EXTRACTED: Daily News Clips 7/25/22
PIPELINE NEWS
WPR: Environmentalists say Wisconsin failed to fully review an oil pipeline project's risks. The EPA agrees.
Lincoln Journal Star: Plan to convert natural gas pipeline to CO2 in Lincoln County raising concerns
The Globe: Summit Carbon Solutions shares pipeline plans in Kandiyohi County
KXNET: Red River Pipeline: Landowners’ fears & worries
S&P Global: Keystone oil pipeline resumes normal operations after disruption
WITN: Colonial Pipeline spill now largest onshore leak in U.S. history
CNN: New Biden administration rules give pipeline operators more flexibility to combat cyber threats
WASHINGTON UPDATES
E&E News: Six climate emergency complications
Bloomberg: States Will Get Billions to Plug Orphan Oil Wells. Is it Enough?
STATE UPDATES
Colorado Sun: Report that oil field methane emissions are down by half is wrong, Front Range cities with own pollution monitors say
Oil City News: Petroleum group intervenes in drilling permit challenge on BLM lands
Anchorage Daily News: Murkowski and Sullivan advocate for speedy approval of major Arctic oil project
Pennsylvania Capital-Star: Environmental watchdogs petition DCNR to remove access fee on oil & gas well database
Bakersfield Californian: Kern proposes fixes to oil permitting system
EXTRACTION
OilPrice.com: Record Profits Could Convince Oil Majors To Hike Dividends
Forbes: The U.S. Is Still The World’s Top Oil Producer
USA Today: Fact check: False claim that Permian Basin oil supply would fuel America for 200 years
The Tyee: Vancouver’s Big Oil Lawsuit, Explained
OPINION
The Hill: President Biden can (still) diffuse the climate bomb in America’s Arctic
PIPELINE NEWS
WPR: Environmentalists say Wisconsin failed to fully review an oil pipeline project's risks. The EPA agrees.
Danielle Kaeding, 7/25/22
“With the sun blazing overhead, tribal and environmental advocates gathered one June morning along a gravel road where a Canadian energy firm’s pipeline crosses a northern Wisconsin tribe’s reservation,” WPR reports. “The site is part of a 12-mile stretch where the Bad River Band of Lake Superior Chippewa has been embroiled in a yearslong legal battle with Enbridge Inc., to remove Line 5 from tribal lands… “Naomi Tillison, the tribe's director of the Mashkiiziibii Natural Resources Department, told WPR the tribal council previously rejected renewal of pipeline easements due to the threat of an oil spill. "That's why the council said we are not going to do these," Tillison told WPR. "We need to protect our water. We need to protect our wild rice beds. We need to protect our fisheries." “...The Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources is the lead state agency permitting the $450 million project. In December, it released a draft environmental review of the company’s plan that critics blasted as incomplete and flawed. Now, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency says the state's review failed to fully analyze the ways in which the project could harm the environment, as well as tribal resources and treaty rights. "We think that many of the comments we've provided to take climate change into account, and to do a much more thorough review of the potential impact on tributaries and on those wetlands, will assist in a better review," EPA’s Regional Administrator Debra Shore told Wisconsin Public Radio's "The Morning Show." In March, the EPA sent a 31-page letter with nearly 200 recommendations for the DNR to strengthen its review as part of preparing a final environmental impact statement. Federal regulators say the state failed to fully analyze the risk of spills, tribal resources and treaty rights, the effects of climate change, and whether the project would violate state and tribal water quality standards… “The EPA doesn't normally weigh in on state reviews, Jen Tyler, a supervisor who oversees federal environmental law within EPA’s Tribal Programs Office in Chicago, told WPR. Tyler said the DNR invited the federal agency to weigh in on its draft. "EPA continues to have concerns about potential significant impacts, particularly to waters that are essential to the exercise of tribal treaty rights and continuation of tribal traditional lifeways," Tyler told WPR… “The EPA's Tyler expects many of the agency’s recommendations will be addressed in the DNR’s final environmental impact statement, which federal regulators will review… “Enbridge plans to break ground once all permits are granted. But it's clear federal regulators want to know much more before they make any final decisions.”
