Pakistan shuts largest gas field after gunbattle
Pakistani authorities suspended gas supplies from the country’s largest gas field after clashes between tribal militants and security forces killed four people, officials said.
Dollar on an oily slope
The unabated rise of international oil prices and depreciation of the dollar will push economic growth in the US down to about 2.5% in 2005, but will have little impact on economic growth in the European Union, where growth is expected to accelerate modestly.
Staring down the barrel of a crisis
The world’s oil production may be about to reach its peak – forever. Such apocalyptic prophecies often surface in the middle of the northern hemisphere winter. What is unusual is that this time the doomsday scenario has gained serious credibility among respected analysts and commentators.
An RV that can withstand nuclear radiation
Two private U.S. companies have designs on building the first luxury recreational vehicle that could withstand nuclear radiation.
US investigates risk of losing oil supplies from Venezuela
The US is investigating the risk of losing its share of Venezuela’s oil exports as the government of President Hugo Chávez seeks to steer more supplies towards China and other nations.
China Goes Beyond Oil in Forging Ties to Persian Gulf
Lured by the world’s largest oil reserves and some markets considered too risky by Western companies, China is quickly becoming a major economic player in the Persian Gulf, making deals in transportation and technology, showcasing its consumer goods and shoring up agreements to meet its enormous energy needs.
Saboteurs strike Iraq’s oil industry on daily basis: minister
Insurgents are carrying out at least one attack a day on Iraq’s vital oil infrastructure, at times shutting down all fuel lines to Baghdad, Oil Minister Thamer Ghadban said Thursday.
Thermodynamics of the Corn-Ethanol Biofuel cycle
Journal paper quantifying the degree of
non-renewability of a major biofuel: ethanol produced from industrially-grown corn. Extensive work seriously challenging the right of this process to renewable status, on net energy, soil depletion, and government subidy-dependence grounds.
America’s Finite Future?
Near the beginning of “Saturday Night Fever,” John Travolta’s Tony Manero, frustrated that his boss thinks he should save his salary instead of spending it on a new disco shirt, cries out, “fuck the future!” To which his boss replies: “No, Tony, you can’t fuck the future. The future fucks you! It catches up with you and it fucks you if you ain’t prepared for it!” Well, I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but America has morphed into a nation of Tony Maneros.
Hungry for hemp
The United States Drug Enforcement Administration recently abandoned, without comment, its three-year effort to ban commercial foods made from or containing nonpsychoactive industrial hemp seed and hemp oil.
Worldwide capacity of solar thermal energy greatly underestimated
The International Energy Agency’s Solar Heating and Cooling Programme and major solar thermal trade associations have published new statistics on the use of solar thermal energy. The new data – expressed for the first time in GWth, rather than in square meters of installed collector area – shows the global installed capacity to be 70 GWth (70.000 MWth).
Sustainable Energy From Vegetable Oil
An excellent practical guide to the techniques of using vegetable oil as a transportation fuel which acknowledges also some of this approach’s large scale limitations.
