Those Darn Speculators Again
Looks like those darn speculators are messing with the price of oil again: The latest data from the Commodity Futures Trading Commission showed a large jump in bets by hedge funds on oil prices falling.
Archive of posts filed under the energy category.
Energy Tradeoffs
Kurt Zenz House lays out the reasons to both laud France’s insight 30 years ago to go nuclear, as well as be concerned: So today, France looks rather smart. It acted decisively in the 1970s to limit its dependence on fossil fuels, and now it’s better positioned than any other non-oil-exporting power to deal with …
The Price of Gasoline
Just playing with a chart from a Google spreadsheet. Data source: EIA
Global Supply Chains Hit by High Energy Costs
Larry Rohter had a story in the New York Times over the weekend that began to answer one of the questions I’ve had about the embedded energy costs in the things we buy: The cost of shipping a 40-foot container from Shanghai to the United States has risen to $8,000, compared with $3,000 early in …
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A remarkable graph from the latest International Energy Agency Oil Market Report: The purple line is total monthly vehicle miles travelled in the United States. The blue is percentage change year-over-year.
Everything’s Bigger in China
China is big coal, but also big green, according to Bloomberg: China is already the world’s largest renewable-energy producer as measured by installed generating capacity, according to a report today from the Climate Group, a coalition of companies and governments that support solutions to global warming. The country is also the world’s top manufacturer of …
Coal-to-liquids
One of my crude measures of the long range energy picture has always been coal-to-liquids. At some price (the usual number I hear is somewhere at or above $60 or $70 a barrel) it becomes economical to make liquid fuels out of coal. Given Appell’s Theorem, it has seemed inevitable to me that, regardless of …
Eschew the Drive-through
Al Zelicoff’s energy tip of the week almost sounds like a no-brainer: skip the drive-through window. But it’s amazing how many of these really are no-brainers. The question: how to get them in people’s brains?
Energy Quote of the Week
I’m more interested right now in the correct questions than the clear answers: Is the price of oil today too high given the fundamentals? Could be. Is it too low? Could be. But one thing I’m sure that’s too high is the confidence on the part of those who insist they know the answer. James …
Natural Gas Rising
While we’ve all been watching gasoline go through the roof (easy to spot – sign on every street corner), natural gas has been quietly doubling in price as well. My colleague Win Quigley has a story in this morning’s paper, and Al Zelicoff, who’s been helping the paper with consumer energy saving tips, put together …