Lincoln Journal Star: Plan to convert natural gas pipeline to CO2 in Lincoln County raising concerns
Chris Dunker, 7/24/22
“The easement to allow a pipeline to run across the Lincoln County homestead, delivering natural gas from northern Colorado to a station near Beatrice 436 miles to the east, was signed more than four decades ago,” the Lincoln Journal Star reports. “While the pipeline is buried underground and remains out of site, it’s never far out of mind, Stephanie Savely, whose family still owns and lives on the homestead claim made by her great-grandfather near Wellfleet a century ago, told the Star… “While the feeling of imposition — gates left open, and a lack of control over the property, for example — was just part of inheriting the property, Savely told the Star the family was caught off guard to learn the natural gas pipeline would be abandoned and converted into a carrier of carbon dioxide… “The project has the backing of Gov. Pete Ricketts and several Nebraska state senators, as well as elected leaders in Colorado and Wyoming, and has won support from business, labor, energy and ethanol groups who say the project will benefit both the environment and the economy. The plan to convert Trailblazer from natural gas to carbon dioxide has also generated opposition from an assortment of strange bedfellows. Environmentalists and pipeline safety organizations have pointed to a lack of regulations for CO2 pipelines, while the oil and gas industry has raised concerns about how the conversion could adversely impact natural gas supply as demand is expected to increase in the future. And landowners like Savely and her sister, Ranae Calvert, tell the Star they are concerned not only about the safety of such a project, but that the agreement their grandfather signed more than 40 years ago never envisioned a natural gas pipeline being converted to a different use. “Our grandfather signed the lease,” Savely told the Star. “He passed and my grandmother ran the farm. She’s passed, and my father ran the farm. He passed, now my mother runs the farm…We don’t even have the original contracts anymore, and we’re busy frantically trying to get our hands on those.” “...Tallgrass Energy has not yet applied for a Class VI permit, according to the Wyoming Department of Environmental Quality, or notified the department of the exact location of the well… “Companies can take advantage of 45Q tax credits if they use CO2 for further extraction of oil and gas, but Steven Davidson, a vice president at Tallgrass Energy, told the Star the Trailblazer Pipeline project is designed to sequester carbon only. “It will not be used for further extraction,” Davidson told the Star… “Attorney Paul Blackburn of Bold Alliance, which has organized opposition to oil pipelines as well as carbon dioxide pipelines, told the Star questions remain about whether or not the conversion can be done safely. “If Trailblazer gets converted, they get to make up their own safety standards,” Blackburn told the Star. “Maybe they’ll do a good job, maybe they won’t. Nevertheless, there won’t be a federal agency overseeing the conversion.” Calvert, who lives in Arizona but co-owns the farmstead in Lincoln County with several siblings, told the Star the family is “not happy” about the lack of regulations currently in place, particularly with their 74-year-old mother living a short distance from where the pipeline runs.” “...Calvert and Savely have also connected with the Nebraska Easement Action Team — the same entity organizing opposition to the other pipeline projects — to learn about their legal options, they told the Star. “We know that the court of public opinion does make a difference,” Calvert told the Star. “And we do believe the fight is worth a fight, even if we don’t win.”
The Globe: Summit Carbon Solutions shares pipeline plans in Kandiyohi County
Shelby Lindrud, 7/22/22
“Summit Carbon Solutions, of Ames, Iowa, has a plan that the company says could help reduce the carbon emissions of more than 30 Midwestern ethanol plants, including Bushmills Ethanol of Atwater,” The Globe reports. “...On Tuesday, representatives from Summit Carbon presented their plan to the Kandiyohi County Board of Commissioners in Willmar. Approximately 27 miles of pipeline would need to be constructed within the county, to connect Bushmills with the larger pipeline network. "Kandiyohi County is our newest county," Joe Caruso, Minnesota external affairs coordinator with Summit Carbon Solutions told the Globe… “Summit says it will not be using the captured CO2 for oil drilling. Instead, to capture the maximum financial benefits from the federal tax credit called 45Q, the company will be permanently storing the captured CO2. "We have nothing to do with the oil and gas industry," Caruso told the Globe. "We are focused exclusively on helping the ethanol industry remain competitive and sustainable as an alternative fuel." “...There were some concerns raised about the project by County Commissioner Steve Gardner, specifically around the environmental and safety impacts of the project… “In February 2020 a CO2 pipeline running near Satartia, Mississippi, ruptured, causing 31,405 barrels of CO2 to be released into the atmosphere. Approximately 45 people were hospitalized due to CO2 exposure, though no one died. The pipeline's operator Denbury was fined just under $4 million for the accident… “One of the top concerns was the use of eminent domain if landowners refused to participate in the project. While Summit has asked to use eminent domain in Iowa, it does not have the legal right in Minnesota… “The current proposed route of the pipeline is not written in stone and is constantly being updated, Caruso said. Summit will not force the pipeline to go through a certain parcel if it doesn't work. "If any of the three surveys — environmental, cultural or civil — fail, or we can't come to an agreement with the landowner, we are going to have to move the route," Caruso told the Globe.
KXNET: Red River Pipeline: Landowners’ fears & worries
Adrienne Oglesby, 7/22/22
“The Red River Water pipeline project is set to sue farmland owners for eminent domain if they don’t sign easements to allow a pipeline to carry water from the Missouri River to the eastern part of the state,” KXNET reports. “In Friday’s report, Adrienne Oglesby will share the fears landowners have once the project is over. We last spoke with Duane Dekry, general manager at Garrison Diversion. “We were able to change some routes. We were able to negotiate on weed control on the crop damage policy things that are going to affect them while we’re constructing,” Dekry told KXNET. Reading close, Dekry ensures these negotiations for the duration while construction is going on. That is exactly why this project is alarming to landowners, but what about after? “It’s not because we’re out here seeking the most money that we can get it we just know down the line when they’re done with it and we all know when you dig something like this the settlement‘s going to come it’ll probably come five and 10 years down the road that’s really when you’re going to see the dirt settlement where are you going to go find black dirt to fill up this trench nobody’s going to sell you black dirt and if they do it’s going to be very expensive I can tell you it’s going to be a lot more than $13,000,” Sykeston Landowner, David Richter told KXNET. And he brings up that 13,000 because it’s $13,000 that landowners are being offered at a non-negotiable price. “Most of us have worked our hearts and our souls off my land that I finally got paid for is my 401K for life I couldn’t have regular ones this is my retirement policy and now it’s going to be screwed up by this whole affair,” Bowdon Landowner, Larry Rexine told KXNET.”.
S&P Global: Keystone oil pipeline resumes normal operations after disruption
Jordan Blum, 7/23/22
“The Keystone oil pipeline network resumed normal operations July 23 after a nearly weeklong reduction in capacity triggered by damage at a third-party electric substation, operator TC Energy said,” S&P Global reports. “The 590,000 b/d crude artery from Canada to the US operated at a reduced capacity since July 17 after vandalism damaged a transformer at an East River Electric Power Cooperative substation in rural South Dakota that solely services the TC Energy flagship oil pipeline. The company declared force majeure on the pipeline network July 18 and operated all week at a reduced, but unspecified, capacity while electric transformer repairs were completed. Pricing impacts were limited due to the relatively short nature of the disruption and because some crude oil flows continued at the lesser capacity… “East River Electric Power Cooperative, which operates the Carpenter Substation in Beadle County, told S&P a criminal investigation is underway. East River said the damaged transformer was leaking mineral oil when the problem was detected.”
WITN: Colonial Pipeline spill now largest onshore leak in U.S. history
7/22/22
“A state environmental agency says the Colonial Pipeline fuel release two years ago outside Charlotte is now the largest onshore fuel spill in the nation,” WITN reports. “The Department of Environmental Quality says Colonial now estimates two million gallons of gasoline made its way into the Oehlet Nature Preserve near Hunterville. Earlier this month, a Mecklenburg County judge approved a consent order that requires Colonial to pay nearly $5 million in penalties and investigative costs to the state as well as taking specific actions to clean up the spill. To date, Colonial says it has recovered nearly 1.5 million gallons of gasoline along with removing approximately 8,700 tons of contaminated dirt from the site.”
