3/17: China ‘ready’ for energy co-operation with US: (Financial Times) - “In the field of energy, China and the US are not competitors,” Qin Gang, foreign ministry spokesperson, said during a press briefing. “China stands ready to co-operate with the US and other countries … on the basis of equality and mutual benefit.”

3/17: Dime-Store Psychology of our energy Problem: (UNplanning Journal -- from July of 2005) - ...whatever interpretation of the future one may have is based on past trends and personal experiences.  Peak energy turns this understanding on its head. For if any given individual takes the time to understand the ideas of depletion and limits to growth and grasp their implications, they will arrive at an unsettling realization: everything they believed would occur was just an illusion or a false promise. For many people it is simply too much to handle and thus you see the various coping mechanisms. 

3/17: Behind the Scenes: Powering the Planet: (Frank Sessno - CNN) - Regarding the making of CNN Presents' "We Were Told: This was, to be honest, simply a different kind of journalism. I've never done anything quite like it. It was time travel, globe-trekking and fact-checking all rolled into one. It was about oil and our addiction to it, how we keep it flowing and what happens if the supply is interrupted. At every turn, I discovered something new and saw the complexity and the global nature of it all.

3/16: Malaysian Leader: The Era of Cheap Oil Is Over: (Yahoo!/AP) - Deputy Prime Minister Najib Razak has urged Malaysians to brace for further hikes in fuel prices, warning that the era of cheap oil was over.  The government on Feb. 28 sharply raised retail prices of gasoline, diesel and liquefied petroleum gas by as much as 23 percent.

3/16: Poll: Most Americans fear vulnerability of oil supply: (CNN/USA Today) - Although Americans don't believe the country faces an imminent energy crisis, most believe there are "major problems" --- from potential oil shortages to possible terrorist attacks -- and they are harshly critical of the leadership on the issue from the White House, according to a new CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll.  The poll, which was released Wednesday afternoon, also indicates that roughly three out of four Americans -- 77 percent -- fear the supply of oil will not be able to keep up with global demand.

3/16: G8 Energy Ministers Moscow Meeting on Energy Security Begins: (Dow Jones) - Russia hosted energy ministers from the world's richest countries Thursday for discussions on energy security - the centerpiece theme of its chairmanship of the Group of Eight industrialized nations.  Opening the talks Thursday, Russian Energy Minister Viktor Khristenko said the  July summit in St. Petersburg would be a "major milestone on the road to building a world system of energy security," the Interfax news agency quoted him as saying.

3/16: OPEC Research Director Sees $50-$60 Oil for Next Few Years: (Dow Jones) - Oil prices are likely to hover around $50 to $60 a barrel for the next few years, Russian news agency RIA Novosti reported Thursday, citing the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries' director of research.

3/16: Pentagon To unveil Energy Conservation Effort: (DefenseNews.com) - The Pentagon will shortly unveil a military-wide program aimed at conserving energy that is expected to address what President George W. Bush termed America’s “addiction to oil” during his State of the Union address in January.

 3/16:  Questions from SXSW: Will we be destroyed by an oil crisis or the credit card companies?: (Salon.com) - I sat breathless through the final minutes of the documentary "OilCrash," maybe the ultimate feel-bad apocalyptic film ever made and the one true knockout at SXSW this year. Their message: The era of oil is nearly at an end, and the social and economic consequences are barely imaginable.  [Ed Note:  Crude Awakening strongly endorsed this film and assisted the Producers with its World Premier in Austin.]  

3/15: Experts: Hydrogen economy possible in time: (MSNBC Staff) - A transition to a pollution-free, hydrogen economy is possible but not for several decades, and efforts should be made in the meantime to curb pollution and reduce fossil fuel dependency via other methods, a panel of experts concluded in a new report for the National Academy of Sciences.

3/15: Germany moves ahead with major wind project: (Reuters) - Germany has approved a second offshore wind energy project in the Baltic Sea with 330 megawatt (MW) capacity, the relevant authority BSH said on Wednesday.

