Saudis Raise Oil Pricing to US and Asia

Saudi Arabia raised pricing for August oil shipments to Asia, the U.S. and northern Europe amid signs that energy demand is continuing to recover from its coronavirus-triggered collapse. The move comes as the world’s biggest crude exporter pushes other major producers to join it in cutting supply to re-balance the market. State producer Saudi Aramco […]

‘The crisis is far from over.’ World economy faces an uphill climb

The world economy is entering the second half of 2020 still deeply weighed down by the COVID-19 pandemic, with a full recovery now ruled out for this year and even a 2021 comeback dependent on a lot going right. It’s a scenario few if any predicted at the start of the year when most economists […]

How the Pandemic Is Changing the Outlook for Peak Oil

One big question emerging from the pandemic is whether it will speed up the global shift away from oil. Life under lockdown gave a taste of a world that burns less petroleum, with consumption down by about a quarter and city dwellers from Los Angeles to New Delhi relishing the cleaner air. As restrictions eased, […]

Oil demand to return to pre-pandemic levels by 2022

Analysts at Goldman Sachs expect global oil demand to return to pre-pandemic levels by 2022, citing a pick-up in commuting, a shift to private transportation and higher infrastructure spending. In a research note published Thursday, analysts at the U.S. investment bank estimated global oil demand would decline by 8% in 2020, rebound by 6% in […]

An Open Letter to the Permaculture and Transition Movements

Back in 2008, around the same time I was beginning my work as an intern with Transition Boulder County, the first official Transition Initiative in North America, I completed a 10-day Permaculture Design Certification Course at the Central Rocky Mountain Permaculture Institute in Basalt, Colorado. I had recently read The Transition Handbook: From Oil Dependency […]

Why BP bailed on the oil industry’s one “bright spot”

Plastics were supposed to be a lifeline for Big Oil. Even before the coronavirus pandemic bottomed out demand for gasoline and jet fuel, the global transition toward climate-friendly energy and electric vehicles had hobbled their long-term outlook. Keen to diversify, Exxon, Shell, Chevron, Saudi Aramco, and other oil majors have been collectively spending $40 billion a […]

The Great Staycation

In the Northern hemisphere, summer is arriving and many families are deciding what to do for their holidays; trying to balance concerns about their finances and their fear of Covid-19, with their desire for fun and relaxation. With airlines mostly still grounded, and many facing fundamental questions over their futures, the pandemic may instead be […]

Demand for fossil fuels may not ever return to 2019 peak levels

New Analysis by Boston Consulting Group Reveals That the COVID-19 Crisis May Have Brought Forward an Expected Decline in Demand for Fossil Fuels by More Than a Decade, Making a Return to the 2019 Peak Unlikely While the short-term economic fallout of the global COVID-19 pandemic has already become visible, the crisis may have a […]

Oil Is Back to $40 What Does That Signal?

After dipping into negative territory crude is back ato $40. What does that mean? Oil analyst Phil Flynn says Oil’s Road Back to $40 Signals Economic and Job Snap Back. The road back to $40-a-barrel oil was fraught with fear and uncertainty, but eclipsing that benchmark indicates the beginning of a strong recovery from the […]

Coronavirus: a wake-up call to strengthen the global food system

Global food production is incredibly efficient, and the world’s farmers produce enough to feed the global population. Despite this abundance, a quarter of the global population do not have regular access to sufficient and nutritious food. A growing and more affluent population will further increase the global demand for food and create stresses on land, […]

Jevons Paradox

The Jevons paradox is that efficiency enables growth. New technologies that can produce more goods from a given amount of resources allow the economy as a whole to produce more. More resources get used overall. This is the magic of industrial capitalism and the secret of growth. Economists have known it for a long time. […]

Global oil demand could hit record growth rate next year, IEA warns

Fatih Birol, executive director of the International Energy Agency, forecasts that the world’s daily oil demand will climb by 5.7m barrels next year. Photograph: Altaf Hussain/Reuters   The world’s oil demand could climb at its fastest rate in the history of the market next year, and may reach pre-crisis levels within years, unless new green […]

Oil Demand Isn’t Roaring Back Yet

It was too good to be true. Last weekend’s OPEC+ meeting took a decision in record time to extend deep output cuts that had halted a dramatic slide in prices — and members even agreed to abide by them. The timing was perfect. The deal would keep oil from flooding the market, allowing time for demand […]

It’s The Oil Demand, Stupid!

