Under my new "format," this should be / would be posted elsewhere but due to the interest in today's news cycle, I elected to post this here. Link here.
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Meanwhile: Doubled His Money and Bought A Bigger House
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And Folks Are Worried About The US Deficit
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Back to the Bakken
Active rigs: 46.
WTI: $78.38.
Natural gas: $2.418.
Six new permits, #39646 - #39651, inclusive:
Seven producing wells (DUCs) reported as completed:
I remember readers telling me that sanctions would never work, Russia would sell more oil than ever, and China and India would buy all the oil Russia could produce.
If gasoline in your neighborhood dropped to 33 cents / gallon, how much would you buy today?
That was the premise from which I was working. Nation-states are not much different than human beings in some respects.
Russia is probably buying no computer chips or semiconductors. Or much of anything else. A year from now, if not sooner, we're going to be hearing about massive food shortages in Russia.
From Charles Kennedy, so you know it's important, link here:
From the "I hope it was worth it" department, Reuters,
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For The Archives
There are two things of which I never tire: walking and biking. And I might as throw in public transportation to complete the three-legged stool.
I was reminded of that today, when for the third day in a row, I found myself in downtown Portland, OR. I absolutely love the process of getting here and the process of exploring. I was walking in Gresham, saw the MAX (light rail) and said "why not?" For $2.50, a 24-hour public transportation pass that is valid on all public transportation: light rail; electric buses, and conventional (mostly diesel) buses.
Somewhere else I blog my biography, but will post this note here for the grandchildren and archives.
I've hitch-hiked across the United States three times -- decades ago -- and many, many shorter regional hikes. And much of that hitch hiking -- as all hitch hikers know is walking.
In England, north Yorkshire, on Saturdays I would leave at 0800 and hike the back country until 2000 -- sometimes barely able to get back home, my legs were so tired. I never thought that could happen.
In Boston, in between work / study in Los Angeles, I would walk all day every day for five or six days exploring Boston. I had "no" money then, so it was more of a challenge than it is today. I was going to school in Los Angeles at the time but had a friend in Boston whom I would visit as often as I could. She worked 12-to-14-hour days but we had a few hours together each evening. I had plenty of time to explore Boston. She told me where not to wander.
Which reminds, when I spent a full summer hiking in Europe, I really had "no" money and my daily rations, many days, were a single beer and a large serving of French fries. After the first 72 hours hiking in Germany, the blisters on my feet were so bad, I had great difficulty putting my boots back on the next morning. After that, I slept with my boots on and gradually the blisters turned into callouses the size of dogs' digital pads.
But I digress.
I'm back in downtown Portland. No rain, slightly cool, and unlike yesterday, the streets are busy with pedestrians and the stores are much more full. I'm back at Starbucks -- I stopped back at Powell Books and bought another book for today's reading, although I will get through very little of it:
Silent Spring Revolution: John F. Kennedy, Rachel Carson, Lyndon Johnson, Richard Nixon, and The Great Environmental Awakening, Douglas Brinkley, c. 2022. By the numbers:
The author lives in Austin, Texas. The author's pronouns appear to be he/him but that should, like everything, be fact-checked.
The first chapter of the book is why I bought the book. Chapter 1: The Ebb and Flow of John F. Kennedy.
Decades later my wife and I spent countless hours on Cape Cod National Seashore, created by President Kennedy. And that's why I bought the book.
In scope, I see America's "southern surge" issue as big in scope as America's "great environmental awakening." I'm hoping that a "JFK visionary" can work the solution to that challenge.
I hate watching sausage being made, but I love brats. I hate watching politics in action, but I enjoy the history. So, we'll see.
Later: wow, wow, wow. Never quit reading. On page xxv in the preface, the author writes,
"Strange as it may seem, one of my models for this book was Daniel Yergin's The Prize: The Epic Quest for Oil, Money, an Power, c. 1991.
The Prize was one of the best books I ever read; not so much due to its good writing and story-telling -- which were both superb -- but in one book I held the history of oil, at least how one writer saw it. It is an incredible book. To some extent, that book may have lost some of its relevancy but as a model for this environmental book -- how incredible is that!
Updates
Later, 1:43 p.m. PT: TTE -- link below.
TotalEnergies saw its net profit double in 2022 to a record $36.2 billion and announced an increase in dividends and share repurchases after the best annual results for the company and for Big Oil ever.
The French supermajor reported on Wednesday, February 8, 2023, $36.2 billion in adjusted net income for 2022, double from a year earlier, thanks to higher oil and gas production, higher prices, a jump in LNG sales, and what it described as a “historic” performance in the downstream segment.
For the fourth quarter of 2022, TotalEnergies reported cash flow of $9.1 billion, and an adjusted net income of $7.6 billion, up by 11% from Q4 2021. For the full year 2022, the company generated $45.7 billion in cash flow.
4 x 9.1 = $36.4 billion, so an "actual" $45.7 billion in cash flow is ... well, stupendous.
Let's put that in come perspective (remember, we're in a recession and an unprecedented supply chain snafu):
Original Post
For those that missed it:
Weekly EIA petroleum report, link here:
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Back to the Bakken
Active rigs: 46. Note comments in "Focus on Fracking" regarding rig counts and then consider:
Peter Zeihan newsletter.
