Venezuela arrests brother of ex oil czar in corruption probe

Venezuela has thrown back in prison the brother of the country’s former oil czar as part of an ongoing investigation into a multi-billion dollar embezzlement scheme at the state-run oil company. Fidel Ramirez was arrested last Wednesday after failing to appear in court as required by the terms of his bail, Venezuela’s Attorney General Tarek […]

Oil tumbles as ‘wrecking ball’ dollar piles on commodity losses

Oil sank again as the dollar’s surge to a fresh peak and mounting recessionary concerns threatened global demand, deepening a rout. West Texas Intermediate fell below $78 a barrel, hitting the lowest intraday level since January, as a Bloomberg gauge of the US currency rallied to an all-time high. US benchmark crude collapsed more than […]

Kunstler: This Is the Way the World Ends

That “singularity” so many blab about is not what they think it is: the merging of human intelligence with Bill Gates’s Office products, leading to an orgasmic nirvana of infinite memoranda from your HR department concerning new diversity, inclusion, and equity policy. Rather, I speak of the magic moment when the necromancers of finance discover […]

Global Warming is Energy Surplus in a World Primarily in Deficit

Where demand-pull inflation describes an imbalance in aggregate supply versus aggregate demand. Where the average inflation rate for July for the G7 countries was 8.4%. Where Europe and the Asia-Pacific economies face an escalating energy crisis, global warming should be an economist’s dream. It is a global surplus of heat energy chasing too few ways […]

Solar radiation will increase 2300 times: this is what science tells us about the future of our star

The development that astrophysics has experienced during the last century has been spectacular. The human being has always felt an enormous fascination for the objects that he could observe in the sky, so much so that we know for sure that Socrates and Plato reflected on them and their nature. nearly two and a half […]

How big a problem is America’s shrinking oil reserve?

What is the U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR)? What are the implications of depleting the SPR, which the U.S. has been doing now since 2016? Further, what has been the impact of the rapid drawdown of the SPR that has taken place this year? Let’s discuss.   Source: Oil Price SPR 101 In December 1975, […]

Oil plunges below $80 to eight-month low as recession fears mount

Recession fears are slamming the oil market, with crude tumbling on Friday below $80 a barrel for the first time since January. The good news is the selloff should drive prices at the gas pump down, easing crushing inflation that has been harming consumers. The bad news is the sharp drop in oil prices is […]

Global crude oil demand continues to decelerate

Growth in global crude oil demand continues to decelerate, weighed down by renewed Chinese lockdowns and an ongoing slowdown in the OECD region, global energy body International Energy Agency said in its latest report. “Persistent demand weakness in China considerably slowed the pace of a summer ramp-up in refining activity. After reaching a post-Covid peak […]

Approaching peak phosphorus

Any long-term solution to the projected decline in phosphate supply must involve improving phosphorus use efficiency in crop plants. In times of rising food prices and global food insecurity it is important to remember the basic needs for productive and efficient agriculture. One of these needs is the use of fertilizer. While much research focuses […]

Europe’s Natural Gas Shortage Could Trigger A Food Crisis

Energy crises impact nearly every aspect of our lives, and that is particularly true of food markets, with food production next year expected to be severely threatened. About 70 percent of the cost of fertilizer production is solely the price of natural gas, and as the price of energy soars, the cost of making and […]

Putin Has Squandered Soviet Energy Legacy

This is part two of a condensed and lightly edited transcript of an interview with Soviet and Russian energy specialist Thane Gustafson. In part one, he described the evolution of the Russian energy industry under President Vladimir Putin until the eve of the war in Ukraine. Part two picks up with him describing the impact of […]

Energy Crisis Could Lead To Food Shortages In Europe

European farm and food groups said soaring energy prices could lead to shortages of fruit and vegetables, as high utility bills force more companies to curb production. “Refrigeration and cooling are very energy intensive, as is the heating of greenhouses,” said Pekka Pesonen, secretary general at Brussels-based farm lobby Copa-Cogeca. “We might expect some shortages […]

Questioning Technological Determinism

This is an essay in two parts on modern technology and its demise. Part I deals with the history of modern technology starting from the Industrial Revolution (1760-1830) and ending with the 2008 financial meltdown and the birth of the Fourth Industrial Revolution. In Part II we will show how this latest industrial revolution is […]

Let’s stop scaring the children

How long will it be before someone writes a book about all the “C”s currently crowding our collective consciousnesses? Cost of living; climate change; COP26; cryptocurrency and coercion towards control. Maybe even corruption or conspiracy theories? We mustn’t forget Covid! The fear is once again palpable. But there’s nothing new here! In 1982 in my […]