CNN: New Biden administration rules give pipeline operators more flexibility to combat cyber threats
Sean Lyngaas, Pete Muntean and Greg Wallace, 7/22/22
“The Biden administration on Thursday issued updated cybersecurity requirements for big US pipeline operators that give them more flexibility over what cyber defensive measures they can take following a major ransomware attack last year,” CNN reports. “The Transportation Security Administration directive -- a revision to requirements enacted in the wake of the cyberattack on a major US pipeline operator which were criticized as onerous and impractical by the oil and gas industry -- focuses on achieving key cybersecurity outcomes rather than dictating to pipelines how to achieve them. The updated directive, for example, requires certain pipeline operators to maintain security controls that would allow industrial equipment to keep operating if IT systems were hacked. Pipeline operators are also required to have an incident response plan outlining how they would recover from a major cyberattack.”
WASHINGTON UPDATES
E&E News: Six climate emergency complications
Robin Bravender, Kelsey Brugger, 7/22/22
“Climate hawks on Capitol Hill and in some environmental groups were disappointed when President Joe Biden made a big climate speech this week without officially declaring a national climate emergency,” E&E News reports. “Biden and his top climate aides have scrambled to chart the path ahead, even while suggesting that such a declaration is likely. They say the administration wants to evaluate any potential pitfalls before proceeding. Biden said after his climate speech in Massachusetts on Wednesday that he hadn’t declared an emergency because “I’m running into traps on the totality of the authority I have.” His international climate envoy, John Kerry, told The New York Times that the president is “very close” to declaring an emergency, adding that there’s internal debate over how it should be done rather than whether it should happen… “Here are six complications that might pose hurdles to a climate emergency declaration: 1. Legal threats…West Virginia Republican Attorney General Patrick Morrisey already issued a warning shot earlier this week as Biden promised to take more executive action to combat climate change: “States like West Virginia will not hesitate to challenge this overreach.” “...2. It won’t solve the problem.. “While climate advocates see an emergency declaration as a way for Biden to use every option at his disposal, they also concede that an emergency declaration isn’t likely to allow the kinds of deep emission cuts that Biden promised and that his allies hope he can deliver… “3. Biden can do a lot without an emergency… “The administration could end offshore oil leasing, deny permits for oil and gas projects, finalize strict standards for automobile emissions, and move quickly to clamp down on greenhouse gases from the power sector, Tauber told E&E… “4. Green groups aren’t aligned… “Progressives with the Center for Biological Diversity and the League of Conservation Voters have taken strong public positions in favor of an emergency declaration, but others have stayed quiet. The Sierra Club and the Nature Conservancy, for instance, have yet to come out either way… “Longtime environmentalists say an emergency declaration is akin to a shiny object, but the executive branch is already equipped with a range of tools to cut emissions and propel renewables. For example, EPA can regulate methane emissions and set strict tailpipe standards. Also, major green groups are still reeling from the recent Supreme Court loss — West Virginia v. EPA — and might be reluctant to advocate for robust executive authority, observers told E&E.”
Bloomberg: States Will Get Billions to Plug Orphan Oil Wells. Is it Enough?
7/25/22
“Cheryl Thomas stood in the woods near her northwestern Pennsylvania home on a rainy afternoon in June, watching black crude drip from an abandoned oil well just steps from a creek leading to the Allegheny River,” Bloomberg reports. “The wet season, it flows like this all the time,” Thomas told Bloomberg. She and her husband have counted about 60 derelict oil wells on their land east of Bradford, where companies began drilling one of America’s first oil fields in 1871. The couple live with that legacy daily: Oil and methane have leached into their water supply and they filter water from their kitchen tap. They once emptied a gallon of crude from their hot-water heater; another time, tests found such high methane levels in their water that a state inspector warned them, “Don’t have a leisurely bath with a lit candle and a cigar.” Abandoned wells are often called orphans because they were left behind by drillers before the state started regulating them in the 1950s. Pennsylvania, where the industry was born, has more than any other state—possibly hundreds of thousands. Congress is spending $4.7 billion from last year’s infrastructure law on a five-year program to clean up orphaned wells, maybe tens of thousands of them. States usually only plug a handful each year, and they’re hoping the cash will kick-start the cleanup when the money begins flowing this fall… “But the infrastructure law funding only scratches the surface of the orphan well problem. Billions more will be needed to plug all the nation’s forgotten wells. Nobody knows exactly how much—because nobody knows how many exist. States have records for about 131,000 orphan wells, mostly concentrated in Pennsylvania, Ohio and Oklahoma. The Interior Department estimates at least 3.5 million nationwide, but “the total scope of the problem is unknown,” spokesman John Grandy told Bloomberg.”