WTI: $77.69.
Natural gas: $2.525.
Thursday, February 9, 2023: 23 for the month; 93 for the quarter, 93 for the year
39010, conf, CLR, Rhonda 7-28H,
RBN Energy: to survive DOE's hydrogen hub cutdown, certain factors may prove critical, part 2. Archived.
The U.S. is gearing up to provide billions of dollars in financial support for a series of regional clean hydrogen hubs and had what amounts to an informal cutdown at the end of December, announcing that 33 project proponents had been formally encouraged to submit a full application this spring. Although the Department of Energy (DOE) didn’t name any of the projects on the “encouraged” list, we’ve been able to identify many of the proposals — and add five more in today’s blog — even though a lot of project details remain under wraps. In today’s RBN blog, we’ll look at the new projects on our list and examine the major factors that are likely to influence a project’s viability.
A fifth project we can add to our list is the Heartland Hydrogen Hub, which is centered on a partnership between Bakken Energy and BNSF Railway, which could utilize clean hydrogen produced from natural gas across its rail network, which covers much of the U.S. west of Chicago. Planning began with a 2021 agreement between North Dakota-based clean hydrogen producer Bakken Energy and Mitsubishi Power Americas to develop a hydrogen hub in the state. North Dakota — along with its neighbors Minnesota, Montana and Wisconsin — agreed in October 2022 to work with Bakken Energy and BNSF on the hydrogen hub proposal. BNSF also signed a memorandum of understanding with Cummins Inc. and Schneider Carriers Inc. to work on incorporating the needs of long-haul trucking into the hub proposal.
Speaking of the Willow project in Alaska: did President Biden telegraph his decision when he appeared to go "off script" during the State of the Union Address? Did the president telegraph that he had made up his mind and that the announcement would be made soon so that COP can get started this spring/summer? I think he did.
For many, it's a win-win.
If the Biden administration denies the project, it's bullish for those long in oil.
If the Biden administration approves the project it will suggest to investors there really will be a shortage. The Biden administration is so "green," that if there was any hint this project was not strategically necessary, the project would be killed.
This is the crux of the matter: if the TransAlaska Pipeline fails due to lack of crude oil, that pipeline will never be re-built. This is an existential issue for Alaska oil.
The fact that it's taken this long for the announcement -- when the decision has obviously already been made, suggests that those in the Oval Office are now arguing / discussing when best to announce the decision.
Both COP and the White House know the "drop dead date." After a certain date, even if approved it will be too late to start the project this summer.
Link here for a nice update. Nothing new but it came out a day later than The Washington Post story a week ago and is closer to the story than The Washington Post.
Two updates posted today:
Time line: the Department of Interior has 30 days following the BLM decision to make its decision. The BLM decision was made on/about February 1, 2023 (the report was apparently released that day).
February is a short month this year; 30 days falls on Friday, March 3, 2023.
The following day: another race begins.
The lede: natural gas prices are at a 25 month low after the largest one month drop in 22 years; commercial crude oil inventories are at a 19 month high; rig count falls by the most in 31 months.
I really can't make any sense of any of this. It's just something to watch for awhile. I guess the fact that rig counts fell by the most in 31 months should get some attention, but it is the middle of winter in the northern hemisphere.
Speaking of which: any update on the Willow project in Alaska?
The EIA "fudge factor" this past week: 438,000 bopd.
Gasoline?
With the big increase in our gasoline production, our supplies of gasoline in storage at the end of the week rose for the tenth time in twelve weeks and for the 13th time in 25 weeks, increasing by 2,576,000 barrels to 234,598,000 barrels during the week ending January 27th, after our gasoline inventories had increased by 1,763,000 barrels during the prior week.
Our gasoline supplies rose again this week even though the amount of gasoline supplied to US users rose by 348,000 barrels per day to 8,491,000 barrels per day, while our imports of gasoline rose by 48,000 barrels per day to 501,000 barrels per day, and while our exports of gasoline rose by 33,000 barrels per day to 893,000 barrels per day.
But even after 10 recent gasoline inventory increases, our gasoline supplies were still 6.2% below last January 28th's gasoline inventories of 250,037,000 barrels, and about 7% below the five year average of our gasoline supplies for this time of the year.
But demand for gasoline is way down, though there was a modest uptick in the most recent report.
Speaking of the Willow project in Alaska: did President Biden
telegraph that the project will be approved soon so that COP can get
started this spring/summer? I think he did.
Whenever the market gets a bit too "funky" or "frustrating" for my tastes, I will quit following the market completely, quit watching CNBC completely, won't even check my Schwab account. I go completely "off the financial grid" as it were. I religiously keep investing every first and third week of each month but I don't pay attention to the price of the shares I'm buying. I just stick to the plan, but I don't follow the market.
For the past two weeks, perhaps slightly less, I forget, I haven't been paying attention to the market.
So, tonight, bored to death, as they say, with no news worth following -- except to think again about the individual who won the Grammy for "song of the year" but I digress.
So, bored to death, as they say, scrolling through my twitter feed for the umpteenth time, this popped up:
So, let's take a look:
Well, that got my attention. Let's go through the list, at the close today:
For the complete list, click here.
Several random, unrelated comments:
Miscellaneous:
