| $62.34↑↑ | 3/16/2018 | 03/16/2017 | 03/16/2016 | 03/16/2015 | 03/16/2014 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Active Rigs | 58 | 47 | 31 | 111 | 190 |
Minnesota regulators approved the final environmental review Thursday for Enbridge Energy's proposal to replace its aging Line 3 crude oil pipeline in northern Minnesota, setting the stage for a final decision on the disputed project in June.
The Public Utilities Commission voted unanimously to declare the review "adequate," meaning it met the legal requirements, after ordering rewrites in December in four narrow areas dealing mostly with proposed route alternatives.Built in the 1960s, Line 3 carries crude oil from Alberta through North Dakota and Minnesota to Enbridge's terminal in Superior, Wisconsin. Calgary-based Enbridge says the replacement, made of stronger steel, would restore its original capacity of 760,000 barrels per day and ensure reliable deliveries of crude to Midwest refineries.
Enbridge wants to replace the 282-mile stretch in Minnesota with a new 337-mile pipeline on a partially different route that would take it through the pristine Mississippi River headwaters region. Ojibwe groups oppose it because of the potential for spills in lakes where they gather wild rice.
The next major step will be when an administrative law judge releases her report on whether the project is needed. That's due April 23. The PUC will consider her recommendations when it decides in June whether to grant a certificate of need for the project and approve the route.I hope we're not being set up for a Kerry outcome: I voted for it before I voted against it. But this is Minnesota.
TransCanada Corporation today announced its Cameron Access project has been placed into service in Southwest Louisiana, enhancing the company's ability to deliver North American-produced natural gas to high-value LNG export markets.
Cameron Access involved improvements to existing pipeline, construction of a new compressor station and the addition of 27 miles of 36-inch diameter greenfield pipeline. Representing an investment of approximately US$300 million, the pipeline is capable of transporting 800,000 dekatherms a day to the Cameron LNG export facility.
The Cameron LNG export facility is currently under construction and scheduled to go into service at the end of 2019.
We have identified the stellar small places -- metropolitan areas with populations between 12,800 and 300,000 – based on wages, and wage growth and job creation from 2007 to 2017. Even as most smaller towns have seen rather tepid job growth, these cities at the top of our list are outperforming not only their same-size counterparts, but some major urban competitors as well.
Surprisingly, our list of the best small areas for jobs does not include many of the scenic small communities that tend to attract affluent emigrés from large cities. Instead most of our leading areas from the last 10 years tend to be those driven by the energy industry, led by No. 1 Williston, North Dakota. With 36,000 people, Williston has been at the center of the shale oil boom in the state, growing its job count 121% since 2007. Wages have soared 47% to over $68,000, well above the national median income of $52,000.
Two other hot spots in North Dakota’s Bakken shale boom: No. 3 Dickinson and No. 6 Minot.
Texas oil towns also figure prominently: No. 2 Midland and No. 4 Andrews.Note: the period includes the "bust" years of 2014 - 2016.
The CNBC report [on Wednesday this past week] noted Tesla's use of re-manufactured parts, but after spending 11 years traipsing through auto plants and driving cars on all six inhabited continents, I just can't reconcile the notion of re-manufactured parts being used on new vehicles, although the CNBC report did not explicitly state that Tesla does this.
Tesla's Fremont, CA, assembly facility has a terrible reputation in the auto industry, and General Motors' attempt to force-feed its workforce the principles of lean production by contributing that plant to a joint venture with Toyota proved to be an abysmal failure. If you don't believe me, check out the NUMMI entry in Wikipedia; it's actually quite amusing.
But "bad plants" are most frequently the result of the absence of design for manufacturability principles, and the more I read about Fremont, the more I realize that Tesla management simply has no idea how to build a car profitably. Note I said "build a car profitably," not just "build a car." Tesla's Model S has performed extremely well in industry quality and owner satisfaction surveys (though the Model X has not) and it seems that once a Tesla leaves Fremont it is in fine fettle.
Getting from the idea to the finished product is supposed to produce a return on capital, though, and Tesla never has. Tesla produced negative EBITDA in the fourth quarter for the second consecutive period and that is just unheard of in the automotive world.
Ferrari produced an EBITDA margin of 30.8% in 2017 and soon-to-be-public Aston Martin posted a 23.6% figure.
In contrast Tesla's $1.6 billion of negative EBIT in 2017 was matched almost to the penny by the company's $1.6 billion of depreciation and amortization. So, Tesla's EBITDA margin in 2017 was zero. That's astounding for a car company focused on the luxury market, and it is simply not sustainable.
Tesla burned through $3.5 billion of cash in 2017, and with the Model 3 still in "manufacturing hell," I don't expect that figure to improve in 2018.So much more at the link.
The growing number of electric vehicles hitting roads is set to fuel a nine-fold increase in copper demand from the sector over the coming decade, according to an industry report on Tuesday.
