The oil companies and the assassins — BP and Ocensa
The Guardian reports: A Colombian trade union leader is beginning an unprecedented claim for damages against BP in the high court in London, alleging the oil company’s complicity in his kidnap and...
View ArticleFort McKay: The Canadian town that sold itself to tar sands
The Guardian reports: Amid the strip mines and steam plants sprawled across the northern Alberta wilderness, Fort McKay is just a tiny dot on the map. It is also one of the single biggest source sites...
View ArticleMajor European oil companies call for carbon price
Big Oil — also known as the supermajors — refers, in order of size, to Exxon Mobil, Royal Dutch Shell, BP, Chevron, Total, and ConocoPhillips. Three American companies and three European companies. It...
View ArticleFossil fuel divestment is rational, says former Shell chairman
The Guardian reports: The former chairman of Shell has said that investors moving their money out of fossil fuel companies is a rational response to the industry’s “distressing” lack of progress on...
View ArticleHow to blow the fight against climate change
Bill McKibben writes: If historians someday need to explain how mankind managed to blow the fight against climate change, they need only point to last month’s shareholder meeting at Exxon Mobil...
View ArticleScientists call for halt to Canadian oil sands expansion
Climate Central reports: The controversial proposed Keystone XL Pipeline put Canada’s vast carbon-laden tar sands on the map for many Americans, with its builders promising that it would carry 800,000...
View ArticleOil demand will dry up faster than oil supply
Amory Lovins writes: Why would anyone want to be in the oil business? Like airlines, it’s a great industry but a bad business. Here are the most obvious challenges to its business model: Oil companies...
View ArticleArctic drilling approval threatens Obama’s climate legacy
InsideClimate News reports: The Obama administration’s final approval of Royal Dutch Shell’s drilling for oil in Alaska’s Chukchi Sea provoked an angry reaction on Monday from environmentalists who had...
View ArticleOil shock: Fears of unrest in petro economies as oil prices drop
The New York Times reports: While the price has been declining for months, forecasts have always been hedged with the assumption that oil would eventually stabilize or at least not stay low for long....
View ArticleHow ISIS became a petrostate
The Financial Times reports: Minutely managed, Isis’ oil company actively recruits skilled workers, from engineers to trainers and managers. Estimates by local traders and engineers put crude...
View ArticleIndigenous Canadians take leading role in battle against tar sands pipeline
The Guardian reports: Chief Na’Moks stood in the dark of a small smokehouse nestled in the Coast range of British Columbia. Hanging above him were nearly a thousand fish which glinted over the fire...
View ArticleOil nations feel the strain of OPEC’s continuing price war
The Telegraph reports: Oil is arguably Saudi Arabia’s best weapon against both Russia and Iran. Although the kingdom’s finances are under severe strain from the collapse in export revenues it can still...
View ArticleSaudi Arabia targets Russia in battle for European oil market
Reuters reports: From global majors such as Shell and Total to more modest Polish energy firms, oil refiners in Europe are cutting their longstanding use of Russian crude in favour of Saudi grades as...
View ArticleSaudis risk draining financial assets in 5 years, IMF says
Bloomberg reports: Saudi Arabia may run out of financial assets needed to support spending within five years if the government maintains current policies, the International Monetary Fund said,...
View ArticleTaking stock of ISIS oil
Matthew M. Reed writes: The early estimate for ISIS oil revenues was $2-3 million a day. Media coverage ran with that number and so did U.S. officials for a time. However, the price/volume assumptions...
View ArticleShell can’t afford to wait until 2050 to adapt its business to climate change
By Steffen Böhm, University of Essex Shell’s recent AGM was tumultuous. Shareholders voted overwhelmingly for the company to report on whether its activities were compatible with promised government...
View ArticleThe prize: Fighting for Libya’s oil wealth
International Crisis Group reports: Libya’s economic conditions could turn sharply for the worse, as rival authorities vie to control rapidly shrinking national wealth. The struggle affects oil fields,...
View ArticleChaos in Libya: It’s the oil, stupid
Issandr El Amrani writes: There seems no end to the bad news coming out of Libya. UN-led negotiations to unite the divided country — it has two parliaments, two governments, two militia coalitions that...
View ArticleArmed with intel, U.S. strikes curtail ISIS oil sector
Iraq Oil Report reports: An intensifying campaign of U.S. air strikes on the self-proclaimed Islamic State (IS) has nearly shut down its oil operations in Iraq and has hampered its more lucrative...
View ArticleIran sanctions: Middle East stock crash wipes £27bn off markets as Tehran...
The Telegraph reports: Stock markets across the Middle East saw more than £27bn wiped off their value as the lifting of economic sanctions against Iran threatened to unleash a fresh wave of oil onto...
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