3/15: Safety Upgrades Will Cut Norwegian Offshore Oil Production by 30 Percent for Several Days: (Assoc. Press) - The platforms being shut down are Troll C, operated by Norwegian oil company Norsk Hydro ASA, and Ekofisk 2/4 J, operated by ConocoPhillips.  The companies said the upgrades will reduce flows for three or four days by about 730,000 barrels per day at two of the offshore fields that make Norway the world's third largest oil exporter, after Saudi Arabia and Russia.

3/15: US says will still need more foreign oil: (Reuters) - Top global energy consumer the United States on Wednesday sought to assure producers that it will need even more of their oil and gas, despite a longer term aim to cut dependence on imports.  U.S. Energy Sect'y Sam Bodman said suppliers could count on a healthy U.S. import market for some time to come, adding that demand reduction measures, such as use of nuclear power and cellulose-based ethanol, had a long horizon.

3/15: Pickens sees $5 per gallon gasoline worldwide: (AP Wire) - Texas oilman T. Boone Pickens suggested Tuesday that the short-term solution to oil supply and demand problems is high gasoline prices at the pump - perhaps $5 per gallon. "By 2020, you're going to need 125 million barrels a day for the world. And I've already said I don't think you can get above 85. That's a long way from 125 - a long way. So price has to do it."

3/14: IEA sees potential for high oil prices in next few months: (AFP) - The IEA, in its monthly market report, noted a recent fall in prices from January levels but added: "A look at fundamentals suggests that while there may be some justification for a moderation in prices, the road ahead is far from smooth."

3/14: President Putin Advocates Energy Dialog With All World Powers: (RIA Novosti) - An overwhelming majority of Western experts view President Vladimir Putin's article published in The Wall Street Journal on February 28, 2006, as an attempt to convince the West of Russia's reliability as an energy partner. However, the article discloses the Russian leaders' strategic plans and approaches that go much farther and even points to certain disagreements among the Russian elite on the global energy problem

3/14: Bartlett: Peak Oil in Congress - one year on: (US Congressional Record) - This is a transcript of a speech given before the US House of Representatives on March 14th, 2006.  Note the "previous" "next" page links at the bottom of each page to navigate.

3/14: CFTC Reauthorization Suggests Energy Trading Rules Changes: (Oil & Gas Financial) - Some congressional members advocate reforming energy market regulations through pending legislation to reauthorize the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission, and at least one CFTC commissioner urges caution.  CTFC Commissioner Sharon Brown-Hruska said efforts to impose additional regulations on energy futures and over-the-counter markets are “veiled in a call for greater transparency.” Advocates of such a move are “misguided,” she said.

3/14: Warnings Were Ignored Of Looming British Gas Crisis: (Guardian) - The latest gas price crisis - signalled yesterday when National Grid warned of supply shortages - will be blamed by the government and energy supply firms in Britain on the unwillingness of continental Europe to open up its markets and provide supplies at times of need.

3/14: Petroleum Closing in on Nadir; World's Oil on Slippery Downhill Ride: (Red Orbit) - MATT SIMMONS might be small in stature, but he's a giant in the worldwide oil industry.   Chairman of a specialized energy investment banking firm which has completed more than 700 investment projects for energy clients at a combined dollar value of at least $US70 billion, he's also energy adviser to the Bush Administration.  So when Matt Simmons says the world is rushing headlong into an energy crisis the likes of which has never been experienced before, then people should sit up and take notice.

3/14: Fox: Deep-water oil find may top Cantarell: (BusinessWeek Online) - Mexico has made a deep-water oil discovery in the Gulf of Mexico that could be larger than the country's giant Cantarell offshore field,  President Vicente Fox said on Monday. The oil find is under 950 meters (3,117 feet) of water and a further 4,000 meters (13,120 feet) underground, Fox said in an interview with Dow Jones Newswires. The find will be formally announced Tuesday.  [ED: Find equals approx. 10Bn barrels, or roughly the equivalent of a three month global supply at current consumption rates.]