STATE UPDATES
Colorado Sun: Report that oil field methane emissions are down by half is wrong, Front Range cities with own pollution monitors say
Mark Jaffe, 7/22/22
“Air pollution from oil and gas operations is on the wane, the industry says. But communities along the Front Range — with their own air monitors — counter that they are finding repeated spikes of methane and other pollutants,” the Colorado Sun reports. “Ground-level methane monitoring shows no decline in levels,” Cindy Copeland, an air and climate policy advisor for Boulder County, told a Colorado Air Quality Control Commission hearing Thursday. In Broomfield, air monitors recorded a dozen spikes where ambient benzene levels were estimated to have exceeded a 9 parts per billion health standard in the fourth quarter of 2021 — in one instance the level reached 223 ppb. Broomfield identified the peaks as coming during drilling, hydrofracturing, or fracking, and tubing wells — the so-called preproduction phase, Mindy Olkjer, the city’s oil and gas program manager told the commission… “What the spikes and eddies in emissions means for public health and safety is still undetermined. In May, two industry groups — the Colorado Oil and Gas Association and API-Colorado — made a presentation to the air commission with data showing that between 2013 and 2019 methane levels had decreased 52% and at the monitor in Platteville operated by the state, ethane concentrations were down 65%... “On Thursday the industry groups’ findings were challenged by air quality officials from Longmont, Erie, Broomfield and Boulder County, where some of the drilling closest to neighborhoods has taken place. The industry methane measurements were done by satellite for a large section of the Front Range, but the monitors located in communities — the Erie monitor is located next to the baseball field at the town’s community center — offer some “ground truthing,” Copeland told the Sun. The Platteville monitor, the local air officials also argued, is no longer representative since the area has already been drilled and operators have moved to new locations. Industry representatives pushed back. “The anti-oil and gas politicians in Boulder and the Boulder suburbs have made clear through their political campaigns, litigation, rulemakings and more that they want to ban oil and natural gas development in Colorado,” Dan Haley, president of the Colorado Oil and Gas Association, told the Sun. “So it’s no surprise they have found cherry picked data that supports their predetermined outcome but serves as an outlier to our industry data and the state’s data.”
Oil City News: Petroleum group intervenes in drilling permit challenge on BLM lands
MARY STROKA, 7/21/22
“Today, the Petroleum Association of Wyoming sought to intervene in a case pending before the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia,” Oil City News reports. “The case, Center for Biological Diversity and WildEarth Guardians v. United States Department of Interior, et al., concerns drilling on federal lands. Center for Biological Diversity and WildEarth Guardians, the plaintiffs, have challenged the federal agencies’ issuance of more than 3,535 applications for permits to drill for oil and gas in Wyoming’s Powder River Basin and New Mexico’s Permian Basin. The plaintiffs said the approvals violate the National Environmental Policy Act, the Endangered Species Act and the Federal Land Policy and Management Act, the groups’ complaint to the court said. The Petroleum Association of Wyoming’s members hold nearly all of the 809 Wyoming drilling permits in question, according to a Petroleum Association of Wyoming news release… “Center for Biological Diversity and WildEarth Guardians want the court to declare that the challenged permits violate the three laws and to enjoy the agencies from approving any applications for permits to drill on federal public lands and minerals until they have complied with the National Environmental Policy Act, its implementing regulations and the other two laws’ substantive provisions, their complaint said. Petroleum Association of Wyoming President Pete Obermueller said in the release that vacating the issued permits and stopping the BLM from issuing any new permits to drill would “strangle” Wyoming’s oil and natural gas industry.”
