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For years, heat pumps were seen as the fragile heroes of mild climates, efficient in theory but unreliable when the mercury dropped. That narrative has now collapsed under the weight of experience. From the frozen lakes of Finland to the prairies of Canada, heat pumps are thriving where they were once thought impossible. The data from the multiple past winters tells the story clearly. Even in subzero temperatures, installations are growing faster than almost any other clean heating technology. This shift is more than a technical achievement; it…
On a recent flight from Los Angeles to Phoenix, I glanced out the window as the aircraft slowly descended over the open desert west of the city. The landscape shifted abruptly from endless scrubland to an expanse of mirrored rectangles stretching to the horizon. I took several pictures, and my phone’s GPS later confirmed what I was seeing: the Mesquite Solar Complex in Arlington, Arizona—one of the largest photovoltaic installations in the United States. From above, the site resembles an enormous geometric tapestry. On the ground, it…
China’s LNG demand is disappointing in 2025 for a second year in a row, just as new U.S. export projects ramp up and Qatar is nearing start-up of the first new facilities in its huge capacity expansion. The wave of new LNG supply that will come online by the end of the decade, mostly from the top exporters, the United States and Qatar, has prompted many analysts to expect an oversupplied LNG market by 2030 that would weigh on prices. Lower prices could incentivize additional demand from price-sensitive buyers in south and Southeast Asia,…
China’s latest oil import data has been rather bullish, with November imports rising 5% year on year. Not only that, but China is building new storage capacity, so it can keep buying more crude, instead of demonstrating that its oil demand growth is weakening, as forecasters say. China is making oil demand forecasting uncertain. FGE NexantECA, for instance, recently reported that China’s apparent demand in October had been revised downwards to 14.6 million barrels of crude daily, or 570,000 barrels daily less than earlier expected.…
Escalating tensions between the United States and Venezuela could lead to profound changes in the oil industry of the world’s largest crude resource holder. Any regime change of President Nicolas Maduro could be a game-changer for oil production in Venezuela, U.S. access to Venezuela’s heavy crude fit for U.S. Gulf Coast refineries, and America’s influence in the Western Hemisphere and Latin America. Although it’s not certain that U.S. President Donald Trump would necessarily pursue regime change or an incursion of some…
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is traveling to Turkmenistan for festivities December 12 marking the Central Asian state’s 30th anniversary of neutrality. While in Ashgabat, Erdogan will also hold talks with Turkmen leaders likely focusing on the topic of natural gas supplies. Speaking to reporters earlier in December, Turkish Energy Minister Alparslan Bayraktar said Ankara is working to expand gas imports via a long-time arrangement with Iran, augmented by a swap deal with Turkmenistan. A lack of clarity about sanctions currently…
On Wednesday, the United States carried out one of its most consequential maritime interventions to date. The Federal Bureau of Investigation, Homeland Security Investigations, and the United States Coast Guard, acting with support from the Department of War, seized a crude oil tanker accused of transporting sanctioned oil from Venezuela and Iran. It was a dramatic show of force in already volatile waters and an intervention that has jolted Caracas. The operation was presented as a decisive strike against illicit oil flows. Yet within hours, Venezuela…
The global energy landscape is undergoing a decisive structural shift, moving away from the century-old model of centralized utility dependence toward localized, autonomous power networks. According to a new industry report by Credence Research, the global market for decentralized microgrid solutions is projected to nearly triple in value over the next decade, reaching $17.16 billion by 2032. This trajectory represents a Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of 13.74%, driven by a confluence of geopolitical instability, accelerating renewable energy…
For farmers in the United States, concerns about too much clean energy production are quickly transforming into concerns about too little energy to go around. For years, rural America has been pushing back against the spread of utility-scale solar and wind farms competing for agricultural land. Now, they have a new sector to worry about as massive data center developments look to set up shop across the country, competing for land, energy, and water resources. AI integration is becoming ubiquitous, with virtually no market sector untouched by its…
The European Union has drawn a line in the sand. By 2027, the bloc intends to phase out Russian natural gas imports completely. But as the policy ink dries in Brussels, a new challenge is emerging in the real economy… We might not have enough hands to build the infrastructure that replaces it. International Energy Agency (IEA) Executive Director Fatih Birol stood alongside European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen last week and called it the "end of an era." But he also delivered a warning. The transition away from Russian…
As U.S. natural gas prices jumped to a three-year high, coal has become a cheaper power-generating fuel for utilities, which are set to run coal-fired generators harder this winter. U.S. benchmark natural gas prices at Henry Hub have jumped from $4.23 per million British thermal units (MMBtu) at the start of November to above $5 per MMBtu by early December. Early on Friday, the front-month futures price was $5.084 per MMBtu. That’s the highest price in three years, as a polar vortex with freezing temperatures and snowstorms gripped most…
As the spread of renewable energy continues to ramp up around the world, finding more efficient and affordable technologies for energy storage has become a high-priority issue for global energy security. While energy storage addition is making huge strides across the world, leading technologies – most notably lithium-ion batteries – have some critical drawbacks. As a result, the race to find the tech breakthrough to replace lithium-ion batteries is on as “clean energy’s next trillion-dollar business” heats up. …
