Petrobras and its logistics arm Transpetro have signed new contracts worth about 2.8 billion reais (roughly $520 million) to build a fleet of gas carriers, barges and pushboats, advancing a major domestic shipbuilding push under Brazil’s Mar Aberto (Open Sea) Program. The deal was formalized at a ceremony in Rio Grande do Sul attended by Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, underscoring his wider priority of revitalizing Brazil’s maritime industrial base. Under the contracts, the Rio Grande shipyard will build five…

Petrobras and its logistics arm Transpetro have signed new contracts worth about 2.8 billion reais (roughly $520 million) to build a fleet of gas carriers, barges and pushboats, advancing a major domestic shipbuilding push under Brazil’s Mar Aberto (Open Sea) Program. The deal was formalized at a ceremony in Rio Grande do Sul attended by Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, underscoring his wider priority of revitalizing Brazil’s maritime industrial base. Under the contracts, the Rio Grande shipyard will build five…

After years of volatility and struggles, Egypt’s oil and gas sector has entered 2026 with a rare piece of good economic news. It has made a decisive dent in the mountain of debts owed to international energy companies, as reported by Egypt’s Prime Minister Madbouli. Cairo has been facing years of crippling foreign-currency shortages and mounting overdue payments, both of which have negatively affected investment and slowed domestic gas production. Egypt is starting to turn the page. Still, optimism should be tempered, as the broader…

U.S. President Donald Trump has taken the first formal step toward reopening offshore oil and gas leasing off California, after the federal government launched a process that could lead to the first new offshore lease sales in the state in decades. The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management said Monday it has issued two Calls for Information and Nominations covering offshore areas in Southern and Central California. The move initiates the early stages of offshore leasing under Trump’s proposed 11th National Outer Continental Shelf oil and gas…

Herbert Stein was an American economist who served in both the Nixon and Ford administrations. He is probably most famous for formulating Stein's Law, namely, "If something cannot go on forever, it will stop." This is, of course, an obvious statement. But I think it cannot be stated too often in a global society that believes in infinite economic growth. I propose to take a subset of that growth to demonstrate Stein's point. The subset is world oil and natural gas consumption versus discoveries. It turns out that Rystad Energy, a major consulting…

In the global race to decarbonize energy systems, attention tends to focus on the headline technologies like hydrogen, carbon capture, electric vehicles, and massive lithium-ion batteries. Yet behind the scenes, a quieter revolution is taking shape. Across Europe and beyond, heat batteries, or thermal energy storage systems, are emerging as one of the most efficient, scalable, and cost-effective ways to balance renewable energy and decarbonize heat. They may not look futuristic. They have no moving parts, produce no dramatic chemical reactions,…

Lukoil has approached the Russian government seeking changes to the oil tax formula as discounts on Russian crude exceed $20 per barrel, a level that would force producers to make net payments into the budget rather than receive compensation, according to The Moscow Times, citing Izvestia. The request comes as Russia’s largest private oil producers face falling realized prices from exports sold well below global benchmarks. Urals crude has been trading at deep discounts as higher freight costs, restricted access to Western insurance, and…

Lukoil has approached the Russian government seeking changes to the oil tax formula as discounts on Russian crude exceed $20 per barrel, a level that would force producers to make net payments into the budget rather than receive compensation, according to The Moscow Times, citing Izvestia. The request comes as Russia’s largest private oil producers face falling realized prices from exports sold well below global benchmarks. Urals crude has been trading at deep discounts as higher freight costs, restricted access to Western insurance, and…

Officials are in damage-control mode in Georgia after the supposed unauthorized publication of a late 2025 state decree showing that the government’s reliance on Russian natural gas imports is growing and Tbilisi is now paying more for Russian imports than it has in the past. Earlier in January, Russia’s state-owned Gazprom announced it supplied 40.4 percent more gas to Georgia in 2025 than in the previous year. This surge can be seen within a broader Russian strategy to increase energy exports southward to partially offset…

A joint venture operated by U.S. supermajor Chevron has made an oil and gas discovery offshore Nigeria as international majors bolster exploration amid the top African producer’s efforts to boost hydrocarbon output and offer more favorable terms for investments.   The Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPC Ltd) on Monday commended Chevron Nigeria Limited (CNL), operator of the NNPC Ltd/CNL joint venture, on the successful completion of the Awodi-07 appraisal and exploration well located in the shallow offshore western Niger…

