Category: Highlights

Winter Storm Elliott, which swept through most of the United States during the Christmas holidays, exposed the vulnerability of the energy system as natural gas and power supplies were strained, wells froze off, and utilities vastly underestimated the power demand during the huge storm.  Despite the fact that it wasn’t as prolonged as the Winter Storm Uri of February 2021, when millions in Texas lost power for days, the latest storm showed—once again—that energy providers couldn’t accurately predict the power demand surge, and some had to resort to rotating outages…

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Russia’s budget deficit in the coming year might exceed the expected 2% of GDP as the oil price cap hurts export income, the country’s Finance Minister Anton Siluanov said on Tuesday. This marks the first time a Russian official has acknowledged that the $60 per barrel price cap imposed on Russia by Europe and G7 nations will negatively impact its economy. Siluanov says the country will tap debt markets to bridge the deficit. Russia expects to use just over 2 trillion roubles ($29 billion) from the National Wealth Fund (NWF) in 2022…

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Iran has long held enormous political, economic, and military sway over neighbouring Iraq through its various military and political proxies, and since the discovery of vast reservoirs of oil in Iran first in the early 1900s and shortly after in Iraq, Tehran has an added incentive to retain this influence and to enhance it. With Iran’s longstanding former superpower ally, Russia, now looking to build out its remaining influence south of Europe, there is another reason for Iran to strengthen its ties with Iraq. In precisely this context, the last…

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Natural gas output in the Appalachia region, the top gas-producing basin in the U.S., dropped by a record amount as Winter Storm Elliott swept through Pennsylvania and Ohio, freezing wells and some equipment and creating mechanical issues at pipeline infrastructure. The Appalachia basin saw natural gas supply drop by 27%, or by 9 billion cubic feet, compared to the typical levels, according to estimates by BloombergNEF based on pipeline flows. The decline was the steepest on record in data since 2013, Bloomberg notes.    In Pennsylvania, natural gas production fell by more…

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Eyeing multifield growth in demand for renewable energy in Pakistan, a family-owned power firm says it has successfully raised advanced level ‘Series-A’ investment to kickstart local production of solar panels from the second half (July-December) of 2023. The firm is setting up the plant through the transfer of technology from Turkiye at an initial investment of $3.5 million in phase one of the project. The company said it will formally announce the size of the privately raised investment in the presence of the local financier in the next couple of…

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