For oil markets the 2020 story is not as much about supply as it is about demand, or rather its lack. To be sure the oil price war between Saudi Arabia and Russia rocked the markets. But soon it became clear that there is not enough demand for the additional volumes that either country wanted […]

From environmental villain to pandemic hero — plastic is back

During the height of the Flint water crisis, CNN introduced us to Gina Luster, her 7-year-old daughter, and 13-year-old niece. The network’s in-depth profile described the family’s physical devastation from the city’s lead-contaminated water and their daily lifeline: bottled water. By CNN’s count, this family of three depended on 151 bottles of water a day […]

Responding to Collapse, Shortages of Money, Part 2

A high water level, wind, big waves and temperatures below freezing combine to create ice sculptures along Lake Huron.   I am writing this in late March of 2020 and it seems that hardly anyone else is writing anything that doesn’t focus on the COVID-19 pandemic. A few posts back I said that shortages of […]

IEA: Oil Demand to Soon Exceed Pre-Lockdown Level

Alternate Title: Peak Oil Foiled Again Guest “too fracking funny for words” by David Middleton IEA chief says low oil prices will take demand beyond pre-crisis highs By JAVIER BLAS on 5/25/2020 LONDON (Bloomberg) –Global oil consumption hasn’t peaked, the head of the International Energy Agency warned, throwing cold water on hopes the coronavirus will […]

Will Covid-19 Delay Peak Oil?

With global demand having fallen by about 29 million barrels per day from a year ago, it seems like this pandemic might delay peak oil production while the pandemic and consequent depression lasts, since so much less oil is being consumed. On top of that, storage is getting full, so many oil producers are being […]

Peak Oil Isn’t Here But It Could Be In Sight

By one oil consultancy’s estimate, Peak Oil will be here by 2028, or two years sooner than it previously had predicted, according to Reuters. That ceiling would be somewhere north of 100 million barrels per day, just above the rate hit in 2019. And while normally one might dismiss this as a mere educated guess, […]

The Severity of Global Hunger 2020

Most Americans do not regard hunger as a problem, let alone understand the magnitude of its scope. If you really want to know about the severity of the global hunger – and if you are willing to do something about it, read on.According to World Hunger Day.org and Mercy Corps: More than 820 million people […]

Global Oil Demand Hasn’t Yet Peaked, Energy Watchdog Predicts

Global oil consumption hasn’t peaked, the head of the International Energy Agency warned, throwing cold water on hopes the coronavirus will cap demand and reduce climate-changing emissions. “In the absence of strong government policies, a sustained economic recovery and low oil prices are likely to take global oil demand back to where it was, and […]

Steady State Economics: We’ve Got Some (Systems) Thinking To Do

In this time of impending economic and ecological crises, we urgently need to aim for a sustainable or ‘steady state’ economy. In order to get there, we will need to adopt a ‘systems-thinking’ outlook taking into account the interconnections of our complex world. We will also need to consider the issue of de-growth, and re-prioritise […]

Crisis Hits Oil Industry and Energy Transition Alike

While it attempts to cushion the effects of the coronavirus pandemic, the Latin American and Caribbean region also faces concerns about the future of the energy transition and state-owned oil companies. These questions were discussed at the 29th La Jolla Energy Conference, organised by the Institute of the Americas. It was held online May 18-22, […]

Oil Market Rationalizes Economic Activity

“Davidson” submits: Looking at the details, the higher $WTI pricing becomes evident. US Crude Production has fallen to 11.5mil BBL/Day Exxon restart refinery-Refinery Inputs rise Gasoline Inv rise a little but US Crude Inv falls ~5mil BBL     Oil prices are rising sharply with the early evidence supplied from Initial Unemployment Claims falling rapidly […]

From Energy Transition to Energy Reduction

With the wholesale price for US crude oil famously, if briefly, turning negative recently, and – slightly less famously – with commenters in a thread under my last post suggesting that it’s technically straightforward to transition the existing energy system largely to renewables, it feels the time is right to address some post-lockdown and post-carbon energy realities. […]

From Supply Glut To Energy Shock

Summary Oil demand dropped from a record peak of 100 mbd reached in 2019 to a recent low of 70 mbd. At $20 oil, no one is making money and if prices continue at these levels for the next year, just about every oil company will be on life support or out of business, including […]

Peak Oil Isn’t Here But It Could Be In Sight

The huge drop-off in demand for oil because of the coronavirus pandemic has some analysts talking about Peak Oil, something we’ve been talking about in these parts for what seems like forever. It still doesn’t seem likely to happen anytime in the near-term, though because of the slow rise of electric cars, we are getting […]

A Huge Fleet Of 117 Tankers Is Bringing Super Cheap Crude To China

While the rest of the world is tentatively coming out of lockdowns, China is taking advantage of the cheapest crude oil in years to stock up as demand is starting to return in the world’s largest oil importer, Bloomberg reported on Friday, citing tanker-tracking data it has compiled. At present, a total of 117 very large crude […]

Oil Posts Two-Month High

Oil rose to levels not seen since Covid-19 lockdowns paralyzed the world’s largest economy, lifted by signs of recovering demand and news of a viable coronavirus vaccine. Futures in New York climbed 8.1% Monday, the highest level since mid-March. Chinese oil use is at 13 million barrels a day, just shy of the levels of a year […]

The slow burn of a long-term slowdown

We’re not in a space race anymore, or an arms race, or any kind of race right now. And even if we were, it doesn’t seem like we’d be winning. As fast-moving as it may feel, the world has really been slowing down for decades. From the global population, to the economy, to technology, the […]

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