At present, Europe is still telling itself a very comforting story. The main theme is that the Russian gas shock has been absorbed, storage is full, and prices are manageable. At the same time, politicians keep stating that diversification has delivered “energy independence.” While repeating this with confidence doesn’t, however, make it true. Behind all these political slogans, Europe’s gas strategy is increasingly showing that it has been built on a fallacy. The latter is clear and steadily unravelling. At present, a new,…

A joint venture operated by U.S. supermajor Chevron has made an oil and gas discovery offshore Nigeria as international majors bolster exploration amid the top African producer’s efforts to boost hydrocarbon output and offer more favorable terms for investments.   The Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPC Ltd) on Monday commended Chevron Nigeria Limited (CNL), operator of the NNPC Ltd/CNL joint venture, on the successful completion of the Awodi-07 appraisal and exploration well located in the shallow offshore western Niger…

OPEC+ is expected to hold oil production flat in March and reiterate the first-quarter pause in supply hikes when the group meets on February 1 to discuss output levels, four delegates from the alliance told Bloomberg on Monday.   The group has not yet held discussions ahead of next Sunday’s online meeting, but it does not see any need of changing the policy despite the expected oversupply and the geopolitical developments that could influence supply from OPEC members Iran and Venezuela. Early this month, the eight OPEC+ members…

Russia and China seem unfazed by the U.S. and European sanctions on Russia’s Arctic LNG 2 project as deliveries continue into the new year. The Chinese Beihai LNG terminal has welcomed the first cargo of 2026 from the Russian project, Reuters reported on Monday, citing data from LSEG. The Buran LNG carrier loaded LNG from a floating storage unit near Murmansk on December 25 and has traveled via the Suez Canal route to China, according to the LSEG data. The Arctic LNG 2 operator, Russia’s Novatek, has started using the Suez Canal route…

U.S. natural gas prices on Monday extended their remarkable 70% rally from last week as the big freeze pushes heating and power demand to winter records. Early on Monday, the front-month U.S. natural gas benchmark price had jumped by 14% to above the threshold of $6 per million British thermal units (MMBtu) as gas demand surged to very high levels. This was the first time since 2022 that the price of U.S. natural gas has soared above $6 per MMBtu, and nearly double the price at the start of last week. The major storm also led to shut-ins of about…

U.S. natural gas prices on Monday extended their remarkable 70% rally from last week as the big freeze pushes heating and power demand to winter records. Early on Monday, the front-month U.S. natural gas benchmark price had jumped by 14% to above the threshold of $6 per million British thermal units (MMBtu) as gas demand surged to very high levels. This was the first time since 2022 that the price of U.S. natural gas has soared above $6 per MMBtu, and nearly double the price at the start of last week. The major storm also led to shut-ins of about…

U.S. natural gas prices on Monday extended their remarkable 70% rally from last week as the big freeze pushes heating and power demand to winter records. Early on Monday, the front-month U.S. natural gas benchmark price had jumped by 14% to above the threshold of $6 per million British thermal units (MMBtu) as gas demand surged to very high levels. This was the first time since 2022 that the price of U.S. natural gas has soared above $6 per MMBtu, and nearly double the price at the start of last week. The major storm also led to shut-ins of about…

Ukraine, Russia, and the United States are set to resume negotiations in Abu Dhabi next week after two days of what officials described as “constructive” peace talks, even as the war shows no signs of easing. On January 23-24, "the United States coordinated a trilateral meeting alongside Ukraine and Russia, graciously hosted by the United Arab Emirates," White House envoy Steve Witkoff wrote on X. "Talks were very constructive, and plans were made to continue conversations next week in Abu Dhabi. President [Donald] Trump and his entire…

Almost 100% of oil market analysts see the market as oversupplied this year, just as it was oversupplied last year. The size of the supply overhang, however, matters. Led by the International Energy Agency, a lot of analysts predicted that the overhang at millions of barrels. Then the IEA had to revise its prediction—again. Because demand turned out to be stronger than expected. In its latest Oil Market Report, released earlier this week, the International Energy Agency forecast global oil demand would expand by 930,000 barrels daily in 2026.…

Recently, U.S. President Donald Trump claimed that the UK has 500 years of oil reserves left in the North Sea, and blamed the country’s high energy prices on the government’s unwillingness to drill. However, the unfortunate fact is that the North Sea oil and gas sector has been in a significant and prolonged decline due to the basin's aging oil fields, with production falling sharply since its peak in the early 2000s. According to the North Sea Transition Authority (NSTA), the UK's energy regulator, the North Sea had ~2.9 billion barrels…