Anchorage Daily News: Murkowski and Sullivan advocate for speedy approval of major Arctic oil project
Riley Rogerson, 7/24/22
“U.S. Sens. Lisa Murkowski and Dan Sullivan are calling on President Joe Biden’s administration to promptly advance the Willow oil project in a letter to Interior Secretary Deb Haaland,” the Anchorage Daily News reports. “Willow is a ConocoPhillips project on the North Slope that could yield over 180,000 barrels of oil per day and generate billions in state revenue. The Biden administration released a draft supplemental environmental impact statement earlier this month — a step in the federal approval process. The project could produce 278 million metric tons of carbon dioxide emissions over 30 years, according to the draft environmental review. Murkowski and Sullivan’s letter to Haaland said the “timely completion” of the approval process is important for development to begin during this winter construction season… “While Alaska’s two Republican U.S. senators and key North Slope leaders are pushing for the comment period to end as scheduled, some environmental and Indigenous groups are advocating for an extension. Sullivan told ADN he believes that the administration will ultimately approve Willow. The senator told ADN Biden has assured the congressional delegation that he is in favor of the project. “The key issue is they have to stay on this timeline,” Sullivan told ADN. “These companies that are going to put billions of dollars in investments, they don’t have forever.” “...Environmental and Indigenous groups sent their own letter to Haaland in June highlighting conservation and pollution concerns. Their letter, signed by 18 groups, several based in Alaska, called permitting Willow a legacy-defining decision. The groups said approving the project would fly in the face of the Biden administration’s climate goals… “It’s shocking,” Sierra Club Alaska chapter director Andrea Feniger told ADN. “It’s surprising that they believe that this project can go forward and they can still meet those goals because it’s simply impossible.”
Pennsylvania Capital-Star: Environmental watchdogs petition DCNR to remove access fee on oil & gas well database
CASSIE MILLER, 7/24/22
“Environmental activists are calling on a state agency to eliminate access fees for a database containing detailed information about orphaned and abandoned oil and gas wells across the commonwealth that they believe Pennsylvania taxpayers should have access to free of charge,” the Pennsylvania Capital-Star reports. “Oil & gas well watchdogs are asking the Pennsylvania Department of Conservation and Natural Resources to drop a $5,000 subscription fee and the $500 annual maintenance fee on its Exploration and Development Well Information Network (EDWIN) database. “Oil and gas well records should be available to all Pennsylvania’s citizens, not just a select few citizens with the ability to pay DCNR’s exorbitant charges,” a petition to DCNR Secretary Cindy Adams Dunn reads. “We the undersigned demand DCNR stop charging citizens $5,500.00 to access the EDWIN database.” As of Friday afternoon, the petition on MoveOn.org, created by Better Path Coalition, a statewide environmental advocacy group, co-founder Karen Feridun, had more than 1,000 signatures. A similar petition on Change.org created by fellow activist Laurie Barr, co-founder of Save Our Streams PA, had more than 100 signatures… “Knowing that it exists, I would love to be able to access it … but I don’t have $5,000,” Barr told the Star, adding that she’s driven to Pittsburgh from her home in Coudersport, Potter County – a three-and-a-half to four-hour drive each way – to access EDWIN free of charge. Barr, who uses the EDWIN database maintained by DCNR to locate orphaned and abandoned wells for her research on stream health, told the Star that the data in EDWIN is more reliable and provides better information than data from the DEP, which oversees oil and gas wells in the commonwealth, as well as plugging operations… “Barr told the Star removing the subscription fee and allowing everyone to access EDWIN could help potential homebuyers in Pennsylvania make informed purchasing decisions. “Wouldn’t it be nice to know that you’re not buying someone’s oil field?” Barr asked. “Wouldn’t it be great if an insurance company could just go to a database and find out if there’s a well there?” “It needs to be made available for people,” Barr told the Star.
