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The Coming Global Blackout

Andrew Gordon — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 15:55:15 +0000

Leave it to the government. It’s proposing a “tax and cap” regime for energy producers which will require fossil-fuel generating plants to pay extra.  The idea is to encourage clean fuels and discourage dirty ones. That’s fine in theory. But instead of helping our future energy situation, it’s going to make it a lot worse.The price of oil has already doubled in the past six months to over $60 per barrel. But it’s just the beginning of oil’s next gigantic price surge. If you thought that oil was ridiculously expensive last summer, you haven’t seen anything yet.

It doesn’t matter whether you believe in “Peak Oil” because this isn’t about Peak Oil coming to fruition. Peak Oil believes that oil discoveries have peaked leading to oil production’s inevitable decline.

This crisis will be strictly man-made. Governments and oil companies have already planted the seeds of the next great energy crisis. And there’s nothing anybody can do to prevent those seeds from sprouting.

The U.S. government got its religion late. But it’s now following the lead of European governments in limiting the use of fossil fuels through taxes and restrictive regulations.

That’s bad enough in itself. But then there’s the roller-coaster ride which oil prices have taken. The price of oil fell more than $100 from over $140 to under $40 (before going back up again). Oil companies everywhere had the same response. They all cut back on oil spending and production…

•    OPEC has cut back production by 2.2 billion barrels a day.
•    UAE has put off plans to expand oil production by 1 million barrels a day.
•    Saudi Arabia has delayed two $10-$20 billion refining projects (and may cancel them altogether).
•    Russia’s biggest oil company, Gazprom, has slashed production spending by 24 percent.
•    Venezuela, Nigeria, Malaysia and other national oil companies have cut back on their capital spending.
•    Statoil, EnCana, Petro-Canada, Suncor, Imperial Oil, and Royal Dutch Shell have all delayed or cancelled major projects in Canada’s vast but expensive-to-produce oil sands.

How bad are these cutbacks? Just ask the widely respected oil consulting agency, the International Energy Agency. It recently warned of a “second capacity crunch” causing widespread underinvestment in the oil industry.

Oil’s recent price rise could have loosened up oil producers’ purse strings. But oil companies are facing increasing disincentives from a government trying to replace fossil fuels with renewables.

If you want to know how the CEOs of Big Oil feel about the Obama administration’s energy policy, just ask Jim Mulva, head of ConocoPhillips.
This global oil company has operations in more than 30 countries. Mulva said last week that government intervention in the energy market “has an impact on the willingness of companies to pour billions into the development of new projects.”

In the meantime, the Obama administration is spending hundreds of millions of dollars on renewables, like the $467 million to encourage the development of geothermal and solar energy.|

The result? Geothermal and solar energy will have slightly bigger pieces of the energy pie. But oil priced at over $150 per barrel will kill the U.S. and global economic recovery in its infancy.

The cost of plastics and resins will go way up. Gas prices will surge over $5/ gallon. New highs in jet fuel will crash several airline companies. Actually, practically everything will cost more. I don’t think that’s what these governments have in mind.

And even with ample government support you shouldn’t invest in geothermal or solar companies. They will still depend on government subsidies to compete with the price of electricity generated by – take a guess – fossil fuels.

Instead you should invest in oil producers but not just any oil producer. Thanks to vast underinvestment and government policies, the price of oil will sky rocket. The only thing keeping the price of oil from going higher right now is that we’re still in the middle of the worst recession in seven decades.

But once demand returns, watch out.

Total’s CEO Christophe de Margerie says that a rise in demand while supply is constrained will unleash oil prices again.
And Mitsubishi warns that spare capacity will quickly disappear when oil demand picks back up.

But, as I said, most oil companies have cut back production and spending. That’s going to prevent them from getting windfall profits from soaring oil prices.

But four of the world’s major oil companies haven’t cut back on spending. Three of them are Exxon Mobil, Chevron and Thailand’s PTT Exploration & Production. But by far the best oil investment you could make is in a fourth big oil company.

Last year it spent 34 percent more on drilling for oil. And this year it’s spending 19 percent more. While the other oil majors are cutting back on spending and facing stagnant output, this company plans on raising production by 7-11 percent a year. I’m predicting its shares will go up at least 80 percent over the next three years, and the gains could be much bigger than that.