3/13: US hopes to reverse oil decline by burying CO₂: (Reuters) - Wanted: carbon dioxide. Large quantity needed to help superpower reverse declining oil output and halt rising emissions of heat-trapping gases.

3/13: Senate Panel To Scrutinize Big Oil Mergers & Profits: (Reuters) - Oil companies and their record profits come under more congressional scrutiny on Tuesday, when a Senate committee holds a hearing on the effect industry mergers have had on gasoline and other energy prices.

3/12: The Future of Natural Gas Pricing Could Be a Trans-Atlantic Tug of War: (NY Times) - JUST when natural gas prices seemed likely to hit the moon this winter, much of the United States had the warmest January in history. With gas inventories high, prices plunged. Natural gas is now unusually cheap relative to oil.  United States natural gas is also cheap relative to gas in Britain, and traders think that pattern will persist into next winter — notwithstanding the fact that the weather is notoriously hard to predict.  "Once it gets really cold, you have both sides of the Atlantic bidding for the same gas," said Francisco Blanch, a commodity strategist at Merrill Lynch in London. "This winter we had a very cold period in November and December, and there was a lot of competition" among Britain, Spain and the United States.

3/12: Toward A Long Range Energy Security policy: (US Army War College) - A linear projection has oil supplies running out around 2030 after a long period of rising prices and tightening supplies, likely to begin after production peaks, generally expected to be sometime between 2010 and 2020—maybe just five years away.  The consequences of a shortfall in oil supplies on the scale of such predictions are as obvious as they are terrifying.

3/12: US Army: Peak Oil and the Army's Future: (Energy Bulletin) - “The days of inexpensive, convenient, abundant energy sources are quickly drawing to a close,” according to a recently released US Army strategic report. The report posits that a peak in global oil production looks likely to be imminent, with wide reaching implications for the US Army and society in general. [Report.  General Conclusions begin on page 73.]

3/11: What if Daniel Yergin is Wrong?: (Resource Insights) - Daniel Yergin is the oil optimist that peak oil believers love to hate. He says there is plenty of oil and the peak is decades away.  He is president of Cambridge Energy Research Associates (CERA), perhaps the most well-respected energy consulting firm in the world.

3/10: Ethanol prices rise as supplies tighten: (Des Moines Register) - Motorists may soon have a harder time finding gasoline that contains corn-based ethanol — even at some Iowa stations. And drivers are already seeing pump prices rise.  Refiners are buying supplies of ethanol in the Midwest, where the alcohol is primarily produced, and moving it to the East Coast and Texas.

3/10: Top Chinese official calls for reduction in oil exports: (World Peace herald) - "Customs statistics showed that in the first six months last year, China exported 7.59 million tons of oil products, a year-on-year increase of 48.6 per cent," said Guo Rongchang, a member of the 10th National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, the country's top advisory body. "It means that while domestic consumers were suffering from the 'oil thirst,' our petroleum companies were selling a large quantity of their products abroad.

3/10: Ecuador Oil Workers Strike Ends, Output Gradually Recovers: (Rigzone) - Petroecuador's E&P arm Petroproduccion is gradually resuming oil production after a 48-hour oil workers strike ended on Wednesday, the company said in a statement.  Armed forces cleared access roads to the main oil producing fields, allowing production to resume, the statement said.

3/09: Many damaged Gulf oil rigs won't be repaired: (Reuters) - Much of the oil and natural gas production still shut-in after last year's hurricanes in the Gulf of Mexico will stay offline because it would not be economical for companies to rebuild the production platforms, Energy Secretary Sam Bodman told Congress today.

3/09: 50 Years After Hubbert’s Prediction Peak Oil Goes Mainstream: (SF Informatics) - Derided at the time, legendary geophysicist correctly predicted U.S. oil production peak; new chart shows "Hubbert's Peak" for the world is arriving on schedule.

