Syria has just put a big Western flag in its gas patch. The state-owned Syrian Petroleum Company has signed a memorandum of understanding with ConocoPhillips and U.S.-based Novaterra to develop existing gas fields and hunt for new ones, in a bid to drag the country’s power sector out of wartime ruin. Damascus says the deal could lift gas output by 4–5 million cubic meters per day within a year from today’s battered base. That target is not trivial. Syria’s domestic gas production has collapsed from 8.7 bcm in 2011 to about…

One year ago, Goldman's precious metal analyst Lina Thomas made the case that gold would rise to $3000 by the end of 2025 (it ended up rising more than $1000 higher) as a result of relentless central bank purchases in general, and thanks to China's ravenous appetite for gold in particular. The bank promptly got pushback on this thesis, with skeptics countering that it is unlikely that gold will manage to keep its ascent at the same time as the dollar rises to new record highs, one of the largest consensus Trump trades. In response, Thomas also…

Rosneft’s oil refinery at Ryazan, Russia’s fourth-largest, has suspended crude processing after a Ukrainian drone attack this weekend, industry sources told Reuters on Tuesday.   The Ryazan refinery, which has been targeted – and hit – by drone strikes all year, has now halted its main crude distillation unit.   “The plant is ‌expected to remain idle until the end of the month. No (oil product) loadings are planned ‌before December 1,” according to one of Reuters’ sources. …

Ukraine’s largest private energy company, DTEK, said on Tuesday it imported the first U.S. LNG cargo via the northern route from Lithuania as Ukraine looks to diversify its gas import routes.  DTEK, through its trading arm D.TRADING, has delivered its first cargo of U.S.-sourced liquefied natural gas via Lithuania—as the Gaslog Houston vessel delivered 160,000 cubic meters of LNG – equivalent to roughly 100 million cubic meters of natural gas or 1 TWh of energy – late on Monday.  Once re-gasified, the gas…

Ukraine’s largest private energy company, DTEK, said on Tuesday it imported the first U.S. LNG cargo via the northern route from Lithuania as Ukraine looks to diversify its gas import routes.  DTEK, through its trading arm D.TRADING, has delivered its first cargo of U.S.-sourced liquefied natural gas via Lithuania—as the Gaslog Houston vessel delivered 160,000 cubic meters of LNG – equivalent to roughly 100 million cubic meters of natural gas or 1 TWh of energy – late on Monday.  Once re-gasified, the gas…

The oil market’s main bullish driver is the Rosneft/Lukoil sanctions, but so far they’ve only led to a buildup of Russian crude at sea. Total’s Power Move Questions Oil Majors’s Renewable Pull-Out - France’s national oil champion TotalEnergies (NYSE:TTE) has agreed to purchase a 50% stake in Western European power generation assets held by the Czech billionaire Daniel Kretinsky. - TotalEnergies committed to European power assets just as it was reported to be considering selling some of its renewable energy assets…

Oil prices are set to further drop into next year from current levels amid a large surplus on the market, with the U.S. benchmark WTI Crude expected to average $53 per barrel in 2026, according to Goldman Sachs.  Early on Tuesday, WTI Crude was trading just above $60 per barrel, at $60.09, up by 0.22% on the day.  The investment bank’s call for next year is that oil prices are on track for further declines and investors should short oil right now, Daan Struyven, co-head of global commodities research at Goldman Sachs, told CNBC…

Ukraine has reached a 10-year deal with France for the supply of 100 Rafale fighter jets to bolster its defenses as the Kremlin said it hopes for a new summit with the United States to discuss a possible resolution to end the war in Ukraine. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy met with his French counterpart, Emmanuel Macron, in Paris on November 17 where they agreed to the deal as Russian forces intensify air strikes around the country and make advances in the east. "It will be the greatest air defense, one of the greatest in the world," Zelenskyy said…

The European Center for Constitutional and Human Rights (ECCHR) said on Tuesday it had filed a criminal complaint in France against TotalEnergies for complicity in war crimes, torture, and enforced disappearance at the Mozambique LNG site in 2021.    According to the NGO’s complaint, the French supermajor “is accused of having directly financed and materially supported the Joint Task Force, composed of Mozambican armed forces, which between July and September 2021, allegedly detained, tortured and killed dozens of civilians…

OPEC does not project an oil supply surplus for 2026, the secretary-general of OPEC, Haitham al Ghais, told CNBC today, slamming the media for covering its Monthly Oil Market Report inaccurately. “There was a misrepresentation by some media about our monthly market report,” al Ghais said, “specifically regarding the messages and a narrative that was being created out of reading some of our numbers. For example, things related to the market being in a surplus next year.” Indeed, as Oilprice reported last week, OPEC said in…