Biden Team Weighs New Oil Release

Officials within President Joe Biden’s administration are hunting for ways to head off a feared spike in oil prices later this year, including the possibility of an additional release from the nation’s emergency crude reserves. The officials are warning of an increase in prices this December when EU sanctions on Russian supplies take effect, unless […]

New UK Prime Minister To Freeze Energy Bill Prices For Two Years

Prime Minister Liz Truss has set out decisive action to support people and businesses with their energy bills and tackle the root causes of the issues in the UK energy market through increased supply – ensuring the country is not left in the same position again. Under new plans, a typical UK household will pay […]

Putin vs Europe – The Long War

”The economy of imaginary wealth is being inevitably replaced by the economy of real and hard assets”. Vladimir Putin, September 2022   Hi all, and welcome back to The Macro Compass! Last week, Vladimir Putin released a massive speech that clearly outlined his strategy to bring Europe to its knees. For decades, Europe’s business model […]

No Stream: EU gas markets brace for price surge after latest Russia gas cut

European gas buyers already grappling with record-high prices face further pain when the markets open on Monday after Russia said one of its main supply pipelines to Europe would remain shut indefinitely, sparking fears over energy rationing. Lower gas flows from Russia ahead of and following its February invasion of Ukraine have already pushed up […]

Europe Looks Set for Energy Rationing After Russian Gas Cut

Energy rationing in Europe this winter is starting to look all but inevitable. German officials on Saturday insisted that security of supply was guaranteed, at least for now, after Russia’s Gazprom PJSC made a last-minute decision not to turn the crucial Nord Stream pipeline back on after maintenance. Storage is filling up and new sources […]

EU Commission plans emergency powers

The European Commission is seeking emergency powers to intervene in the production of certain goods in critical situations, Germany’s Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (FAZ) newspaper reported, citing a draft of the proposal. The EU executive has been looking at how to avoid the supply bottlenecks that accompanied the coronavirus pandemic and no longer wants to rely […]

No, not Peak Oil again?

How Patterns of Peak, Plateau, and Decline Point to Fossil Fuels’ Accelerating End By  Kingsmill Bond,  Sam Butler-Sloss The Peaking Series – 1. Theory The Peaking Series is a new series mapping the vast mountain range of past and current peaks in fossil fuel demand. In country after country, sector after sector, fossil fuel demand […]

weekend drivers to enjoy cheaper gas

The final long weekend of summer will also be the cheapest for Canadian drivers, with gasoline prices heading into the Labour Day holiday the lowest they’ve been since late February. The national average retail price for regular gasoline on Thursday, according to Natural Resources Canada, was 161.1 cents per litre. The last time Canadians saw […]

Lukoil Chairman Dies After Hospital Window Fall

Chairman of Russia’s second-largest oil producer Lukoil Ravil Maganov died on Thursday after falling from the Central Clinical Hospital window in Moscow, media reports claimed. Some Russian media reported the death of 67-year-old Maganov who was also Lukoil’s vice president. One such media is RosBiznesConsulting (RBC), a media group headquartered in Moscow, and The Russia Times, […]

California Declares Grid Emergency

California officials declared a statewide grid emergency to cope with surging demand for power amid a blistering heat wave, raising the prospect of rolling blackouts. The California Independent System Operator issued a level-1 energy emergency alert around 3:10 p.m. local time Wednesday after tapping all of its available power supplies. The notice, which comes after […]

U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve Hits Lowest Level Since 1985

The U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR) hit historic lows this week as President Joe Biden continues to order a record release of barrels from the emergency stockpile. The SPR now sits at around 453 million barrels – the lowest level in 37 years. For perspective, the U.S. Energy Information Administration estimates that in 2021, the United States consumed an […]

Where We’ll End Up Living as the Planet Burns

While nations rally to reduce their carbon emissions, and try to adapt at-risk places to hotter conditions, there is an elephant in the room: for large portions of the world, local conditions are becoming too extreme and there is no way to adapt. People will have to move to survive. Over the next fifty years, hotter […]

The Status of Global Oil Production (Part 5)

  What are the Alternatives to Oil?  A key area in which oil distillates, which come from oil, are used is transportation.  In the U.S., ~70% of oil is used for transportation purposes.  In Part 5, I will focus on alternatives to oil in the transportation sector.  Environmentalists like to say that oil can be […]

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