Crude tankers are once again firing on all cylinders, with freight rates surging across all segments as oil in transit reaches its highest level in more than five years. According to data from Vortexa, total crude and condensate in transit rose to 1.31 million barrels per day in mid-October, a level not seen since May 2020 during the pandemic-era floating storage boom. The surge is being driven less by traditional supply-and-demand dynamics and more by geopolitical disruptions, notably delivery delays of sanctioned oil cargoes bound for China and…

It appears that the Trump Administration can’t have it all. Soaring LNG exports to assert America’s energy dominance have intensified competition for U.S. natural gas supply, pushing domestic energy prices higher—the opposite of what President Trump promised during his election campaign at this time last year.     As more U.S. LNG export facilities come online or ramp up operations, demand for LNG exports is set to exceed U.S. residential gas demand for the first time ever, according to estimates by Reuters based…

Google has signed the first U.S. corporate power purchase agreement involving natural gas with carbon capture, marking a major shift in how Big Tech plans to fuel the data-hungry future of artificial intelligence. The deal centers on the Broadwing Project, a 400-megawatt gas-fired power plant planned for Decatur, Illinois, developed by privately held Low Carbon Infrastructure. The plant will capture and store about 90% of its carbon dioxide emissions in underground wells 5,000 to 7,000 feet deep. Power will flow to Google’s expanding network…

Google has signed the first U.S. corporate power purchase agreement involving natural gas with carbon capture, marking a major shift in how Big Tech plans to fuel the data-hungry future of artificial intelligence. The deal centers on the Broadwing Project, a 400-megawatt gas-fired power plant planned for Decatur, Illinois, developed by privately held Low Carbon Infrastructure. The plant will capture and store about 90% of its carbon dioxide emissions in underground wells 5,000 to 7,000 feet deep. Power will flow to Google’s expanding network…

Google has signed the first U.S. corporate power purchase agreement involving natural gas with carbon capture, marking a major shift in how Big Tech plans to fuel the data-hungry future of artificial intelligence. The deal centers on the Broadwing Project, a 400-megawatt gas-fired power plant planned for Decatur, Illinois, developed by privately held Low Carbon Infrastructure. The plant will capture and store about 90% of its carbon dioxide emissions in underground wells 5,000 to 7,000 feet deep. Power will flow to Google’s expanding network…

Previously, we reported that the Trump administration has lately been taking over Canada’s rare earths companies as Washington looks to counter Beijing’s dominance in the sector. To wit, Canadian rare earths developer, Trilogy Metals (NYSE:TMQ), more than tripled three weeks ago after the U.S. government purchased a 10% stake in the company with warrants to purchase an additional 7.5% stake. The Trump administration announced that it will reverse a ban on the construction of the Ambler Road project in Alaska by the Biden administration…

CenterPoint Energy (NYSE: CNP) beat the Street in Q3 on a very simple story: Houston’s industrial appetite for electrons is exploding, and regulators are letting the utility recoup what it spends to keep up. Adjusted EPS landed at $0.50 (vs. $0.44 est.), up more than 60% y/y on a non-GAAP basis. The drivers were textbook utility levers—about $0.07/share from growth and regulatory recovery and $0.12/share from leaner O&M—partly shaved by $0.04/share in higher interest expense. GAAP EPS was $0.45 on net income of $293 million.…

Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan are striving to reduce their digital dependence on Russia and tilt their economic attention a bit more to the West. The two countries are moving forward with a plan to lay a fiber-optic cable beneath the Caspian Sea to establish a connection with Azerbaijan. At present, virtually all Kazakhstan’s and Uzbekistan’s Internet traffic passes through Russian-controlled systems. Uzbekistan’s Internet connections to the outside world even must pass through Kazakhstan before reaching Russia, where the Kremlin…

Spain has rapidly transformed its energy industry to be a global leader in renewable deployment and to ease its reliance on foreign oil and gas imports. The sun-baked country now sources more than 40 percent of its electricity supply, with more to come. But while this transition has been a boon for the nation’s energy independence, climate goals, and cheap and abundant clean energy, the costs of clean energy production in Spain have become too cheap for their own good. Instead of serving as a green energy inspiration for the rest of the world,…

Algerian state energy firm Sonatrach resumed oil and gas exploration drilling in Libya in mid-October, Libya’s National Oil Corporation (NOC) said on Thursday, as several international majors have restarted work in Libya’s oil and gas basins.   Algeria’s Sonatrach is drilling an exploration well in the Ghadames basin close to the Libyan-Algerian border, according to an NOC statement carried by Arab newspaper Asharq Al-Awsat.  Sonatrach is back working at the site in the Ghadames basin, after quitting more than 10…