3/09: Specter mulls plan to rein in big oil, OPEC: (Reuters) - With the chiefs of big U.S. energy companies headed to Capitol Hill next week to discuss record profits, a key U.S. Republican senator is weighing a plan to discourage mergers and profiteering.  Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania is drawing up legislation that would boost federal authority to block oil and gas mergers and prosecute companies that try to exacerbate supply shortages, according to a draft distributed by the committee on Thursday.

3/09: Survey respondents favor alternative fuels: (Detroit Free Press) - country is facing an energy crisis and that government and private industry should invest billions of dollars to increase the role renewable fuels play in the nation's economy.  Those are the sentiments of a new survey of 1,000 registered voters commissioned by Energy Future Coalition, a nonpartisan public policy initiative in Washington, D.C.

3/09: Huntington Beach Councilor Debbie Cook on peak oil: (Global Public media - audio) - Huntington Beach City Councilor Debbie Cook speaks with David Room about how people can engage their municipal government on issues such as peak oil. She suggests concrete methods of establishing relationships and communicating with councilors that generally work better than haranguing the councilors at their monthly meeting. She also talks about her experiences in trying to raise awareness of peak oil with her colleagues and peers in municipal government.

3/07: The Coming Resource Wars: (Tom Paine.CommonSense) - It's official: the era of resource wars is upon us.  In a major London address, British Defense Secretary John Reid warned that global climate change and dwindling natural resources are combining to increase the likelihood of violent conflict over land, water and energy.  Climate change, he indicated, “will make scarce resources, clean water, viable agricultural land even scarcer”—and this will “make the emergence of violent conflict more rather than less likely.”

3/07: OPEC President Edmund Daukoru discusses oil prices, potential supply threats: (E&E TV - Video) - OPEC President Edmund Daukoru explains why he thinks $60 per barrel is a "fair" price for oil, and why prices are unlikely to fall much further. Daukoru, the minister of state for petroleum resources for Nigeria, also addresses the rebel insurgency in his own country and questions about whether Iran will continue to supply the market as diplomats work towards a deal on nuclear power.

3/07: Why the nation's largest community garden must become a Wal-Mart warehouse: (Gristmill) - The fate of LA's South Central Community Garden, the largest of its kind in the United States, looks fairly straightforward: It sits on private property, and its owner wants to sell it for development. The 300 or so families who garden there, most of whom by all accounts live under the poverty line, will have to find a new source of food.

3/07: Lambs to the Slaughter: (Sierra Club) - A few weeks ago, ExxonMobil slapped President Bush in the face by declaring that, in spite of the President's State of the Union call for energy independence, the world is now, and must continue to be, held hostage to OPEC and Middle Eastern oil. Now the company has picked up the cudgel of deep denial again. In its favorite spot on the op-ed page of the New York Times, it proclaimed, "Peak Oil? Contrary to the theory, oil production shows no sign of a peak."  However, careful readers of the company's annual analyses of energy trends, intended for its own key stakeholders, know that ExxonMobil doesn't believe its own hype.

3/07: Chevron to Boost Oil and Gas Production: (Associated Press) - Chevron Corp. sought to ameliorate Wall Street on Tuesday by pledging that its oil and natural gas production would rise 24 percent by 2010, and it announced plans for a possible major expansion of a Mississippi refinery.

3/07: Energy minister says Alberta has enough oil to last for centuries: (Canadian Press) - Alberta has enough oil in its tarsands region to last for hundreds of years, says Energy Minister Greg Melchin.  Albertans and Canadians shouldn't be concerned about Americans draining oil to meet a growing thirst for energy in the United States, the minister said Tuesday. "We have centuries of supplies," Melchin said. "And our policies are built on a lot of trade, the United States being our most valuable customer.

