OPEC’s top Arab energy ministers arrived in Doha on Monday for the 12th Arab Energy Conference as countries clash at the UN’s COP28 climate summit over a possible agreement to phase-out fossil fuels. OPEC Secretary General Haitham Al Ghais in a letter dated Dec. 6 and seen by Reuters urged OPEC members to reject any COP28 deal which targets fossil fuels rather than emissions. Ministers from Iraq, Kuwait, Algeria and Oman arrived for the energy meeting, as well as Saudi Energy Minister Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman who had been in ...

China’s top climate diplomat on Saturday said a final agreement on fossil fuels at the United Nations COP28 summit was crucial – even if not perfect – but he declined to say whether the country could agree to eliminating coal, oil and gas entirely. An agreement by the world’s nearly 200 countries to eliminate fossil fuels – the main driver of climate change – has become the make or break issue on the negotiating table at the Dubai summit. The Chinese climate envoy, Xie Zhenhua, told reporters in a briefing ...

Ammonia and methanol are key industrial chemicals with strong demand in agriculture, manufacturing, and construction sectors. Conventional ammonia and methanol production processes contribute to carbon emissions. As governments around the world are pursuing various decarbonization strategies, it has become imperative to curb emissions from these processes. The evolution of low-carbon hydrogen, a critical feedstock for both ammonia and methanol, can help in decarbonizing these chemicals, says GlobalData, a leading data and analytics company. GlobalData’s thematic report, “Ammonia and Methanol in Energy Transition,” provides an overview of developments in the low-carbon ...

Carbon capture and storage has emerged as flashpoint at the UN climate conference in Dubai about how big a role it is destined to play in reaching the target of net zero emissions. It has also prompted an unusual and bad-tempered confrontation between senior officials at the International Energy Agency (IEA) and the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC). In the run up to the conference, the IEA called on oil and gas producers to let go of “the illusion that implausibly large amounts of carbon capture” are the ...

Environmental groups urged countries gathered at the COP28 climate summit in Dubai on Friday to stop support for expansion of the global trade in liquefied natural gas (LNG), saying the industry was undermining efforts to contain global warming. More than 250 environmental and community groups called on U.S. President Joe Biden’s administration in an open letter to stop permitting LNG facilities. At the same time, activists gathered on the grounds of the summit in Dubai holding signs urging the world to “stop exporting climate chaos” and to “break the chains” ...

Oil prices held steady on Monday as U.S. efforts to replenish strategic reserves provided support, though concerns persist about oversupply and softer fuel demand growth next year. futures edged up 2 cents to $75.86 a barrel by 0913 GMT. U.S. West Texas Intermediate crude futures were up a single cent at $71.22. Both contracts jumped more than 2% on Friday but were down for a seventh straight week, their longest streak of weekly declines since 2018, on lingering oversupply concerns. The recent price weakness drew demand from the United States, ...

The European Union’s climate chief on Saturday heavily criticised an attempt by OPEC to derail a COP28 deal on phasing out fossil fuels, calling the move by the oil producers’ club “unhelpful” and “out of whack”. Nearly 200 countries meeting in Dubai for the U.N.’s COP28 climate summit are debating whether to agree, for the first time, to eventually end the world’s use of fossil fuels, the main cause of climate change. In an unusual intervention, OPEC Secretary General Haitham Al Ghais this week urged countries in the OPEC+ group ...

China’s natural gas demand is expected to peak in 2040 at around 605.9 Bcm, data from state-owned CNPC’s Economics & Technology Research Institute showed Dec. 7. The projection was made under a baseline scenario set by ETRI assuming a stable international environment and a state of moderate competition and cooperation between countries, Wu Mouyuan, vice president of ETRI, said at the 10th International Energy Executive Forum, jointly held by CNPC and S&P Global Commodity Insights. However, China’s natural gas demand could be as low as 558.5 Bcm in 2040 under ...

A raft of new pledges announced at the COP28 climate summit – from tripling renewables to reining in methane emissions – won’t be enough on their own to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius, the International Energy Agency (IEA) said on Sunday. So far, 130 countries have agreed to triple renewables and double the rate of energy efficiency improvements, while 50 oil and gas companies have agreed to cut out methane emissions and eliminate routine flaring by 2030 under the Oil and Gas Decarbonisation Charter. If everyone delivered on ...

Despite global risk factors, LNG exports from the Middle East and North Africa have remained strong in 2023, with exports from both regions making up nearly one-third of global LNG exports this year. So far this year, global LNG exports are at 392 million mt, with the Middle East and North Africa exporting around 108 million mt, according to data from S&P Global Commodity Insights. Exports have persistently hovered around just under the 30% mark, from around 28% in 2020 to nearly 30% in 2021, 29% in 2022 and currently ...

OPEC members are pushing against attempts to include language on “phasing out” fossil fuels in a COP28 climate deal, underlining the struggle over whether the summit can for the first time in 30 years address the future of oil and gas. Negotiators and observers at the annual U.N. climate talks, pursuing a deal to tackle the worst impacts of climate change, said several OPEC members appeared to have heeded calls by the oil producer group to veto any deal to phase out fossil fuels. In a letter dated Wednesday, OPEC ...

U.S. energy firms this week added oil and natural gas rigs for a fourth week in a row for the first time since November 2022, energy services firm Baker Hughes said in its closely followed report on Friday. The oil and gas rig count, an early indicator of future output, rose by one to 626in the week to Dec. 8, its highest since September. Despite this week’s rig increase, Baker Hughes said the total count was still down 154, or 20%,below this time last year. The rig count has dropped ...

Coastal grade Mars strengthens 5 cents on Friday, dealers said, as the U.S. government said would buy up to 3 million barrels of competing sour crude oil to refill the Strategic Petroleum Reserve. Mars Sour gained 5 cents to a midpoint of a 65-cent premium to U.S. West Texas Intermediate crude futures. The announcement comes after The U.S. Department of Energy last week sped up the return of 4 million barrels of oil to the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, from a previous exchange of crude to energy companies. WTI Midland fell ...

The oil industry is starting to sweat as United Nations climate talks heat up and threaten to plug fossil fuel-belching wells for good, veteran negotiation observers say. A reported letter from OPEC’s leader pleading with the oil cartel’s member countries to block any language in an agreement at climate talks that would phase out or phase down fossil fuels hit negotiations like a thunderclap. Host and fellow petrostate United Arab Emirates is trying to tamp down its reverberations in a process where one or two key nations can block everything. ...

Urals crude differentials to dated Brent remained stable on Friday, while loadings on the December schedule from Novorossiisk were revised down to 1.72 million tons from 2.14 million tons to make way for exports postponed from November. Azeri BTC crude oil exports from Turkey’s Ceyhan port have been set at 19.51 million barrels for January, up from 18.65 million barrels in December, the schedule showed on Friday. India’s purchases of Russian oil could rise due to easing global oil prices, a senior government official said on Friday. PLATTS WINDOW There ...