Month: January 2023

After a decade of exponential growth, the U.S. shale patch is no longer the swing producer on the global markets. That role is now back in the hands of OPEC and its largest and most influential members in the Middle East, analysts and industry executives say.  From growth of over 1 million barrels per day (bpd) in oil production annually before the pandemic hit demand in 2020, the United States is now set to see the growth rate at half of that, at best, this year. Although most of the…

The Nord Stream pipeline can be repaired within a year, but it’s unclear whether Germany would want to receive Russian natural gas at all, said Klaus-Dieter Maubach, the outgoing CEO at German energy giant Uniper, which was Russia’s top gas customer before Moscow cut off supply via Nord Stream. “The first question that needs answering: what’s the political will on a European level and in Berlin to bring Russian gas to Germany?” Maubach said at the annual Handelsblatt Energy summit on Tuesday, as carried by Reuters. Last summer, the German…

Saudi Aramco CEO Amin Nasser has sent a stark warning about the lack of spare oil production capacity, telling the Energy Intelligence Forum that an uptick in demand could cause a supply crunch and price volatility similar to that seen in the gas market. With benchmark crude prices falling by around $30 per barrel since June, Nasser said the market was focusing on short-term economics rather than supply fundamentals. But with only around 1.5 million barrels per day of global spare capacity, Nasser argued that if Chinese demand picks up,…