3/07: US, Global 1Q Oil Demand Weaker than Expected -EIA: (FWN Select) - Oil demand growth in the U.S. and globally was lower than expected in the first quarter, the federal Energy Information Administration said in a report Tuesday.  Global second-quarter demand [forecast] was trimmed by 100,000 b/d from the month-earlier forecast, to 83.7 million b/d, and is expected to grow by 1.7% from a year ago, instead of 1.8% as projected last month.

3/07: Egypt to Present Oil Price Stability Plan at OPEC Meeting: (FWN Financial Select) - Egypt's Minister of Petroleum Sameh Fahmy will present a plan designed to stabilize international oil markets when he meets in Vienna with ministers of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries Wednesday, a statement issued by his ministry said Tuesday.

3/07: Local Solutions To The Energy Dilemma to Be Addressed at Upcoming Conference: (PR Web) - Over 30 leading experts in energy, agriculture, economics, engineering, geology, politics, transportation and sustainability will gather during the final week of April to address the local impact of what is viewed to be an impending crisis in world affairs.

3/06: Frank Sesno to present new Documentaary on Oil Crisis: (CNN Presents) - Frank Sesno, professor of public policy and communication and CNN special correspondent, will present his latest CNN documentary about America’s energy reliance, "We Were Warned: Tomorrow's Oil Crisis."  The program is part of CNN’s award-winning documentary series "CNN Presents." It is scheduled to air on CNN on Saturday, March 18, at 8 p.m., with a rebroadcast that night at 11 p.m., and Sunday, March 19, at 8 and 11 p.m.

: 3/06: Complacent and addicted: (The Minnesota Daily) - Despite lack of debate, there are clear signs that a permanent oil shortage is around the corner.  To understand the full implications of this fact, it is important not to lose sight of the role that plentiful supplies of inexpensive petroleum have played in maintaining the American way of life.

3/06: BP's Prudhoe Bay Output Cut After Pipeline Leak: (AFX News Limited) - The leak forced the shutdown of the gathering centers and up to 245 wells as BP worked to contain the spill.  Approximately 100,000 barrels of oil per day were affected by the shutdown--nearly one-fifth of the 470,000 bpd being produced at Prudhoe Bay, the biggest oil field in the U.S

3/06: Militants Threaten to Blow up More Oil Facilities in Niger Delta: (Deutsche Presse-Agentur (dpa)) - With three of the nine expatriate oil workers kidnapped in the Niger Delta in February yet to be released, ethnic Ijaw militants of the region have threatened to blow up more oil facilities to halve Nigeria's daily oil production of 2.6 billion barrels.

3/06: Venezuela Demands Royalties: (Bloomberg) - Venezuela, the world's fifth-largest oil exporter, is demanding that the country's four heavy-oil joint ventures pay their royalties in crude rather than in cash.  "We can gain a lot more" with this kind of payment, Energy and Oil Minister Rafael Ramirez told reporters Thursday in Caracas. Ramirez said Feb. 16 that the ventures would have the option of paying their 16.67 percent royalties in cash.  The companies in the ventures include Exxon Mobil, Chevron, ConocoPhillips, and France's Total

3/06: Gulf Energy Firms Hurting: (New York Times) - The huge task of fixing the country's most important energy hub is far from over. Six months after Hurricane Katrina battered the gulf with 175-mph winds and waves higher than eight-story buildings, more than a quarter of the region's oil output remains shut.  Shortages, amounting to 6 percent of the country's domestic production, have worsened a global picture of razor-thin margins of supply, playing a central part in keeping oil prices around $60 a barrel.

3/05: South Africa: Power woes won't be over for a while: ( iOL) - South Africa and the Western Cape in particular face at least six more years of electricity shortages - because Eskom misread the country's economic future.

3/05: Tanzania: Government Struggles to Cope With Food, Power Deficit: (AllAfrica.com) - The East African drought has caused food and power shortages in Tanzania and forced the government to implement measures to offset potentially serious humanitarian consequences.

