Peak Oil News

China says "carbon tariffs" proposals breach WTO rules

BEIJING (Reuters) - Proposals to impose "carbon tariffs" on imported products will violate the rules of the World Trade Organization as well as the spirit of the Kyoto Protocol, China's Ministry of Commerce said.

In a statement posted on its website, the ministry said collecting carbon duties from foreign products would enable developed countries to "protect trade in the name of protecting the environment."

EU seen meeting renewable fuel targets with blends

HAMBURG (Reuters) - The European Union is likely to achieve its target of generating 10 percent of transport fuels from renewable sources by 2020 by blending biofuels with fossil fuels, a leading EU researcher said.

Most blending is likely to use first-generation biofuels produced with food crops, said Giovanni De Santi, director of the Energy Institute at the European Union Commission's Joint Research Center.

Iraqi crude deal 'boost' for China's oil security quest

The successful joint bid by BP and China National Petroleum Corp (CNPC) to develop an oilfield in Iraq has offered unique opportunities for the Chinese company to tap crude reserves in the oil-rich nation, analysts said yesterday.

But domestic oil producers should prepare themselves well for any uncertainties in the war-torn country, which boasts of the third-largest oil reserves in the world, they added.

OPEC and IEA Agree Not to Disagree: A Good Omen for the Industry

The IEA and OPEC are different organizations. Their briefs are different. They represent two worlds, two distinct interest groups and two schools of thought. They diverge rather than concur on major issues, but professionals run them; they may agree to differ yet both have no constraints in concurring, either. Despite all the odds, this industry, so very crucial to civilization, is maturing.

OPEC has been emphasizing for a long time now, that fundamentals -- demand and supply -- no more control the oil markets. Non-fundamentals -- speculation to be specific -- are now in full control and the world needs to rein them in.

Organic Farms as Subdivision Amenities

SOUTH BURLINGTON, Vt. � The bewildered Iowan who converted his farm into a ballpark in �Field of Dreams� in 1989 might reverse the move today. From Vermont to central California, developers are creating subdivisions around organic farms to attract buyers. If you plant it, these developers believe, they will buy.

Increasingly, subdivisions, usually master-planned developments at which buyers buy home sites or raw land, have been treating farms as an amenity. �There are currently at least 200 projects that include agriculture as a key community component,� said Ed McMahon, a senior fellow with the Urban Land Institute.

Book Review: Blackout

Coal. Under the surface we seem to have a lot of it. It’s fairly inexpensive but this is changing as demand rises to meet increased energy needs especially in countries like China. So we have a lot, its cheap, let’s use it, what’s the problem? Right? Wrong!

Author Richard Heinberg writes in Blackout: Coal, Climate and the Last Energy Crisis, “In short: two of the defining trends of the emerging century–the development of the Asian economies and climate change–both center on coal. But coal is finite non-renewable resource. Thus, a discussion of the future of coal must also intersect with a third great trend of the new century: resource depletion.”

Group: World failing to halt biodiversity decline

Governments are failing to stem a rapid decline in biodiversity that is now threatening extinction for almost half the world's coral reef species, a third of amphibians and a quarter of mammals, a leading environmental group warned Thursday.

"Life on Earth is under serious threat," the International U-nion for Conservation of Nature said in a 155-page report that describes the past five years of a losing battle to protect species, natural habitats and geographical regions from the devastating effects of man.

Spain backtracks on nuclear power phase-out

MADRID (AFP) � Spain's government said Thursday it would allow the country's oldest nuclear reactor to operate beyond its intended 40-year lifespan, reversing a policy of gradually phasing out nuclear power.

Industry Minister Miguel Sebastian said the Garona plant in northern Spain, which had been designed to function only until 2011 and whose operating permit expires on Sunday, would now be allowed to operate until July 2013.

Eager to Tap Iraq's Vast Oil Reserves, Industry Execs Suggested Invasion

Two years before the invasion of Iraq, oil executives and foreign policy advisers told the Bush administration that the United States would remain "a prisoner of its energy dilemma" as long as Saddam Hussein was in power.

That April 2001 report, "Strategic Policy Challenges for the 21st Century," was prepared by the James A. Baker Institute for Public Policy and the U.S. Council on Foreign Relations at the request of then-Vice President Dick Cheney.

Europe urged to stockpile gas

European countries were urged to start stockpiling gas reserves for the winter as another gas crisis involving Russia and Ukraine is looming.

The European Commission said a repeat of January's energy shortfall was likely if Ukraine failed to raise �4.2m needed to pay for Russian gas supplies required to fill its storage facilities.