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Libya Downplays Saudi Oil Talks
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No OPEC members have publicly mooted an organization-wide production cut, with oil passing through the $135 a barrel mark, although some countries trimmed output during this yearÕs second quarter.
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Some oil-producing countries may defy the West by cutting production, Libya warned on June 21, ahead of an emergency meeting of oil producers and consumers in Saudi Arabia.
According to the Guardian, Shorki Ghanem, the chairman of Libya’s National Oil Corporation, told Reuters in advance of the meeting in Jeddah: “Some countries may think of increasing production, but some countries may even think of cutting production.“
A move to cut production would fly in the face of appeals by Gordon Brown, George Bush and other western leaders. They have been pressing OPEC, the oil organization, to raise production in an effort to bring down record oil prices.
No OPEC members have publicly mooted a organization-wide production cut, with oil passing through the $135 a barrel mark, although some countries trimmed output during this year’s second quarter, when demand from refineries is at its lowest.
Brown, who was flying out to Jeddah on June 21, will press Saudi Arabia and other oil producers to use some of their huge oil profits from the worst “oil shock“ in history to invest in renewable energy and nuclear power in the west.
Brown says 30-35 percent of all electricity generated in the UK will have to come from renewable sources to meet the targets set by Europe to reduce the effects of climate change.
“Over the next three years I think we will see large investments in Britain in solar, wind power, wave power, nuclear and in expansion to alternatives to oil,“ Brown told the Guardian.
But the OPEC oil organization sees little prospect for lower oil prices in the short term.
A senior Iranian oil official said he expected crude prices to rise in coming days with the approach of summer, which will not go down well with motorists in the UK currently forking out £1.20 per liter. But it is the world’s poorest who are feeling the brunt of higher energy prices, with riots seen in Haiti and Somalia.
“In coming days we will witness another increase in oil prices,“ Hojjatollah Ghanimifard, an Iranian official, told the Tehran-e Emrooz daily newspaper.
“As we get closer to the end of the current month and the... summer season oil prices are more likely to rise,“ Ghanimifard added.
Meanwhile, Iran’s OPEC governor, Mohammad Ali Khatibi, said: “Currently, OPEC does not see a need to boost its production.“
However, Saudi Arabia, the world’s biggest oil producer and the most pro-western OPEC member, confirmed it would boost production to 9.7 million barrels a day next month - its second increase in as many months and its highest production rate in decades.
Besides hinting at a possible cut in oil production by some OPEC members, Libya downplayed hopes for decisive action from the Jeddah summit.
“You can’t get any decision on important matters in the energy market in a meeting of three hours,“ Ghanem, said.
Saudi Arabia will press consumer nations to curtail the speculation it sees as a major factor behind high oil prices.
“Governments have a role in organizing oil markets and structuring them in a way that prevents speculators behaving in a manner that has led oil prices to reach their current levels,“ the deputy oil minister, Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman, was quoted as saying in the Saudi-owned Asharq al-Awsat daily.
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Canada: No Entry for Electric Vehicles
Despite increasing local demand for zero-emissions cars and trucks and robust exports of electric vehicles, Canada will not allow them on its roads, lament manufacturers.
“It’s a daily embarrassment,“ said Ian Clifford, president of Zenn Motor Company, which builds “zero emissions no noise“ vehicles in Canada for export primarily to the United States, AFP reported.
“Even my employees can’t drive to work in a Zenn. It’s absurd,“ he said of federal and provincial rules that forbid electric cars from being driven on most Canadian roads.
Clifford’s frustration is aggravated by the view that Canadians are increasingly concerned about the environment and are said to be eager to drive electric vehicles in this warming climate.
“We build the car in St. Jerome (Quebec) and ship them all south of the border,“ where 44 states allow them, and some 45,000 electric cars are in use today, he said.
But Transport Canada says the vehicles made of lightweight metals and plastics are not safe to drive on Canada’s open roads, and would not stand up in a collision.
The regulatory agency has so far certified only five models as road-worthy, including the Zenn, and two others that are no longer in production, said Transport Canada spokeswoman Maryse Durette.
But most provinces, which have jurisdiction over the vast majority of roads and highways in the country, have balked at giving electric cars the green light, citing Transport Canada’s safety concerns.
“We found Transport Canada to be very hostile towards low speed electric vehicles,“ echoed Danny Epp of Dynasty Electric Car in an email to AFP.
The Canadian company was recently sold to a Pakistani group which plans to move production to Karachi and continue exporting its vehicles to the United States.
According to reports, others allege political bias, noting Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s Conservative government’s base of support in oil-rich Alberta province.
To date, only westernmost British Columbia allows low speed electric vehicles on its urban roads.