The machinery that powers the modern world, from industrial assembly lines to the cooling systems of data centers, is undergoing a massive, capital-intensive overhaul. According to a new analysis by Allied Market Research, the global electric motor market is projected to reach $373.9 billion by 2032, nearly tripling its 2020 valuation of $142.1 billion. The data reveals a Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of 9.5% from 2023 to 2032. But beyond the growth percentages, the report outlines a structural change in how the global economy consumes energy. …
Congress just overturned a Biden-era rule that had restricted how much of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge’s Coastal Plain could be leased for oil and gas. The Senate passed the resolution 49-45, using the Congressional Review Act to wipe out a 2024 Interior Department plan that kept large sections of the 1.56-million-acre area off-limits. Federal leasing will now revert to the broader 2020 Trump-era framework that opened essentially the entire Coastal Plain to development. For Alaska’s delegation and regional Native corporations,…
Notions of renewable energy and reducing greenhouse gases are nice, but costly energy prices are forcing a shift in Europe’s priorities. Reuters reported this week that two members of the European Union — Greece and Italy — and the UK are loosening their opposition to new oil and gas drilling, even as the continent builds out renewables to slash greenhouse gas emissions and meet climate targets. Greece in November issued its first offshore oil and gas exploration license in more than 40 years to a trio of companies including Exxon…
Energy Costs Prompt Europe To Reconsider Oil, Gas Opposition Europe’s Green Dreams Buckle Under the Weight of Its Power BillsSoaring Energy Costs Push Europe Back Into Oil and Gas’s ArmsEurope’s Transition Stalls as Voters Rebel Against Sky-High Electricity Prices The Most Boring Oil Month in Years Sets the Stage for a High-Stakes December When Germany earlier this year approved an offshore gas drilling project, it raised a lot of eyebrows. An energy transition champion, a record breaker in wind and solar installations, now Germany…
Pro?West Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia’ al?Sudani performed strongly in the 11 November parliamentary elections – the seventh since Saddam Hussein’s fall in 2003. With turnout around 56%, Sudani’s Reconstruction and Development Coalition emerged as the largest faction, winning 1.3 million votes out of nearly 11 million cast, beating the pro-Iran State of Law Alliance by 370,000. However, Sudani’s faction still only received 15% of the seats in parliament, totalling 46 out of 329. On the other hand, pro-Iran…
A Texas oil firm is fighting an uphill battle with the state of California to restart crude oil production and sales from three platforms in federal waters offshore Santa Barbara. Houston-based Sable Offshore Corp, led by industry veteran James Flores, is embroiled in contentious legal battles with California’s agencies and attorney general over a project to restore and re-launch a pipeline from the offshore fields to the coast. Faced with California’s opposition and lawsuits, Sable is proposing an alternative plan to ship oil via shuttle…
In a recent article, a professor at the Naval Academy argues that “Trump can leverage the Arctic to end the Ukraine war.” It’s clear that Trump was excited by the possibilities the article raised in ending the war. Written by Lyle J. Goldstein, a research professor at the China Maritime Studies Institute (CMSI) at the US Naval War College. The author makes the case that the key to ending the war lies in the Arctic. Goldstein argues that Trump’s announced plan to end the war swiftly “seemed increasingly out of…
For decades, Nigeria’s oil industry has faced a multitude of challenges. Despite having vast quantities of crude, the mismanagement of revenue, weak agreements with international oil companies, an underinvestment in infrastructure, and widespread oil theft have left many opposed to the ongoing production of crude. Now, Nigeria has high hopes for its renewable energy sector, as it looks to diversify its energy sources and boost energy security over the coming years. Oil theft has long been a problem in Nigeria, affecting both the financial…
After the discovery of oil in Suriname’s territorial waters in January 2020, the government in the capital Paramaribo pitched its hopes on an oil boom matching that of neighboring Guyana. You see, decades of economic mismanagement, excessive spending, and corruption wreaked havoc on the former Dutch colony’s economy. Over the last decade, gross domestic product (GDP) collapsed, plunging by over 10%, hitting Suriname’s population of over 600,000 particularly hard. This exploded in violence during February 2023, with protestors…
Shale drillers are finding new and exciting ways to boost production in the Permian and elsewhere. This can make the industry more resilient to international price swings—but never fully resilient and never for very long. The pain from the prolonged price depression is beginning to bite in. Back in October, Kpler warned that U.S. oil production could shed 700,000 barrels daily if international oil prices slid lower than $60 per barrel. The analytics firm cited drilled but uncompleted well data showing the inventory of these wells had shrunk…
On 16 November 2025, at the Seventh Consultative Meeting of the Heads of State of Central Asia, the presidents of the “C5,” the Central Asia republics of Kazakhstan, the Kyrgyz Republic, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan, announced the Republic of Azerbaijan would join the group, now christened the “C6.” In October 2023, President Ilham Aliyev of Azerbaijan attended the Fifth Consultative Meeting of the Heads of State of Central Asia and noted, “Azerbaijan is a reliable transit country along the route to…
Two conferences in the Middle East this month opened insights on energy and sustainability from a Middle Eastern perspective. The enormous ADIPEC event in Abu Dhabi brought together hundreds of speakers in 10 different strategic areas and numerous technical sessions across four days. Discussion of sustainability occurred within the context of an imperative for investment to sustain growth in all forms of energy and especially oil and gas. The spotlight was also on AI which received praise for already providing remarkable efficiency gains…