Electric or hybrid cars and buses are expected to reach 27 million by 2027, up from 3 million this year, according to a report by consultancy IDTechEx, commissioned by the International Copper Association (ICA).
Electric vehicles use a substantial amount of copper in their batteries and in the windings and copper rotors used in electric motors. A single car can have up to six kilometers of copper wiring, according to the ICA.
The global market for copper is around 23.9 million tonnes, according to the International Copper Study Group.
That suggests electric vehicles could account for about 6 percent of global copper demand in ten years, according to analyst estimates, rising from less than 1 percent this year.
On Thursday, Western Canadian Select was trading at a discount of US$27 a barrel to WTI. The discount widened to the biggest level, US$30.55 a barrel, in four years on February 5, after a selloff following the temporary shutdown of Keystone in mid-November.
...as additional storage capacity in Alberta and data about lower crude-by-rail shipments added concerns over the domestic oil glut, as TransCanada’s Keystone Pipeline has yet to return to normal pressure levels following a leak and temporary shutdown last November.Global warming causing much of the trouble:
This week, market participants were digesting news about increased storage capacity and January crude-by-rail data. Crude-by-rail exports out of Canada fell by 11.3 percent month on month in January to 140,959 bpd, according to the latest data by Canada’s Crude Oil Logistics Committee, quoted by Platts. Analysts had expected rail crude exports to be either flat or down, because Canadian rail operators and customers had reported delays in shipments due to extreme weather.And new storage comes on-line early:
In addition, Kinder Morgan Canada and Canadian midstream operator Keyera said earlier this week that they added two additional tanks at the Base Line Terminal for service ahead of schedule. The two tanks add an additional 800,000 barrels of crude storage to the 1.6 million barrels currently in operation.Much more at the link.
Williston used to have an ISO rating of somewhere between 5 and 8, depending on location. That has changed, and changed dramatically. The city’s new rating is now Class 2, and that puts it in the top 2 percent of the nation.
“Two new fire stations, personnel and equipment from a bond backed by the safety sales tax allowed for this impressive improvement in our city,” Mayor Howard Klug said.
The rating for Williston is actually a dual classification, 2 and 2y. In a dual ISO rating, the first number applies to properties within 5 road miles of a fire station and 1,000 feet of a fire hydrant. The second is for those within 5 road miles of a fire station, but more than 1,000 feet from the nearest hydrant.
Catrambone said the 2y group is not actually much different from the 2 group in Williston, however. The city is now able to bring a lot of water on the scene, thanks to all the new equipment the public safety tax allowed them to purchase. The amount is now more than plenty to handle initial fire fighting while the nearest hydrant is being hooked up.
In 2016, the Vermont state Legislature was given an independent report that revealed Vermont’s electric customers actually buy zero percent of the wind energy and just 0.4 percent of photovoltaic solar energy produced in the state. Moreover, the report found, “the state’s electric sector greenhouse gas emissions had doubled over a historic 10-year period.” And they pay more for their electricity.Texas, the "wind" state? It was my understanding based on news stories that wind energy was increasing exponentially. In fact, in the past year or so, consumption of natural gas has increased significantly, taking the place of coal, and the percentage of wind energy consumed against all types of energy has actually dropped a bit:
| $61.39→ | 3/16/2018 | 03/16/2017 | 03/16/2016 | 03/16/2015 | 03/16/2014 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Active Rigs | 57 | 47 | 31 | 111 | 190 |
With U.S. NGL production hitting a record high of just over 4.0 MMb/d in the fourth quarter of 2017 and ethane production also reaching record volumes at 1.6 MMb/d, the price for ethane has remained stuck at about 25 c/gal — where it’s been for the past two years, even though prices for other NGLs are up over the same period.
The combination of roaring high-ethane-content Permian and SCOOP/STACK NGL volumes, coupled with steam cracker outages and construction delays due to Hurricane Harvey, have landed us here. So where do we expect the ethane market to go now as incremental cracker and export demand ramp up in 2018 and 2019? Today, we continue a series on our updated NGL market forecast, highlighting the NGL product whose market is going through the most changes: ethane.LNG buyers not taking advantage of buyer's market, Reuters:
Royal Dutch Shell, the world's biggest liquefied natural gas (LNG) trader, said on Thursday buyers of the fuel have not taken advantage of a market that favours them and have failed to extract better supply deals.
Steve Hill, executive vice president at Shell Energy, said this failure was damaging to all market participants as it prevented new supply from being developed.
"It's quite interesting in that you could argue that buyers haven't necessarily taken advantage of the buyer's market because buyers haven't done very many long-term deals," he told an industry seminar in Tokyo.
"I think what is our concern is that if deals aren't done and projects aren't sanctioned, eventually it won't be a buyers' market anymore because demand will grow and supply won't.
Hill said that a traditional model of switching back and forth between the buyer's market and the seller's market would not be helpful either way because that would lead to demand destruction in addition to projects not being developed on a regular schedule.