The Energy And Market Page (And A Little Bit Of Snarky Politics), T+275 -- October 23, 2017

HAL. Halliburton profit tops estimates on strong North America demand. Reuters even used the word "surged" -- a word we don't often see these days in the oil sector except when combined with production, such as "production surged." Data points:

• revenue surges 91%
• revenue from North America at $3.16 billion
• total revenue rose 42% to $5.44 billion
• profit: 42 cents a share vs 1 cent per share a year earlier
• profit: $365 million most recent quarter vs $6 million one year earlier
• analysts forecast: 37 cents/share

Futures: green.

WTI: $52.13

$60 oil? Not until 2019, at the earliest -- CNBC. Can Saudi Arabia hold on that long? If Prince Alwaleed wants to save the Saudi Aramco IPO, the first thing he needs to do is get rid of the keffiyeh. In an interview this morning with an American "journalist," Prince Alwaleed, for some inexplicable reason wearing his keffiyeh, something he doesn't do when walking the streets of London. To most/many/some Americans, the keffiyeh simply reminds them that a) Saudi Arabia is still in the Middle Ages; and, b) it was Saudi-financed terrorists that brought down the towers on 9/11. I wonder if Saudi would have let the American journalist wear a kippah? Just saying.

Collision course: Canadian hydroelectricity vs off-shore wind farms. 

In boreal forests above the Gulf of St. Lawrence, Hydro-Quebec is building a series of dams that will generate enough electricity for more than one million homes. The $5.2 billion project on the Romaine River is part of a sweeping expansion the government-owned utility began in 2007, with the intention of selling power to the U.S. where nuclear reactors are closing.

It’s not clear Americans will buy. While New York and Massachusetts want to avoid fossil fuels when they replace the soon-to-be-shuttered Indian Point and Pilgrim nuclear plants, wind and solar developers are also jockeying for the job.

Merckel: world's #1 eco-vandal --

The [London] Guardan, September 19, 2017

... perhaps the most embarrassing is Germany’s shocking failure, despite investing hundreds of billions of euros, to decarbonise its electricity system. While greenhouse gas emissions in other European nations have fallen sharply, in Germany they have plateaued.

The reason is, once more, Merkel’s surrender to industrial lobbyists. Her office has repeatedly blocked the environment ministry’s efforts to set a deadline for an end to coal power. Coal, especially lignite, which vies with Canadian tar sands for the title of the world’s dirtiest fuel, still supplies 40% of Germany’s electricity. Because Merkel refuses to restrict its use, the peculiar impact of Germany’s Energiewende programme has been to cut the price of electricity, stimulating a switch from natural gas to lignite, which is cheaper. (In Germany they call this the Energiewende paradox). But Merkel doesn’t seem to care. She has announced that “coal will remain a pillar of German energy supply for a prolonged time span”.

National Review, September 24, 2017

Merkel’s energy policy was based upon a combination of nuclear power and “renewables” in order to close down power stations dependent on fossil fuels, and help Germany lead the European Union and the world toward a carbon-free future.

She had been a strong defender of nuclear energy against SPD chancellor Gerhard Schröder’s attempts to phase it out. Within a few weeks of the Japanese nuclear disaster at Fukushima, though, she panicked, reversed herself, and closed down Germany’s entire nuclear program.

Her Energiewende since then has led to a massive increase in power bills for consumers and industry, the movement abroad of German companies heavily reliant on energy, and, more recently, a phasing out of the phasing out of coal-fired power stations. Merkel and the nuclear companies are still haggling over how much the German government will pay for the estimated €23 billion cost of shutting down their plants. Meanwhile, no one believes that Germany and Europe will meet their official goal of reducing carbon emissions 80-95 percent from their 1990 levels by the year 2050.

InvesterVillage, October 22, 2017: most countries ignoring Paris accord

According to the analyst, popular opinion against German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s “Energiewende” (energy transition) policies, which had doubled electricity prices, played no small part in Merkel’s terrible showing in last month’s national elections.

Costs of the ill-fated Energiewende now total some €650 billion, a bill that weighs heavily on the shoulders of German taxpayers.

Late last year, to their national embarrassment, the Germans had to be bailed out of a small energy crisis by Poland when the wind failed to blow for several days and a thick fog surrounded many parts of Germany, driving the output from renewables to just 4 percent of total demand. It was coal-fueled Poland that had to rescue Germany from its self-induced energy crisis.

“Merkel may now be unable to form a government without the support of the libertarian Free Democratic Party, which demands an end to renewables subsidies,” Solomon notes.