Oil prices surged on Monday as the fallout from U.S. and Israeli military strikes on Iran rippled through global energy markets, with tanker traffic through the Strait of Hormuz already heavily impacted and military strikes continuing across the region. In early Asian trade, Brent futures broke the $80 mark, briefly trading at $82.37 before trimming gains slightly as markets digested volatility. Similarly, WTI futures climbed rapidly, soaring past the $72 mark in early trading before dropping back to $71 at the time of writing. The spike in oil…

In a typical Chinese rare earth processing plant, 200 workers move through a maze of massive chemical tanks, risking life and limb to produce the materials that power everything from fighter jets and missile components to cellphones. Hundreds of these facilities operate across China, and they give Beijing overwhelming control over the single most critical choke point in the modern industrial economy. But now, in Saskatchewan, Canada, a hi-tech plant of engineers and chemists is beginning to break that monopoly. The facility is built around an AI…

China's imports last year broke yet another record, despite talk of waning oil demand. Since the start of this year, the world’s biggest oil importer has continued buying crude at elevated rates, but this may be about to change as prices extend their rally. Brent crude has been hovering around $70 per barrel for over a week now, and the outlook remains rather bullish compared to forecasts from the end of 2025, which could not foresee the latest geopolitical developments and their potential implications for supply security. China, while not…

BP is betting big on the U.S. shale patch to raise its worldwide production and accelerate drilling while keeping a tight capital budget. The UK-based supermajor is doing something few other pure shale producers are doing. Shale drillers have been slowing drilling activity, or at least not spending too much on raising production, amid volatile oil prices that have dropped below the estimated break-even levels too many times to count in the past few months. For example, Diamondback Energy, one of the biggest names in the patch, plans to keep activity…

Several Middle Eastern states have introduced overarching national strategies with aims to diversify their energy mix to reduce their reliance on fossil fuels, as they also seek to expand their economies beyond a dependence on oil and gas revenue. This has led countries, such as the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Saudi Arabia, and Qatar, to invest heavily in the expansion of their renewable energy and cleantech industries.  Oil and gas production has provided several Middle Eastern countries with significant revenue for many decades, allowing…