3/03: Outlook 2006: World [Oil] Prices and Supply: (World Oil Review) - Annual outlook written by Matthew Simmons, Chairman of the world's largest energy investment bank.  "Like it or not, 2006 will be eventful for oil. It will also be the year when the Peak Oil topic intensifies into a debate on the scale of climate change/ global warming."

3/02: Shortfalls Expose Italy Energy Weakness: (Associated Press) - When Russia's gas exports to Europe began to falter this year, Italy's dominant energy supplier, Eni SpA, was one of the victims, reporting shortages in daily deliveries. But then it became a target itself, accused of abusing its dominant market position and putting Italy's energy security at risk.  Analysts say the drop in supplies from Russia and a cold winter at home that saw gas consumption booming have brought Italy's energy problem into focus: a lack of infrastructure for importing more gas, even as demand is growing.

3/02: Putin calls for global energy security system: (Peoples Daily Online) - Russian President Vladimir Putin called for the creation of a world energy security system to tackle instability in energy markets on Wednesday as he outlined Russia's priorities for its presidency of the Group of Eight (G8) leading industrialized nations.  "Instability in hydrocarbon markets poses a real threat to global energy supply," and to maintain stability in the hydrocarbon markets, "coordinated activities of the entire international community are needed," Putin said.  A global energy strategy should feature a principle of long-term stability in energy supply based on reasonable prices, the Russian leader said, adding the world community should also develop energy saving technologies and explore alternative sources of energy.

3/01: Niger Delta oil crisis not abating: (Mail & Guardian) - The United States oil giant Chevron has been forced to cut production in Nigeria by 13 000 barrels per day after a pipeline in an area patrolled by armed militants sprang a leak, a company spokesperson said.

3/01: OPEC president says oil priced fair: (AP Wire) - While tight markets and global tensions have pushed up prices, the president of OPEC said Wednesday there's plenty of oil with the global surplus expected to grow at current production levels.  He called $60 a barrel for oil a "fair price" and said oil prices should be kept at "an equilibrium with global economic growth." He cautioned if prices are allowed to edge toward $70-a-barrel "everybody gets nervous" about the impact on the global economy.

3/01: Renewable Ventures to Fund up to $100m in solar projects: (Power Engineering) - Renewable Ventures is a specialist in the financing and management of renewable energy projects and works with project developers, installation companies and energy customers to commission onsite power plants that deliver renewable energy. This first round of institutional funding will be used to finance Renewable Ventures' growing pipeline of investment-grade solar photovoltaic projects.

3/01: Half of new homes must have solar by 2020, SLO Council rules: (San Luis Obispo Tribune) - By 2020 more than half of the new single family homes built in San Luis Obispo must have solar power ability, the City Council decided Tuesday.  The Council made the decision as it began the grueling process of updating and combing policies on open space, and energy and resource conservation.

3/01: Soaring gas prices will lead to 7,000 layoffs in plastics sector: (London Times) - Britain’s plastics manufacturers, which make goods as varied as toys, bottles, artificial hips and car bumpers, will this week warn energy minister Malcolm Wicks that 7,000 jobs are at risk in the industry because of crippling energy costs.  “We are a barometer for what is going on. This affects every sector of the UK economy and every industry.”

3/01: New York Times Says 'Peak Oil' "almost certainly correct": (The Oil Drum) - "The Age of Oil -- 100-plus years of astonishing economic growth made possible by cheap, abundant oil -- could be ending without our really being aware of it. Oil is a finite commodity. At some point even the vast reservoirs of Saudi Arabia will run dry. But before that happens there will come a day when oil production "peaks," when demand overtakes supply (and never looks back), resulting in large and possibly catastrophic price increases that could make today's $60-a-barrel oil look like chump change. Unless, of course, we begin to develop substitutes for oil. Or begin to live more abstemiously. Or both. The concept of peak oil has not been widely written about. But people are talking about it now. It deserves a careful look -- largely because it is almost certainly correct."  (NYT link)