Bakersfield Californian: Kern proposes fixes to oil permitting system
JOHN COX, 7/24/22
“Regulatory patches are being proposed to bring Kern's oil and gas permitting system up to the state's environmental standard and potentially let the county resume approving new drilling,” the Bakersfield Californian reports. “A public notice the county paid to have published Thursday listed four steps intended to fix holes in the county's blanket environmental review as identified in early June by Kern County Superior Court Judge Gregory Pulskamp. That was after the judge halted local permitting in October, returning review authority to the state and effectively restraining production in the heart of California oil country. The notice set an Aug. 23 public hearing of the county Board of Supervisors, and a public workshop Aug. 1, on a proposal that would require removal of idle oilfield equipment on certain oil permits on farmland. Another "mitigation measure" proposed to soften the industry's local impact would adopt a regional agreement on fine particulate pollution; two others would remove then replace a community drinking water grant program… “A coalition of environmental groups opposed to the county's permitting system declined to comment on the hearing notice. Even so, it seems unlikely they will drop their objections, considering that since 2015 environmental justice advocates and anti-oil activists around the state have condemned the county's permitting efforts as opening the door to vast new drilling and local pollution.”
EXTRACTION
OilPrice.com: Record Profits Could Convince Oil Majors To Hike Dividends
Tsvetana Paraskova, 7/24/22
“The world’s largest international oil and gas companies are expected to accelerate share repurchases, and some could raise dividends next week when Big Oil is expected to report another very strong quarter,” OilPrice.com reports. “Shareholders could be in for higher returns as Shell, BP, TotalEnergies, Exxon, and Chevron are all forecast to post exceptional and possibly record quarterly earnings for the second quarter due to high commodity prices and multi-year-high refining margins. Some of the top international oil majors have already announced expectations of blockbuster earnings—especially in their refining divisions—for Q2. Analysts expect at least some of them to step up share buybacks and some even to announce an increase in dividends amid record cash flows and record or near-record earnings. The second-quarter earnings for the top majors are forecast to be even higher than the already blockbuster earnings reported for the first quarter. Oil above $100 per barrel throughout the second quarter and surging refining margins amid rebounding gasoline demand will help Big Oil beat in Q2 the blowout earnings from Q1, companies signaled and analysts say. Big Oil’s shareholders could see their returns much improved in the coming months as companies report Q2 earnings over the next week. Previewing Q2 results, firms have said they expect “exceptional” earnings, particularly in their refining divisions.”
Forbes: The U.S. Is Still The World’s Top Oil Producer
Robert Rapier, 7/22/22
“Earlier this month BP released its Statistical Review of World Energy 2022,” Forbes reports. “...Today, I want to cover the production and consumption of petroleum. For 2020, the Review reported the largest decline in oil1 consumption on record. After nine consecutive years of increase, the Covid-19 pandemic caused global consumption of crude oil to decline by more than 9% in 2020. Last year oil consumption bounced back by climbing 6% — the fastest rise since 1976. However, consumption remains 3.7% below the record level of 2019. The United States remains the world's top oil consumer, averaging 18.7 million BPD in 2021. This marked an increase of 8.7% from 2020. This was the sharpest increase for any country in the Top 10, but it is still 9% below the all-time high U.S. oil consumption level of 2005 (20.5 million BPD). China was the second-highest consumer at 15.4 million BPD. Over the past decade, U.S. oil consumption has increased by an average annual rate of 0.4%, while China’s average annual increase was more than 10 times higher at 4.8%. Germany was notably the only country in the Top 10 that saw a demand decline in 2021. Despite the ongoing impact the pandemic has had on U.S. oil production, the U.S. remained the world's top oil producer in 2021 at 11.2 million BPD. Russia and Saudi Arabia retained their positions at #2 and #3… “Note that these production numbers are for crude oil and lease condensate. The U.S. also leads all countries in the production of natural gas liquids (NGLs), which partially end up in the oil products supply chain. If NGLs are included, the U.S. has an even larger lead over Russia and Saudi Arabia”.
