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Previously, we reported that U.S. oil production has maintained its upward trajectory in the current year even as oil prices have sunk to multi-year lows. According to data from the Energy Information Administration (EIA), U.S. crude oil production hit an all-time high of 13.58 million barrels per day (mb/d) in June 2025, exceeding the previous record set in October 2024 by 50 thousand barrels per day (kb/d), and the pre-COVID November 2019 high by 582kb/d. Commodity experts at Standard Chartered have predicted that U.S. production will continue…
The U.S. shale patch is seeing the deepest jobs cuts in three years as producers respond to lower oil prices with slowing drilling activity and greater efficiencies through consolidation and cost cuts. Employment in the industry fell by 1.7% in August, per data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) cited by Bloomberg. In contrast, total U.S. nonfarm payroll employment changed little in August and has shown little change since April, BLS said in its most recent publication. In August, employment in mining, quarrying, and oil and gas extraction…
Russia and Belarus have kicked off major joint military drills as tensions in the region spiked after Russian drones entered Polish territory, prompting Warsaw and NATO allies to scramble their defenses. The Zapad-2025 drills that began on September 12 will take place in Belarus and Russia and will last until September 16. Russian officials said the war games will simulate repelling an enemy attack and analysts say a central aim of the exercises is to showcase that the Russian military is still powerful after 3 1/2 years of grinding war in Ukraine…
America’s power grid is straining under the weight of a fast-changing energy landscape. Beyond the usual summer hum of air conditioners, power demand is surging from electric vehicle chargers and sprawling new data centers. At the same time, the infrastructure built to deliver reliable electricity is aging and showing its limits. From Texas heatwaves to California blackouts, the warning signs are impossible to ignore. This isn’t a technical challenge—it’s an economic and political reckoning. If the grid fails, it won’t…
Carbon markets have become increasingly important as a cost-effective pathway for companies and countries to reduce emissions in a world struggling to meet its climate goals. They can mobilize private capital, particularly in developing countries where clean technology financing remains scarce, and provide hard-to-abate sectors with access to solutions that would otherwise be out of reach. Climate finance pledges are materializing – the $100 billion goal was finally met and the Loss and Damage Fund launched, both in 2022 – but public…
Rystad Energy’s latest analysis reveals a growing threat to global energy security as the world’s five most critical maritime chokepoints, narrow sea routes that handle the bulk of global oil and gas transit, face escalating risks from conflict, piracy and environmental hazards. In 2023, these chokepoints carried an estimated 71.3 million barrels per day (bpd) of oil and petroleum products and about 26 billion cubic feet per day (Bcfd) of liquefied natural gas. By 2024, that volume had dropped to 65 million bpd for oil and petroleum…
China and the West have taken their competition to secure critical minerals to a new battleground—central and southern Africa, where the race to secure critical routes to move the critical metals to demand markets is in full swing. The United States, Japan, and China are backing three different railway corridors in Africa, where a large part of the global copper and cobalt supply is mined. As the U.S. and its allies look to reduce their reliance on China in critical minerals supply, these three railway corridors – all starting in Zambia…
The signing of the Power of Siberia 2 pipeline deal by the presidents of Russia and China was perhaps the biggest news to come out of the two leaders’ meeting earlier this month. It was also the deal that may very well make the new global natural gas flow order permanent, potentially interfering with President Trump’s energy dominance ambitions. The Power of Siberia 2 project has been in the works for years. Yet China took its time deciding to commit to it. Now, the decision has been made, and although details have yet to be tailored,…
US President Donald Trump significantly pivoted US energy policy with the signing of The One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA), transforming supply chains, redirecting investment flows and solidifying the US government’s support of traditional fuels. The act, which underscored the administration’s domestic energy dominance ambitions, was packed with various cost-cutting measures that directly reversed key provisions of the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA). Rystad Energy estimates that the OBBBA’s aggressive foreign content tests, and…
Chinese leader Xi Jinping has presided over a multi-day pageant in Beijing and Tianjin staged in part to showcase the strength and unity of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, a grouping that China and Russia hope can emerge as a new geopolitical center of gravity in a shifting global order. Azerbaijani leader Ilham Aliyev might have a thing or two to say about that. Azerbaijan figures centrally in several simmering disputes and rivalries among SCO states that undermine Xi’s carefully cultivated image of an organization moving in lockstep…
China and Russia presented their masterplan for a new global order at the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) summit currently underway in China’s port city of Tianjin, highlighting China's growing ties with Central Asia. China’s President Xi Jinping called for a new global economic and security order that prioritizes the "Global South" in what is considered a direct challenge to the West and the United States’ hegemony. "We must continue to take a clear stand against hegemonism and power politics, and practise true multilateralism,"…
Shares of lithium miners have been on a tear over the past couple of weeks, reversing months of losses on potential supply disruptions. Last month, China’s giant EV battery maker, Contemporary Amperex Technology, or CATL, announced that it had suspended production at one of its main mines following the expiration of its operating license after failing to extend a key mining permit. CATL said that it had stopped operations at the Jianxiawo mine--one of the world's largest lithium mines, producing ~3% of world supply--prompting speculation…