I’m sorry but I can’t give you the name of the company because it’s my latest recommendation to readers of my INCOME service. They deserve first crack at this company, especially since its price is so cheap at the moment. But if you’re interested in this company, just click here for more information, including how to sign up in order to get this company as your first recommendation.

Source: The Coming Global Blackout

The Direction of Energy Policy

Byron King — Thu, 30 Apr 2009 19:36:45 +0000

The other day I had lunch with a “brain trust,” of sorts. Participants included a retired executive from an aerospace company. This guy helped design and build many of the reconnaissance satellites that the U.S. has launched. There was a senior executive from a large steel company. There was a venture capitalist who made his first $500 million in the software industry, and who now has much of that wealth spread around in biotech and nanotech startups. There was a former senior political appointee who worked in the Treasury Department. And then there was me.

“Climate Change” Driving Policy Now

According to the satellite builder, the dominant elements of the political and media culture are “completely in the tank” when it comes to believing in the dangers of “climate change.” It’s not as if climate change is demonstrably true, he pointed out. There are valid scientific data from both sides of the climate change issue, and many valid data points in between. But according to the aerospace executive – some of whose satellites were built to track climate change — “For at least ten years, if you have not been promoting the dangers of climate change then you have not been receiving government grants. So the research community is following the money.”

Thus the research literature is coming out strongly in favor of “doing something” about climate change. And policy-makers are using this research literature to justify doing what they’ve wanted all along, which is change the world as we know it. As a class, the activists want to change the world into something else.

“Pathological Hatred” of Carbon-Based Fuels

According to the steel executive, the climate change issue has spurred what amounts to “a pathological hatred” of carbon-based energy systems. “It doesn’t have to make practical sense,” says this source. “It doesn’t even have to work with economics. It just has to support a policy to utterly transform the nation’s energy system. The people making policy now have a crusader’s mentality. ‘The past is trash,’ is how many of the new policy makers view our world. So the new policy makers want to promote radical change in energy policy. They’re going to jam it down the throat of the economy.”

According to the steel executive, the steel industry expects to see inflation-adjusted, baseline energy prices triple or quadruple within ten years. “Whether the government taxes carbon-based energy at the source, or whether they pass ‘cap-and-trade’ legislation, it’s going to cost us. So we’ll pay. Of course, we’ll pass along the new costs to the steel buyers. If demand goes down, we’ll close facilities. Then the TV cameras will show up at the plant gates to watch us shut the doors and click the padlocks. And we’ll get called bad names by the people who never much liked us in the first place.”

Can the Economy Support What the Government Wants to Do?

The former Treasury official added that a new “policy paradigm” has yet to form in Washington DC. “It’s like during the Cold War, there was a bi-partisan consensus to confront and contain the Soviet Union. It was expensive, but we agreed to do it. We made the national sacrifice. Well, that foreign policy consensus ended when the Berlin Wall fell and the USSR came down.” The groupthink in the early 1990s was that another kind of broad consensus had to take the place of the confrontation with the Soviets. And by its very nature, that consensus was fragile.

“Let me back up,” said the former Treasury official. “Confronting the Soviet Union gave the U.S. an excuse to continue with Franklin Roosevelt’s Depression Era, New Deal, big government for 45 years after World War II. But after the USSR fell? Why did we still need big government? To run a modern welfare state? That was the justification. Remember the talk about that ‘Peace Dividend?’ People were drooling over the idea of cutting the military budget and paying for more and better social welfare through more big government.”

“So what happened?” asked the Treasury guy. “Some people thought they were going to run a big government welfare state using modern monetary theory. They convinced themselves that we could do that. They didn’t understand the long term problem.”

What was the long-term problem? “The welfare state was never going to last. Especially because the nation collectively wanted it to support a rank, consumerist culture that could not earn its keep within the world economy. We imported, imported, imported. And we paid for it with cheap dollars. After the U.S. left the gold standard in 1971, the fundamentals of the American productive economy could never support what the nation was trying to do. We’ll look back eventually and realize it was delusional policy-making. All we did was run down the economy for a couple of generations. It finally collapsed in 2008.”

