Tag: climate change

Best in Energy – 26 May 2023

Nickel trade flows transformed after price spikes (Reuters)¹

Maritime services firms end contracts with Gatik (Reuters)

U.S. shale slows research and development spend (Reuters)

China puts first commercial airframe into service (Reuters)

India’s coal generation and changing climate (Bloomberg)

Semiconductor firms push back against U.S. controls (WSJ)

U.S./China semiconductor security controls broaden (WSJ)

Norway’s complicated policy on oil and gas emissions (FT)

¹ Spiking commodity prices usually encourage changes in behaviour and innovation that have long-term impacts on production and consumption. In nickel’s case the surge in prices to more than $50,000 per tonne in 2007 has encouraged a long-term shift from cathodes and other highly refined forms of nickel to nickel pig iron (NPI) and other forms of lower-quality metal. At the time, many observers predicted users would never switch wholesale to NPI because of its quality issues. But businesses and markets are good at innovating around bottlenecks if the price incentive is strong enough.

EUROPE’s gas storage reached two-thirds full on May 24, the second earliest date in the last 13 years, and 57 days earlier than the average since 2011:

EUROPE’s gas prices are slumping to encourage more consumption by power generators and industrial users and slow the accumulation of inventories. Front-month futures have fallen to €25 per megawatt-hour down from €77 at the start of 2023 and a peak of almost €340 in August 2022:

Best in Energy – 25 May 2023

U.S. LNG exports and impact on domestic prices (EIA)

OPEC⁺ expected to leave output unchanged (Bloomberg)

Greenhouse effect’s intellectual history (Conversation)

Mining as limiting factor for energy transition (Reuters)

Asia coal imports rebound in 2023 (Reuters)

China/Russia gas pipeline negotiations (FT)

U.S. airlines report more near-misses (WSJ)

U.S./China cyber-espionage (Reuters)

(see also joint statement by Five Eyes)

U.S. PETROLEUM INVENTORIES including the strategic reserve depleted by -12 million barrels in the seven days ending on May 19 to the lowest seasonal level since 2004. There was a major drawdown in commercial crude stocks (-12 million barrels) with smaller draws in gasoline (-2 million) and distillate fuel oil (-0.5 million) but a small build in jet fuel (+1 million). Commercial crude stocks are in line with the prior ten-year seasonal average (+0.01 standard deviations) but there are substantial deficits in gasoline (-1.20 standard deviations) and distillates (-1.45 standard deviations):