Artificial intelligence (AI) is eating up more and more energy all the time as large language models become increasingly complex and pervasive. In the United States, nearly half of all growth in electricity demand between now and 2030 will come from data centers, driven by the AI boom. But the problem isn’t your daily queries to ChatGPT – it’s indiscriminate AI integration in technologies and services that are far outside the end-users' control. Yet, it’s consumers who are footing the bill for soaring energy demand. …
Russian President Vladimir Putin, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, and other leaders from the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) are attending a two-day summit in China where Xi Jinping will aim to hone his vision of an alternative world order. More than 20 leaders are gathering in the northern port city of Tianjin on August 31 to September 1 as China hosts the bloc’s annual summit to discuss regional security and trade issues against the backdrop of rising tensions with the West. The summit is also an opportunity for China to portray…
This week saw yet another hike in Britain’s electricity price cap—the latest in a string of hikes that have ranked the country among the top five with the most expensive electricity in the world. But there is a bigger problem: the country is the undisputed leader in industrial electricity prices in the world. And that may cost its government their energy transition plans. On Wednesday, energy regulator Ofgem announced a 2% hike in household electricity prices, beginning in October. This will add an average of 35 pounds, or $47, to a…
It's been a busy few weeks up on the windswept Russian archipelago of Novaya Zemlya: people, earthmoving trucks, shipping containers, temporary housing, heavy-lift aircraft, helicopters, cargo ships. The activity shows up in satellite imagery, aircraft hazard notifications, ship transponder trackers, and open-source intelligence reporting at a time when long Arctic days and good weather mean favorable conditions for building projects at the Pankovo test range and nearby air base. The betting money for close watchers of Russian weapons development…
In a wide-ranging television interview, Azerbaijani leader Ilham Aliyev asserted a key provision of the Trump peace plan for the Caucasus can be implemented quickly. The same cannot be said for the restoration of stable relations between Azerbaijan and Russia, he indicated. Aliyev spoke at length about the provisional peace deal he signed with Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan and US President Donald Trump on August 8 in Washington, sounding broadly optimistic that the agreement signals the end of almost four decades of conflict and “opens…
Amid lower oil prices this year, the U.S. shale patch is in a wait-and-see mode, expecting to ride the price decline with minimal tweaks to strategies. U.S. oil producers are trimming capital expenditure budgets, relying on efficiency gains from current drilling activity to keep output levels. American oil production is rising, due to the lag between oil price slides and drilling, but large shale producers are already calling the peak of oil output, despite the Trump Administration’s best efforts to support the fossil fuels industry. “We’re…
Lithium-ion batteries power the world around us. Their prevalence in our daily life is growing steadily, to the extent that lithium-ion batteries now power a whopping 70 percent of all rechargeable devices. From electric vehicles to smartphones to utility-scale energy storage, lithium-ion batteries are increasingly forming the building blocks of innumerable sectors. But despite its dominance in battery technologies, there are some serious issues with lithium supply chains that make it a less-than-ideal model upon which to base our world. Not only…
Pakistan is undergoing an energy revolution fuelled by a sharp rise in solar-plus-battery systems. This rapid evolution and decentralization of power grids is helping to shore up the nation’s energy security and meet international decarbonization pledges. However, while the solar boom is helping to keep the lights on for many Pakistanis, it is also hurting the poorest citizens. Pakistan has long struggled with rolling blackouts, power shortages, and crippling energy costs, and – like many emerging economies around the world –…
U.S. President Donald Trump is taking India to task, and we are a long way from what then-President Barack Obama called a "defining partnership of the 21st century." But India’s neighbor, and enemy, and America’s frenemy, escaped Trump’s ire. Why? Despite a successful visit to India by Vice-President J.D. Vance in April 2025, and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to the White House in February 2025, Trump hit India, America’s #12 trade partner, with two rounds of 25% tariffs. (Pakistan’s tariff of 19%,…
Since the 1950s, the Middle East has established itself as the world’s most prolific oil producing region, typically accounting for a third of global production. The oil crises of 1973–74 and 1978–80 spurred growth in Middle Eastern oil production and began the shift in market control from multinational corporations to national oil companies within OPEC nations. However, the region still exported most of its oil in crude form and had limited refining capacity at that time. However, that has changed in recent years, with the Gulf…
Trade uncertainty and tariffs are prompting America’s battery makers and battery material manufacturers to expand overseas to have production sites in the biggest demand centers now that clean energy isn’t a favorite with the U.S. Administration. The trend has become evident in recent weeks, in which two U.S. battery companies have taken over production sites in South Korea and Europe, betting on being close to customers in markets favoring green technology and renewable energy expansion. First, it was California-based…
For years, energy workers from the fossil fuel sector have been growing increasingly concerned about their future working in the sector. As many countries invest heavily in renewable energy, in a bid to decrease dependence on oil, gas, and coal, many traditional energy jobs are disappearing. However, the knowledge and experience that workers in this sector hold could be well-suited to new jobs in the renewable energy industry, so long as governments invest in a just transition. According to the European Union definition, a “Just transition…
