight climate change, which included a campaign vow to end new federal oil and gas leasing. Biden paused drilling auctions after taking office in January pending an analysis of...

Full Title: The Chinese military has deployed armored vehicles to Europe for the first time as Chinese medics train in Germany More at the link, including photos

An international team of scientists is getting closer to perfecting molecule-sized motors that drill through the surface of cancer cells, killing them in an instant. Researchers at Rice University, Durham (U.K.) University and North Carolina State University reported their success at activating the motors with precise two-photon excitation via near-infrared light. Unlike the ultraviolet light they first used to drive the motors, the new technique does not damage adjacent, healthy cells. The research led by chemists James Tour of Rice, Robert Pal of Durham and Gufeng Wang of North Carolina may be best applied to skin, oral and gastrointestinal cancer...

BILLINGS, Mont. — A judge blocked oil and gas drilling across almost 500 square miles in Wyoming and said the U.S. government must consider climate change impacts more broadly as it leases huge swaths of public land for energy exploration. The order marks the latest in a string of court rulings over the past decade - including one last month in Montana - that have faulted the U.S. for inadequate consideration of greenhouse gas emissions when approving oil, gas and coal projects on federal land. U.S. District Judge Rudolph Contreras in Washington appeared to go a step further than other...