Over two days during the short 2025 summer beyond the Arctic Circle, a mining company moved a 113-year-old timber church building in its entirety nearly two miles away, in an engineering feat that made international headlines. The moving of the Kiruna Church from the Swedish town of the same name, created by the iron ore mining industry, wasn’t a solitary feat. The relocation of the church is part of a decades-long project by Sweden-based mining company LKAB, which is relocating the entire town of Kiruna to expand iron ore mining and tap…

For years, energy experts have predicted that natural gas will be the only fossil fuel that will see significant growth in its share in the global primary energy mix in the coming years, thanks to its role as a "bridge fuel" due to a lower emission profile compared with coal and oil as well as flexibility for grid stability, especially with increasing demand in Asia and as a backup for renewables. Natural gas is poised to reshape Africa’s future, offering transformative pathways for countries to earn export revenues and achieve domestic industrialization.…

From devastating wildfires to swirling cloud vortices, NASA’s fleet of Earth-observing satellites captured remarkable views of our planet throughout 2025. As Visual Capitalist's Nick Routley shows below, these images reveal both the beauty and fragility of Earth’s systems, documenting natural phenomena, climate events, and human impacts visible from space. All images featured in this article come from NASA’s Earth Observatory, captured by instruments aboard a variety of satellites in orbit around Earth. Together, they tell the…

Suriname’s government, in the capital Paramaribo, has been hungrily eyeing neighboring Guyana’s massive world-class oil boom since before the 2020 pandemic. Both impoverished South American nations of less than one million share the Guyana Suriname Basin. The offshore basin is delivering an oil boom that is exceeding all expectations, making Guyana, based on GDP per capita, one of the wealthiest nations in the world. Suriname, which is one of South America’s poorest countries and is experiencing a deep, long-running economic crisis,…

The geopolitical landscape of the Western Hemisphere shifted violently Saturday morning. In a nighttime operation that mirrors the 1989 capture of Manuel Noriega, U.S. special operations forces—reportedly including the Army’s Delta Force—struck Caracas and seized Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores. President Donald Trump confirmed the capture on social media, describing it as a "large-scale strike" conducted alongside law enforcement.  Maduro is currently being flown to the United States…

U.S. liquefied natural gas exports set new records in 2025 as new capacity came online and existing terminals ran at high utilization, pushing annual shipments past levels previously thought years away. Preliminary data from LSEG show the United States exported 111 million metric tons of LNG last year, making it the first country to surpass the 100-million-ton threshold in a single year. That volume puts U.S. exports nearly 20 million tons ahead of Qatar and about 23 million tons above 2024 levels, reinforcing the country’s position as the…

Chinese-made electric buses are rapidly gaining ground across Southeast Asia as governments push to decarbonize public transport and Chinese manufacturers seek growth beyond a slowing home market, according to Nikkei Asia. In Jakarta, that shift is already visible. Transjakarta, the capital’s main bus operator, introduced electric buses from China’s BYD in 2022. It now runs 420 electric buses — nearly 10% of its fleet — including models from Skywell and Zhongtong, and plans to fully electrify its 10,000-bus fleet by 2030.…

Petrobras has brought the P-78 FPSO online at its Búzios 6 development, adding up to 180,000 barrels per day of oil capacity and reinforcing just how central the pre-salt has become to Brazil’s production story. The new unit is the seventh FPSO now operating at the Búzios field in the Santos Basin, lifting installed capacity at the field to roughly 1.15 million bpd. That matters because Búzios is no longer just a growth project. It is already one of the world’s largest producing oilfields, and it is still climbing.…

Petrobras has brought the P-78 FPSO online at its Búzios 6 development, adding up to 180,000 barrels per day of oil capacity and reinforcing just how central the pre-salt has become to Brazil’s production story. The new unit is the seventh FPSO now operating at the Búzios field in the Santos Basin, lifting installed capacity at the field to roughly 1.15 million bpd. That matters because Búzios is no longer just a growth project. It is already one of the world’s largest producing oilfields, and it is still climbing.…

The total number of active drilling rigs for oil and gas in the United States rose by 1 this week, according to new data that Baker Hughes published earlier this week, bringing the total rig count in the US  to 546 this week, down 43 from this same time last year. The number of active oil rigs rose by 3 in the reporting period for the second week in a row, according to the data. Oil rigs are now at 412, which is 70 below this same time last year. The number of gas rigs fell by 2 to 125, which is 22 more than this time last year. The miscellaneous…