LNG carrier rates for the Atlantic route between the U.S. and Europe have surged close to a two-year high on strong demand for American liquefied gas as Europe fills up its storage ahead of winter. The spot rate hit $98,250 per day on Monday, Bloomberg reports, which was a 19% increase and the highest in over a year, according to price trackers. The European Union’s gas storage is now 81.94% full, which is less than the 90% target the bloc had for November, before the winter colds begin. Most of the gas that the EU uses in winter comes from…

Over the past couple of years, uranium and nuclear energy markets have enjoyed a renaissance thanks to surging global power demand and the global energy crisis triggered by Russia’s war in Ukraine. Uranium is no longer trading on legacy sentiment, with prices moving more on fundamentals characterized by tight physical supply, underbuilt production pipelines, and a policy-driven nuclear revival that’s accelerating faster than commodity markets anticipated. The uranium market is experiencing a structural supply deficit, creating potential…

The expected surge in liquefied natural gas export capacity in the United States is on course to boost gas consumption significantly, from around 18 billion cu ft right now to as much as 40 billion cu ft—and that 18 billion cu ft is already an all-time high. The United States turned into the world’s largest exporter of LNG in a matter of years as energy companies raced to build new liquefaction trains along the Gulf Coast in response to the surge in demand for a lower-emission alternative to coal. Last month, the U.S. became the first…

Iran is blocking the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) from inspecting multiple sites of interest in its nuclear weapons development programme, a senior source in the European Union’s (E.U.’s) security complex exclusively told OilPrice.com late last week. “These include the major sites targeted during the U.S. and Israeli strikes on its nuclear programme facilities in June, including Fordow and Natanz, and another site in particular -- close to Natanz that seems to be the focus of significant Iranian activity since then,”…

In the coming days, the media will push themes related to the upcoming meeting between Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MBS) and US President Trump in Washington. While most will be looking at the possibilities of Saudi investments in US LNG via Aramco or defense deals, Saudi Arabia’s mineral strategy and opportunities will also be on the table. Geopolitically, Washington will also be interested in Saudi Arabia’s international mining investment strategy, through its national champion, Ma’aden, or its sovereign wealth fund,…

A new gas discovery in Egypt’s Western Desert has added another timely boost to the country’s strained upstream portfolio. The well, identified as Gomana-1, encountered several gas-bearing intervals based on electric-log data, with early tests indicating output of around 36 million cubic feet per day, according to the Daily News Egypt.  The find is now undergoing reserve evaluation before being mapped into the operator’s development sequence. The well is operated by Khalda Petroleum Company, one of Egypt’s larger onshore…

A new gas discovery in Egypt’s Western Desert has added another timely boost to the country’s strained upstream portfolio. The well, identified as Gomana-1, encountered several gas-bearing intervals based on electric-log data, with early tests indicating output of around 36 million cubic feet per day, according to the Daily News Egypt.  The find is now undergoing reserve evaluation before being mapped into the operator’s development sequence. The well is operated by Khalda Petroleum Company, one of Egypt’s larger onshore…

Mining giant BHP has been found liable for a dam disaster under both environmental law and the Brazilian civil code, in a significant ruling handed down by the High Court. The case stems from a deadly dam disaster in Brazil. On 5 November 2015, the Fundao dam in the south-eastern part of Brazil, operated by Samarco, a 50:50 joint venture owned by BHP and its peer Vale, failed, unleashing a deluge of thick, red, toxic mud that wiped out the village of Bento Rodrigues.The collapse of the Fundao dam killed 19 people and is the worst environmental…

We spend a lot of our time talking about reserves and capacity in the energy sector. But for the serious money, the most critical asset isn't the price of oil or the megawatt. It’s the paper that guarantees how those resources will be sold. A company’s contract portfolio, not its latest discovery, is often times the real barometer of its financial stability. This distinction forces a fundamental choice: are you betting on a company fully exposed to merchant risk, relying entirely on whatever price the spot market offers today? Or are…

I've put the word "evacuation" in the title of this piece in quotes because it's not clear where Tehran's 9.8 million people, or some significant number of them, would evacuate to as water supplies run dangerously low. Iranian President Massoud Pezeshkian has been criticized for saying out loud how bad the situation is: "If it does not rain in Tehran by December, we should ration water; if it still does not rain, we must empty Tehran." Doubtless, Iranian water authorities will force severe restrictions on Tehran's residents if the rains—which…