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It’s been a devastating few weeks for the natural gas market. Sure, Shale Era abundance was supposed to keep gas prices from skyrocketing — and it generally has. But seriously? Henry Hub gas sinking below $2/MMBtu — and staying there, in the depths of the winter heating season? Prices have stabilized a little as a few E&Ps announced cutbacks in cap…
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The uncertainties around solar power are well understood — when the sun doesn’t shine as much as expected, power grids that rely heavily on that generation must turn elsewhere to meet consumer demand. And while a shortfall in solar generation can be challenging to navigate, the difference between actual and forecast levels is typically only a few p…
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Many have argued that U.S.-sourced LNG can be instrumental in combating climate change by helping countries around the world replace coal-fired generation with natural gas-fired power. While this argument carries a lot of force in the eyes of many politicians and LNG marketers, the questions of exactly how — and to what extent — LNG can replace coa…
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The Biden administration has placed some big bets on clean hydrogen, seeing it as a replacement fuel for some hard-to-abate industries and putting it at the heart of its long-term decarbonization efforts. But while clean hydrogen has significant long-term potential — backed by major subsidies, including the 45V production tax credit (PTC) — figurin…
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The Enbridge Mainline, by far the largest transportation network for growing Western Canadian crude oil supplies to the U.S. Midwest, Gulf Coast and Eastern Canada, recently received regulatory approval for the tolls that it charges shippers for using the massive pipeline system. As we discuss in today’s RBN blog, the Canada Energy Regulator’s (CER…
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Listen to Paul Simon’s “The Sound of Silence” and you hear the words of a teenager coming to terms with the disconnect between the world his parents promised and the real world yet to come. In the LNG market, there’s a similar generational divide. A business built on long-term contracts, rigid trade patterns, and the promise of substantial growth p…
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There’s always a risk when you take a new approach to doing or making something that your expectations won’t pan out — that something you hadn’t figured on happens and messes things up. But oh, the satisfaction that comes when the stars align exactly as you foresaw. The folks who developed Project Traveler, a recently completed Houston-area plant t…
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With many years gone by and many millions of dollars spent, the deepwater crude oil export projects under development along the U.S. Gulf Coast are finally getting close to receiving their regulatory green light. These projects have sparked commercial and wider market interest because of the many benefits they may provide — including the ability to…
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There’s already so much involved in developing new LNG export capacity: lining up offtakers, securing federal approvals, sourcing natural gas, developing pipelines ... the list goes on. Now, with the increased emphasis on minimizing emissions of methane, the folks involved in LNG exports are also wary of the methane intensity (MI) of their feedgas,…
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It’s that time of year, folks! March Madness is upon us — time to reboot the office pool and fill out your brackets. And not just for the NCAA Tournament field announced Sunday night, but for the natural gas pipeline projects out of the Permian you think will make it to the Elite Eight or even the Final Four. Matterhorn Express is like the UConn of…
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In the three years since the deadly electrical outages caused by Winter Storm Uri, the Texas Legislature, the Public Utility Commission of Texas (PUCT), and the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) have been working overtime to design and implement changes to ensure a more reliable Texas power grid. But it hasn’t been easy. The state’s ene…
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As U.S. crude oil expands its foothold across the world, the markets that trade it have undergone some fundamental changes. Since the onset of the pandemic almost four years ago, these changes have included the shortening of the loading-date range for crude oil cargoes marketed along the U.S. Gulf Coast. Price reporting agencies (PRAs) like Argus h…
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When legendary University of Texas football coach Darrell Royal was asked how he approached important games, he frequently said, “You dance with the one who brung ya,” which meant sticking with the strategy that produced previous success. After struggling through a period of extreme price volatility in 2014-20, U.S. E&Ps finally locked onto a game …
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Mexico’s state-owned Comisión Federal de Electricidad (CFE) and private-sector developers of LNG export terminals have been aggressively advancing new natural gas-consuming projects in Northwest Mexico. But while plans for a number of new pipelines to help bring in gas from the Permian are on the drawing board, it remains to be seen if they can be …
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Two maritime passages long regarded as essential shortcuts in the complex world of commodity shipping have become a lot more challenging to navigate. Transiting the Red Sea has turned potentially deadly because of geopolitical tensions, while severe drought has critically reduced operations at the Panama Canal. Combined, these issues are being felt…
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When the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) was passed into law in August 2022, it earned near-unanimous acclaim from longtime supporters of renewable energy and decarbonization efforts. Industry types also approved of the bill’s focus on incentives to fuel new developments. One of its most ambitious elements was creation of the 45V production tax credi…
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The Energy Information Administration (EIA) recently changed the weather forecast methodology for one of its most important energy models — the Short-Term Energy Outlook (STEO) — and while we talk about the effects of weather on energy markets fairly often (571 times in the past 12 years, or about once a week, but who’s counting?), we rarely take a…
