Wednesday -- News, View, And Links; FERC Nominee Withdraws

Active rigs: 187

RBN Energy: the continuing series on the fuel oil industry along the Gulf coast:

The US Gulf Coast is perceived by midstream operators to offer a growing opportunity for the export of fuel oil left over from refinery processing. The US does not produce as much residual fuel oil as European refiners and the largest market is in Asia. But the US Gulf is ideally positioned to import fuel oil from Europe or Latin America to blend with domestic production and export to Asia. New terminal infrastructure is coming online to meet growing demand for storage and blending facilities. Today we look at the Gulf Coast’s largest fuel oil terminal.

This is the second installment in our series covering fuel oil infrastructure on the Gulf Coast. In the first episode we provided definitions for some of the many types and grades of fuel oil. We discussed the main markets for fuel oil as a feedstock for refineries and as bunker fuel for ships. There is also demand for fuel oil or its derivatives in manufacturing industry and power generation.

Wow, this is incredibly good news.... the president's nominee to head the FERC withdraws his name ahead of the vote. Rigzone reported.  Regular readers were aware of the story. Today:

“I’ve never seen this before,” Wiggins, who had 25 years of experience working with FERC, said.

“Confirmations for the FERC head are generally not divisive.”

The nomination of Binz quickly generated criticism from fossil fuel groups, and particularly the coal industry. Critics said Binz was out of the mainstream, and they were particularly bothered when Binz suggested that natural gas might be a “dead end” fuel.

Binz was also criticized for misleading the panel regarding his support of the coal industry while he was serving as the head of Colorado’s Public Utility Commission (PUC). Binz reportedly told the Senate Committee that he had approved the largest coal power plant in Colorado. However, Binz was not with the Colorado PUC until 2007, and the power plant was approved in 2003.

Also in The Wall Street Journal.

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And more interesting news: Brazilian judge dismisses oil spill case against Chevron, Transocean, reported in Rigzone. 

A word search for "Syria" in the on-line edition of the front section of today's WSJ turned up empty.