USA Today: Fact check: False claim that Permian Basin oil supply would fuel America for 200 years
BrieAnna J. Frank, Molly Stellino, 7/21/22
“The claim: Parts of the Permian Basin have enough oil to fuel America for 200 years,” USA Today reports. “...This small area has enough oil to fuel America for the next 200 years," reads a July 12 Facebook post that was shared more than 1,400 times in three days. The image in the post shows a map of Texas and New Mexico with a part greyed out to indicate the boundary of the Permian Basin, the U.S.'s most productive oil region. Within that greyed out section, two dotted yellow lines outline the Delaware and Midland Basins. Other versions of the claim amassed thousands of additional shares on Facebook. Estimates of how much oil is in the Delaware and Midland Basins can vary, but experts told USA TODAY even if the highest estimate were true, it would not be enough to meet Americans' oil consumption needs for two centuries. U.S. Geological Survey assessments show those two basins contain about 66 billion barrels of oil, which equates to about nine years of America's oil consumption – not 200 years as the post claims… “Albuquerque-based KRQE News reported that Ryan Flynn, the executive director of the New Mexico Oil and Gas Association at the time, said the 2018 announcement meant the state could "meet the energy needs of the entire U.S. for decades to come."
The Tyee: Vancouver’s Big Oil Lawsuit, Explained
Geoff Dembicki, 7/25/22
“City councilors have voted 6-5 in support of a motion that would set aside approximately $700,000 — or roughly $1 per every Vancouver resident —in order to fund litigation against the country’s biggest producers of oil and gas,” The Tyee reports. “Companies such as ExxonMobil — which owns the Canadian oil sands producer Imperial Oil —are being singled out because they privately researched climate change decades before it was a mainstream issue and determined that burning fossil fuels creates grave global threats, according to extensive documentation surfaced by researchers and journalists. But instead of acting on that life-saving information, Exxon and others then ran media campaigns throughout the 1990s and 2000s — crucial decades for getting the climate emergency under control — to convince the public that human-induced warming isn’t real. It’s an alleged disinformation campaign that continues to this day. “There are companies that absolutely knew that if they continued to sell their products it would increase greenhouse gas emissions,” Adriane Carr, the Green Party of Vancouver city councillor who is lead sponsor on the lawsuit motion, told The Tyee. “They knew that would create climate change and that would have damaging effects on people.” Vancouver is now footing the bill for decades of oil industry denial, Carr told the Tyee, spending roughly $50 million per year in order to deal with and prepare for the impacts of climate change. That includes last year’s heat dome, which led to 99 deaths in the city proper and more than 390 deaths across the Lower Mainland. It also includes last November’s catastrophic flooding, which the Insurance Bureau of Canada now estimates led to $675 million in insured damage. Carr told the Tyee she hopes Vancouver can win a settlement against Canada’s largest oil and emitters in order to recoup some of those costs… “No Canadian city has yet taken Big Oil to court over climate denial and delay, but such litigation is becoming more common in the U.S., where more than 20 jurisdictions have filed lawsuits asking fossil fuel polluters to pay for the damage caused by their products.”
OPINION
The Hill: President Biden can (still) diffuse the climate bomb in America’s Arctic
Dr. Peter Winsor lives in Fairbanks, Alaska, and is the executive director of The Alaska Wilderness League, 7/23/22
“Although President Biden’s larger climate agenda teeters on the razor’s edge of congressional negotiations, he faces an enormous climate opportunity in America’s Arctic,” Dr. Peter Winsor writes for The Hill. “...The resident finds himself in an increasingly hot seat to address the climate crisis on all fronts — and the ticking climate bomb that only the White House can diffuse is a development proposal so massive it would equal the annual output of nearly one-third of U.S. coal power plants. ConocoPhillips Willow oil and gas development project would be the largest in the nation, proposed on some of America’s most biodiverse and sensitive public lands. The administration recently initiated a process to consider the project’s environmental impact, giving the public and local communities just 45 days to weigh in, the shortest period legally allowable. A project of this magnitude deserves longer, as no single oil and gas proposal has more potential to impact this administration’s climate and public lands legacy. Furthermore, the enormous proposal is just the tip of the iceberg, laying a foundation for expensive oil and gas infrastructure for decades to come. Our climate would pay the price, and yet — as the project wouldn’t come online for years — it would have zero impact on current gas prices… “As the single biggest oil and gas proposal on federal lands — by far — Willow represents an existential climate threat. It would further accelerate climate change effects in a region already being ravaged by climate change (warming 3-4 times the global average). If President Biden is serious about honoring the climate and public lands protection commitments that helped elect him, this is the real litmus test… “The decision — and climate accountability — rests solely with the White House. Willow is the penultimate climate mistake America cannot afford to make.”