WTI Flirting With $70; Active Rigs Jump To 63 -- August 30, 2018

Jobless claims, link here:

• consensus: 214K
• prior: 210K
• actual: 213K
• so, the number comes in 1,000 less than forecast -- right in line

Personal income and consumer spending: right in line

Market, just before the open --  all indices red, but not particularly remarkable; a typical back-and-forth; background noise

Enbridge: from SeekingAlpha.  

Flaring: in the Permian; same problem the Bakken had. Next, satellite photographs of Texas at night.  Texas regulators' response: so what? We've been through this before. It will take care of itself. In the Bakken, flaring bad. In the Permian, flaring is the cost of doing business. And so it goes.

Produced water: in the Permian. This IS a problem. 

Appalachia: Eclipse and Blue Mountain merge; creating a $1.4 billion company.

Methanol: new plant in Texas reached milestone -- data points --

• Beaumont, TX
• 5,000-metric ton per day (1.8 million metric tons per annum)
• successfully ramped up to full utilization 
• achieved provisional acceptance
• Consolidated Energy Ltd (CEL)
• analyst: North America is oversupplied in natural gas; methanol is a great way to monetize that resource

Day late, dollar short: OPEC will discuss in December if it needs to ramp up production to make up for Iranian shortfall due to sanctions. Inshallah.

No wells coming off confidential list until this weekend. There was no "February 30" six months ago.

Active rigs:

$69.97↑	8/30/2018	08/30/2017	08/30/2016	08/30/2015	08/30/2014
Active Rigs	63	54	33	76	194

RBN Energy: Hurricane Harvey and the important of the Gulf coast refined product infrastructure to the US, part 2.