The U.S. sanctions on the top Russian oil firms are reverberating through markets with Russia’s main crude buyers as India’s Reliance Industries will stop importing crude under a long-term deal with the now-sanctioned Russian oil giant Rosneft, sources with direct knowledge of the plans told Reuters on Thursday.  Reliance, India’s top private refiner which operates the world’s biggest refinery complex at Jamnagar with 1.4 million barrels per day (bpd) of processing capacity, has a long-term deal with Rosneft to buy…

Valero Energy Corporation (NYSE: VLO) easily beat analyst forecasts of third-quarter earnings as refining margins surged by 44% from a year earlier, exceeding the average increase in U.S. refining margins.  Valero reported on Thursday an adjusted net income of $1.1 billion, or $3.66 per share, for the third quarter of 2025. This compares to $371 million, or $1.16 per share, in net income for the third quarter of 2024.  The $3.66 per share income easily beat the $3.05 consensus estimate for EPS in the Wall Street Journal.   The…

Russian drones attacked the Ukrainian capital for the second night in a row on October 22, injuring four people, officials said within hours of an announcement from Washington imposing sanctions on Russia’s two largest oil companies. Tymur Tkachenko, head of Kyiv's military administration, said drones had damaged several dwellings and other buildings. Air assaults the night before struck throughout the country, killing at seven people and causing power outages. One of the attacks hit a kindergarten in Kharkiv and another hit an apartment…

The sanctioned Russian Arctic LNG export facility continues to ship cargoes to China as the U.S.-sanctioned project did not incur additional sanctions in Wednesday’s U.S. package imposed “as a result of Russia’s lack of serious commitment to a peace process to end the war in Ukraine.” While the U.S. slapped sanctions on Russia’s two largest oil companies, Rosneft and Lukoil, and a number of their subsidiaries, it stopped short of imposing further sanctions on Arctic LNG, developed and operated by Russian energy firm…

The EU on Thursday adopted the 19th sanctions package against Russia, which includes a ban on imports of Russian LNG from 2027, sanctions on additional shadow fleet vessels and on entities in China and Hong Kong supporting Russia’s energy trade and revenues.   The sanctions package includes placing Rosneft and Gazpromneft on a full transaction ban, sanctions on 117 additional vessels from the shadow fleet, bringing the total blacklisted tankers by the EU to nearly 560, and a ban on Russian LNG imports into the EU starting January…

Amid a global race to secure critical minerals outside China’s control, U.S. rare earth developer REAlloys Inc. has forged a strategic alliance with Japan Organization for Metals and Energy Security (JOGMEC), the government agency under Japan’s Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) charged with safeguarding the nation’s industrial supply chains. The agreement, outlined in a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU), sets out a framework for joint development, technology transfer, and industrial-security cooperation, according…

A looming oil glut has taken over the energy commodities market as the dominating sentiment among traders and analysts. Everyone is predicting a glut—the only difference is in its size. But there is a fly in the bearish ointment. The IEA admitted this week that it was unable to account for 1.47 million barrels of supply. The International Energy Agency deepened the glut mood last week, when it predicted a supply overhang of 2.35 million barrels daily for this year, and an all-time high surplus of 4 million barrels daily for 2026. In the same…

Two of the founding members of the BRICS alliance, India and Brazil, drew the short straw when it comes to new U.S. trade policy. South America’s largest economy and Asia’s second-biggest economy have both been slapped with 50% tariffs on their goods exported to the United States. Faced with the highest U.S. tariffs of any nation, India and Brazil are seeking closer strategic, economic, trade, and energy cooperation and have recently signed deals to expand their trade agreements. Brazil’s Vice President Geraldo Alckmin visited…

There is a lot more than meets the eye to a series of meetings by U.S. and European firms recently to talk to Iraq’s leadership about opportunities in the liquefied natural gas (LNG) sector. Since Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022, LNG has become the world’s emergency energy source, as unlike pipelined gas or oil, it can be secured and shipped very quickly to wherever it is needed. Iraq does not have an LNG sector to speak of, but it is now planning to build   its first LNG import terminal at Khor Al-Zubair port, with a second…

Two drastically different trends in energy careers are taking place on either side of the Atlantic Ocean. While the Trump administration pulls back billions of dollars in clean energy funding and seeks to prop up coal careers, the United Kingdom is rolling out a plan to add 400,000 clean energy jobs to the national economy. Just this week Edward Miliband, the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change of the United Kingdom, announced a national plan to train hundreds of thousands of plumbers, electricians, carpenters, welders, HVAC installers,…