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The drivers behind most upstream M&A the past couple of years have been consistent — namely, to gain scale (mostly in the Permian) and the economies that come with it, boost free cash flow (and share more with shareholders), and replenish reserves to keep the good times rollin' into the 2030s. There are hints of all that in California Resources’ re…
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Faced with sustained sub-$2/MMBtu natural gas prices and dim prospects for significant gas-demand growth until sometime next year, a number of major gas-focused E&Ps have been tapping the brakes on production and trimming their planned 2024 capex. But one company — Chesapeake Energy, slated to become the U.S.’s largest gas producer thanks to a rece…
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It’s been a devastating few weeks for the natural gas market. Sure, Shale Era abundance was supposed to keep gas prices from skyrocketing — and it generally has. But seriously? Henry Hub gas sinking below $2/MMBtu — and staying there, in the depths of the winter heating season? Prices have stabilized a little in recent days as a few E&Ps announced …
  continue reading
 
Natural gas prices remain at near-record lows, but with so much production being driven by still-favorable crude oil economics there’s a distinct possibility — especially given the warm winter we’re in — that gas inventories may test storage capacity this year, perhaps as early as Labor Day. Of course, there are many market factors that might preve…
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Observers of the natural gas market over the past 20 years know that the main story has been one of enormous growth. The Shale Revolution gave new life to the U.S. natural gas sector, leading to the record production levels we are seeing in early 2024. The economy has found many uses for this new gas: increased power generation, more pipeline expor…
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It’s been nine years since Formosa Petrochemical filed its first permit applications for a proposed $9.4 billion petrochemical complex in Louisiana and, while the greenfield project has faced legal setbacks, it recently posted an important win and may — emphasis on may — eventually make it across the finish line. The Sunshine Project would be massi…
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The Raceland crude oil hub is far from Louisiana’s largest but might be positioned to earn a little more of the spotlight after Sentinel Midstream and ExxonMobil Pipeline formed a joint venture in December to enhance business for a few crude oil pipelines connecting Louisiana hubs, including Raceland. In today’s RBN blog, we examine the infrastruct…
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Way back in 2018-19, U.S. NGL production was rising fast, new ethane-only steam crackers were coming online along the Gulf Coast, and new fractionation capacity wasn’t being added quickly enough — the capacity shortfall sent the NGL market into near-panic. Fast forward to now: NGL production is still rising but domestic demand is flat, resulting in…
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The federal government’s Hydrogen Production Tax Credit (PTC), also known as 45V, provides the highest incentives for hydrogen produced using clean sources of power generation, like wind and solar. That might seem like great news for current and potential hydrogen producers looking to take advantage of the credit, since the U.S. has added significa…
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Everyone in Texas remembers the infamous Winter Storm Uri of three years ago. What started out as a simple cold snap for many quickly turned into something far more serious: the biggest power outage in state history, with billions of dollars in property damage and hundreds of lives lost. Since then, the expected arrival of frigid temperatures has b…
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As mightily as U.S. LNG exports have impacted global trade dynamics, so have U.S. natural gas flows been reshaped by the pull toward Gulf Coast export terminals. The next new terminal on deck is Venture Global’s enormous Plaquemines facility in Louisiana, which could begin taking feedgas as early as late fall 2024 and will eventually ramp up to mor…
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Around the world, a lot of smart people in the public and private sectors hold similar views on where we’re all headed, energy-wise. An accelerating shift to renewables and electric vehicles, driven by climate concerns. A not-so-far-away peak in global demand for refined products like gasoline and diesel. There are also what you might call consensu…
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Big changes are coming to the new epicenter of the global LNG market: Texas and Louisiana. On top of the existing 12.5 Bcf/d of LNG export capacity in the two states, another 11+ Bcf/d of additional capacity is planned by 2028. The good news is that the two major supply basins that will feed this LNG demand — the Permian and the Haynesville — will …
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The Biden administration’s recently announced decision to pause further action on new LNG export permits for at least several months sent shockwaves through the industry and shook up expectations regarding which projects will be hurt by — or benefit from — the pause. As we’ll discuss in today’s RBN blog, the decision is likely to put a number of Gu…
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Thanks to expanding heavy crude oil production in Western Canada’s oil sands in recent years and increased pipeline access from the region to the U.S. Gulf Coast, re-exports of Canadian heavy crude from Gulf Coast terminals set a record in 2023. With additional production gains on tap in the oil sands, it might seem natural to think that another re…
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A Super Bowl game (and halftime show) for the ages followed up only hours later by a made-in-heaven combination of two of the largest, most admired E&Ps in the super-hot Permian? It doesn’t get any better than this, unless you’re a Taylor Swift fan too — in which case, it may be impossible for you to “shake it off.” In today’s RBN blog, we examine …
