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The once peaceful South American nation of Ecuador is being rocked by cocaine related violence. Since the 2020 pandemic, the tiny country’s murder rate has spiraled higher, hitting an all-time high of nearly 51 murders per 100,000 people during 2025. The tiny impoverished country of less than 20 million is regularly affected by extreme bloodshed, conflict, and lawlessness despite frequent security crackdowns. The rapid rise of cocaine trafficking and related brutality is sharply impacting government finances and Ecuador’s broken oil…
Trump faces a simple but difficult choice: Iran’s enriched uranium still needs to be secured, and airstrikes haven’t accomplished that. The only clear way to control it would likely require U.S. troops on the ground—an option that risks widening the conflict and raising the stakes significantly. That uncertainty has been pouring over into global energy markets. Oil prices have pulled back from recent highs but remain elevated as the Middle East conflict shows no signs of abating. Europe remains largely non-committal towards using…
The first lease sale in the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska in seven years became the most successful auction in the area ever, as oil majors bid on hundreds of tracts, signaling they haven’t given up on Alaska’s petroleum resources despite development and court challenges. This week’s oil and gas lease sale for the National Petroleum Reserve in Alaska, one of five mandated in the next decade under the Trump Administration’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA), drew a record high of $163.7 million in high bids and resulted…
Thermal batteries are the hottest new thing in energy storage tech. As energy storage heats up to be “clean energy’s next trillion-dollar business,” the private sector is throwing its full weight behind developing the technology that will unlock scalable long-term energy storage. As of 2022, the energy storage market was valued at nearly $198.8 billion, on track to reach $329.1 billion by 2032, and showing no sign of slowing from there. The race to corner that market is a contentious one, and thermal batteries are rapidly emerging…
The shutdown of the Strait of Hormuz following the war in Iran has delivered a harsh lesson to global energy markets: the waterway carries far more than crude oil. Beyond crude and natural gas, the Middle East anchors key downstream fuel flows that sustain entire national energy systems. Nowhere is that dependence clearer than in India, where the liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) market relies overwhelmingly on supplies from the Gulf. Middle Eastern suppliers account for roughly 90% of India’s LPG imports, a figure that becomes even more striking…