Since Kyiv and its European backers panned a 28-point US proposal for a deal to end Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, warning that it was skewed in Moscow’s favor, Ukraine and the United States have been trying to hash out a revised blueprint known as the 20-point plan. Following a meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Florida on December 28 -- bookended by phone calls with Russian President Vladimir Putin -- US President Donald Trump said that after nearly four years of full-scale war and inconclusive Russia-Ukraine talks…

Despite the public spat between two of OPEC’s top producers, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE), the wider OPEC+ group is expected to confirm at a Sunday meeting that it would hold output steady through the first quarter of 2026, delegates from the alliance told Reuters on Friday.  In recent days, OPEC’s top producer and de facto leader, Saudi Arabia, and the cartel’s large producer and influential member, the UAE, had a very public rift regarding their backing of opposing sides in Yemen.  Saudi forces intercepted…

Despite the public spat between two of OPEC’s top producers, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE), the wider OPEC+ group is expected to confirm at a Sunday meeting that it would hold output steady through the first quarter of 2026, delegates from the alliance told Reuters on Friday.  In recent days, OPEC’s top producer and de facto leader, Saudi Arabia, and the cartel’s large producer and influential member, the UAE, had a very public rift regarding their backing of opposing sides in Yemen.  Saudi forces intercepted…

Despite the public spat between two of OPEC’s top producers, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE), the wider OPEC+ group is expected to confirm at a Sunday meeting that it would hold output steady through the first quarter of 2026, delegates from the alliance told Reuters on Friday.  In recent days, OPEC’s top producer and de facto leader, Saudi Arabia, and the cartel’s large producer and influential member, the UAE, had a very public rift regarding their backing of opposing sides in Yemen.  Saudi forces intercepted…

Another setback in Russia–Ukraine peace talks and persistent tensions around Venezuela failed to jolt oil markets out of their New Year’s lull. 02 January, 2026 Another round of failed Russia-Ukraine peace talks and continued tensions around Venezuela have failed to wake oil prices from their New Year’s slumber, with ICE Brent staying put around the $60 per barrel mark on the first trading day of 2026. Whilst unlikely, the upcoming OPEC+ meeting on Sunday could provide some excitement as Saudi Arabia and the UAE continue to fight…

India’s government is asking domestic refiners to provide timely and accurate data on a weekly basis of imports of Russian and U.S. crude, as New Delhi plans to show the data to the U.S. Administration as it seeks a trade deal, sources with knowledge of the efforts told Reuters on Friday.   “We want timely and accurate data on Russian and U.S. oil imports so that, when the U.S. asks for information, we can provide verified figures instead of them relying on secondary sources,” an anonymous Indian government official…

Recently, many people have begun talking about the US having a k-shaped economy. In it, a handful of wealthy people are doing very well financially, while many others are falling further and further behind. I expect that the low wages of the majority of workers will soon lead to adverse impacts on businesses, governments, and international organizations. This phenomenon is likely to lead to a very uneven world economic downturn in 2026. The world economy is subject to the laws of physics. The world economy seems to be reaching growth limits because…

Politics, Geopolitics & Conflict The situation in Venezuela has further escalated after a drone strike on a port facility linked to the Maduro government, an incident Trump publicly said was carried out by the United States, without details, with later reports attributing the strike to a CIA operation. Nothing has been formally confirmed. Venezuelan authorities accused U.S. intelligence of direct involvement and raised security measures following the attack. This coincides with more maritime interdiction warnings and the release of more political…

Earlier this week, Aden airport (in Yemen’s interim capital) was shut after a dispute between the Saudi-backed Yemeni government and UAE-aligned STC forces over control of airport operations and security. Government officials attempted to assert authority over the site, which was refused by STC security forces on the ground, leading to a total suspension of flights.  Aden is the interim capital and the main southern logistics hub. The closure shows that the government cannot impose decisions at key infrastructure sites and that Saudi…

Coal India Limited, the biggest coal producer in the world’s second-biggest coal user, opened this year its online coal supply auctions directly to buyers in Bangladesh, Bhutan, and Nepal, as Indian coal supply has swelled amid weaker-than-expected demand in recent months.  Amid an oversupply of coal and weaker demand, India and its top state coal producer are looking to optimize domestic supply and monetize exports to neighboring countries. Until 2026, only middlemen could bid in Coal India’s online supply auctions. This has now…