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A handful of U.S. midstreamers are striving to build an offshore export buoy in the Gulf of Mexico that would be able to fully load a Very Large Crude Carrier (VLCC). If successful, they could facilitate a new wave of crude oil export flows and dynamics. With domestic production back to record highs and global supply and demand dynamics in a consta…
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Since the mid-2010s, Mexico’s Comisión Federal de Electricidad (CFE) has developed a massive fleet of natural-gas-fired combined-cycle plants and helped to underwrite the buildout of a far-reaching network of gas pipelines from South Texas and West Texas into and through much of Mexico. Now, there’s a big push to extend that network southeast throu…
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The Biden administration has placed some big bets on clean hydrogen, seeing it as a replacement fuel for some hard-to-abate industries and putting it at the heart of its long-term decarbonization efforts. All of these bets are backed by a brand-new tax credit. But the goal isn’t just to drive production of more hydrogen — it’s also to make hydrogen…
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Fresh on the heels of expanding its Beaumont, TX, refinery into the largest in the country, ExxonMobil announced in January that it had finished yet another project at its century-old Baton Rouge complex in Louisiana. The Baton Rouge Refinery Integrated Competitiveness (BRRIC) project took roughly three years to complete and did not add crude refin…
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So far this winter, front-month CME/NYMEX natural gas futures have fallen, risen and fallen again but, until their most recent dip, generally remained within the same $2.30-to-$3.30/MMBtu range where they have been lingering since mid-2023. With production sustaining near-record levels, LNG export volumes down from the winter highs, and temperature…
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Brutal arctic cold may have chilled broad swaths of the U.S. last month, but the scorching pace of upstream M&A activity continued to be red hot, with nearly $20 billion in deals announced in January after a record-setting 2023. Last year’s transaction value totaled an astounding $192 billion, a mark 79% higher than the previous 10-year high and mo…
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Natural gas storage — especially well-sited storage with lightning-fast deliverability rates — is taking on a new significance (and value) as LNG export facilities and power generators seek to manage their often-volatile gas demand. But developing new gas storage capacity is costly and, with only a few exceptions, it’s hard to make an economic case…
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If the U.S. is to significantly grow its production of electric vehicles (EVs), it’s going to need a robust domestic supply chain that includes critical metals and minerals. The Biden administration has previously provided billions in funding made available through the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA, also known as the Bipartisan Infra…
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There’s no doubt about it: The Biden administration’s decision to pause approval of LNG export licenses poses a new threat to a number of projects thought to be nearing a final investment decision (FID). The questions brought on by the move are profound: how big of a problem is this for U.S. developers, how does the timeout affect the projects now …
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When the Group of Seven (G-7) countries placed a $60/bbl cap on the price of Russian crude oil in December 2022 — one of many responses to Russia’s February 2022 invasion of Ukraine — there were two primary goals. The first was to keep Russian barrels flowing to the market to help keep global prices in check, and the second was to slash the profita…
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The current winter heating season in Canada has seen extremes of warmth and cold, but much more of the former than the latter. Given that the Canadian natural gas market was already oversupplied and struggling with record-high gas storage levels as winter approached, even the most intense cold blast in mid-January wasn’t enough to return the supply…
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Big changes are coming to the new epicenter of the global LNG market: Texas and Louisiana. On top of the existing 12.5 Bcf/d of LNG export capacity in the two states, another 11+ Bcf/d of additional capacity is planned by 2028. The good news is that the two major supply basins that will feed this LNG demand — the Permian and the Haynesville — will …
  continue reading
 
A lot of energy-industry M&A activity lately has been focused on the acquiring company gaining scale in a shale play or region where it’s already very active, usually the Permian. The latest multibillion-dollar deal in the energy space is different: Sunoco LP (stock ticker symbol SUN), which is primarily involved in fuel distribution east of the Mi…
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When the price of the Tier 3 sulfur credit hit a new high of $3,600 in October 2023, the tradable sulfur credit for gasoline moved from the background to center stage in refining circles. And while credit prices have retreated slightly to about $3,400, they still represent a nearly 10-fold increase over two years and translate to a Tier 3 complianc…
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Discussions and debates around the carbon-capture industry have been everywhere in recent years, from the federal incentives designed to spur its growth and the role it might play in decarbonization efforts to the technical challenges and economic headwinds that add uncertainty to its long-term outlook. And while all of those are important topics w…
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As we step into the new year with record-high U.S. crude oil production and export volumes as strong as ever, there’s a race underway among four offshore export projects that aim to tap into those rising supplies and — with their ability to fully load Very Large Crude Carriers (VLCCs) without any reverse lightering — push export volumes to new heig…
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With all the talk about U.S. LNG exports and plans for more LNG export capacity, it can be easy to forget that more than 6 Bcf/d of U.S. natural gas — mostly from the Permian and the Eagle Ford — is being piped to Mexico. That’s more than 3X the volumes that were being piped south of the border 10 years ago, a tripling made possible by the buildout…
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