This week, Quebec in eastern Canada announced a three-year pilot project that would permit starting in July the Zenn and an electric truck called Nemo on its roads with posted speed limits of 50 kilometers (31 miles) per hour.
Manufacturers are hoping Quebec’s pilot may spur its neighbors to jump on the bandwagon and eventually make it possible to drive an electric car from coast to coast across all 10 of Canada’s provinces.
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Iraqi Stance
Iraq wants massive development of its oil production in the medium term, seeking to more than double the average number of barrels per day, an oil adviser to Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri Al-Maliki said.
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Pricier Gas Won’t Sap China Demand
Chinese motorists, long accustomed to cheap gas, seemed to take in stride a government decision to boost fuel prices on Friday by as much as 18 percent.
’’Maybe I might drive a bit less. But if it’s for business, then if I have to drive, I will,’’ said He Ping, a trading company employee who was refilling his VW Jetta at a Beijing gas station.
There were at least a dozen vehicles waiting behind him in line, Miamiherald said.
While higher prices for China’s state-controlled fuel will inevitably squeeze consumers at both filling stations and grocery stores, analysts say it is unlikely to make an immediate or huge dent in the country’s hunger for oil.
China’s economy is booming, and people are buying cars and air conditioners as their incomes grow. There is huge pent-up demand in the country of 1.3 billion, where per capita energy consumption remains far below western nations.
’’It’s still affordable,’’ said a man who was filling up his car, who gave only his surname, Pan.
The 12.6 gallons of gas Pan bought cost him 318 yuan ($46). That’s $3.65 a gallon.
The silver lining is that with the government increasing prices, refiners may finally boost production of gasoline, diesel and other refined products, helping to alleviate long lines at gas stations and a widespread fuel shortage.
Refiners have cut production because they were losing money on the wide gap between global crude oil prices and state-set retail prices.
While the government paid billions in subsidies to China’s two big state-owned refiners, many smaller refiners were shutting down.
’’Do not expect an immediate fall in China’s oil imports--the price effect on demand will work in China as well, but it will take some time to work through,’’ Wang Tao, an economist for UBS Securities, said in a report issued Friday.
Crude oil prices on Friday jumped more than $4 per barrel at one point on the New York Mercantile Exchange after tumbling the day before on news that China’s National Development and Reform Commission would raise prices for gasoline and diesel fuel by 16 percent and 18 percent respectively.
Some analysts said the oil market may have overreacted to the news from China, with some traders buying oil futures on the belief that their climb will continue.
’’Whether domestic demand cools, or the price increase simply serves to bring more refining capacity on-line to satisfy China’s voracious appetite, remains to be seen,’’ said Jing Ulrich, chairwoman of China equities for JP Morgan Chase & Co.
The government last hiked fuel prices by about 11 percent in November. It froze prices to avert further inflation, which has hit 12-year highs since the beginning of 2008.
Despite surging oil costs, China’s imports of both crude oil and oil products have surged to unprecedented levels as it builds up national stockpiles, while exports have plunged. Crude oil imports rose to 59.8 million barrels in January-April, up 10 percent from a year earlier.
Solar Dish Could Revolutionize Energy Production
A new type of solar energy collector concentrates the sun into a beam that could melt steel. Researchers say the device could revolutionize global energy production.
The prototype is a 12-foot-wide mirrored dish was made from a lightweight frame of thin, inexpensive aluminum tubing and strips of mirror. It concentrates sunlight by a factor of 1,000 to produce steam, LiveScience said.
“This is actually the most efficient solar collector in existence,“ said Doug Wood, an inventor based in Washington state who patented key parts of the dish’s design - the rights to which he has signed over to a team of students at MIT.
To test the prototype this week, MIT mechanical engineering Spencer Ahrens put a plank of wood in the beam and generated an almost instant puff of smoke.
The thing does more than burn wood, of course. At the end of a 12-foot aluminum tube rising from the center of the dish is a black-painted coil of tubing that has water running through it. When the dish is pointing directly at the sun, the water in the coil flashes immediately into steam.
Ahrens and his teammates have started a company, RawSolar, to hopefully mass produce the dishes. They could be set up in huge arrays to provide steam for industrial processing, or for heating or cooling buildings, as well as to hook up to steam turbines and generate electricity, according to an MIT statement. Once in mass production, such arrays should pay for themselves within two years or so with the energy they produce, the students figure.
Wood, the inventor, said the students built the dish and improved on his design.
“They really have simplified this and made it user-friendly, so anybody can build it,“ he said.
Wood said small dishes work best because it requires much less support structure and costs less for a given amount of collection area.
“I’ve looked for years at a variety of solar approaches, and this is the cheapest I’ve seen,“ said MIT Sloan School of Management lecturer David Pelly, in whose class the project first took shape last fall.
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