Insight and inspiration in turbulent times.
Andrew McKillop argues that up to a point, high oil prices can stimulate economies. However, ways must be found to rapidly decrease oil demand as leaving it to the market will necessarily lead to a new ‘Great Depression’.
Alarm is spreading that President Bush may seek a military draft, or mobilize more of the National Guard and Army Reserve, to obtain enough combat troops to wage his bogged-down Iraq war.
Analysts at Deutsche Bank believe that, after 2008, almost half the opportunities for oil companies will be in LNG, GTL and the Venezuelan and Canadian oil sands, with deep water projects making up another quarter of the expected openings. But oil companies diverge on the need to get into such projects.
BHP Billiton will consider spinning off its oil and gas division if the market continues to undervalue the business, according to Chip Goodyear, chief executive of the Anglo-Australian group.
One of the reasons for the crippling food shortage is a radical change in the pattern of cultivation, from wheat – the country’s staple commodity – to poppy.
Shell Canada outlined $4 billion worth of expansions and de-bottlenecking at its Athabasca Oil Sands Project yesterday. The work will eventually bring the project to 500,000 barrels per day in production.
Russian leaders are acutely aware of the need to maintain a delicate balance between the looming giant that is China, and the pesky neighbor that is Japan.
Proved reserves of natural gas increased for the fifth year in a row, according to “Advance Summary: U.S. Crude Oil, Natural Gas, and Natural Gas Liquids Reserves 2003 Annual Report” released today by the Energy Information Administration. U.S. natural gas reserves increased by 1 percent in 2003.
OIL giant Royal Dutch/Shell has announced plans to invest £8 billion a year over the next two years to boost its reserves and production, as it tries to move on from the reserves scandal that rocked the company earlier this year
Testifying before a House Small Business subcommittee on behalf of the American Farm Bureau Federation, Missouri farmer Hal Swaney said increased energy costs over the 2003 through 2004 growing season have cost farmers more than $6 billion in added expenses to produce the food and fiber for this country.
Almost anytime is a good time for Alan Greenspan and other presidents or directors of central banks in Europe and Japan to remind the faithful that “extreme oil prices” act as a kind of energy tax, and in official central banker mythology ‘can only reduce economic growth,’ and of course raise inflation.
A Man-Made rainforest that should have taken millennia to evolve has baffled scientists by springing up in just 150 years.