Whatever “post-USSR consensus” existed in the U.S. in the 1990s shattered during the 2000s. “People went nuts because of the Bush Administration,” said the Treasury official. “The white-bread explanation – call it ‘Decline and Fall for Dummies’ — was that it was all about the evil George Bush and his wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. Well, Bush and the wars were visible, so that’s what people blamed. The real problem for the U.S. was that the whole foundation for post-war American society, economy and governance was caving in under our feet. The timbers were rotten.”

The Barn Burned Down – Did Anyone Notice?

According to the Treasury man, the U.S. economy is now confronted by “block obsolescence” of many of the economic and political assumptions with which we’ve lived for decades, since World War II. “Chrysler isn’t the only big institution that’s bankrupt. We ought to burn down a few universities, while we’re at it,” he added.

And he noted that Republicans and Democrats both fed at the trough while the going was good. “But while the politicians had their heads buried in the trough for all those years,” he said, “they didn’t notice that the barn was burning down around them.”

The Treasury-man continued: “Look at the destruction of former industrial titans like General Motors (NYSE:GM), and with GM the annihilation of much of the rest of the automobile industry. Who’s going to invent whatever will take its place? We used to say that 40% of the U.S. economy was based on the auto industry, directly or indirectly. Are we ever going to see 40% of the U.S. economy based on putting solar panels on roofs, or tuning the gearboxes of windmills?”

“Free-Traded” to the Poorhouse – We’re at the Edge of the End

The former Treasury official looked at the ongoing economic crash. He placed it within the context of the long-term decline in U.S. manufacturing. “As a society,” he said, “we’ve made a lot of very bad choices of both moral philosophy and economic policy. Those bad choices have brought us to the edge of the end. We’ve spent, borrowed and ‘free-traded’ ourselves to the poorhouse. Now the Chinese own us.”

Helping Embryonic Industry – Creating a Success Story

The venture capitalist chimed in with some thoughts. “If the feds are going to spend billions on stimulus, then they ought to direct some of that money to help fund promising research. How about some money to pay for every fossil-fuel power plant in the country to siphon off some of its CO2? Then run the CO2 through a facility to grow algae to make biofuels.”

“We’d be killing about four birds with one stone,” explained the venture capitalist. “We’d be taking down CO2 emissions. Not much, maybe, but some. We’d be helping an embryonic industry that can be competitive in coming years. Heck, turning algae into fuel is easy. The basic part is just high school chemistry. So we’d be creating a new supply source for the liquid fuels industry. And we’d be able to point to at least one success story where people can agree that we all did something right.”

Then the venture capitalist added that one of his startups is “working on coal-eating bugs.” He explained that “There’s a lot of coal buried so deep, or under other conditions that we can’t mine it. That coal will never get out. So why not put bugs down in the deep seams, and let them eat the coal? Then we can harvest the gases that come out the back end of the bugs, and use that as feedstock for other things.”

“Well, What Do YOU Think?”

At one point, one of the lunch participants turned to the silent person at the table, who was busy taking it all in and making a few discrete notes. Then came the dreaded question, “Well Byron, what do YOU think?”

I focused my comments on geothermal development. I pointed out that for all the anti-carbon sentiment out there, the most under-appreciated, “clean and green” energy source is geothermal. There appears to be strong support for geothermal development via tax incentives and other, policy-based standards. Combine this with the growing social focus on clean, renewable energy sources.

Right now, 24 states have renewable portfolio standards (RPS) for electricity production. And Congress is leaning towards setting a national standard of 20% to 25% RPS power production by 2025. We’re at the point where a utility like California’s Pacific Gas and Electric is so desperate for “clean” energy that they’re contracting with a privately-owned company to build a satellite to harvest solar energy from space, and “beam” it back to earth.

The companies that are out there now are in relatively advanced stages of developments. The big problem is that the follow-on pipeline is almost empty. The problem has been lack of access to capital for the past year or so. In other words, lack of capital is the strongest headwind to progress. If the funding delays can break down, then we’ll see decreased complexity for funding, and project schedules moving ahead.

That’s all for now. Thanks for reading…

Byron King

Source: The Direction of Energy Policy

Trina Solar (TSL), In Play

Alexander Green — Tue, 17 Feb 2009 17:33:06 +0000

Trina Solar is recognized as a solar pioneer since it was founded in 1997. Their products provide reliable and environmentally-friendly electric power and their fourth quater revenues are about to beat expectations.

This from the editors at Investment U:

In the news this morning, Trina Solar (NYSE: TSL) announced that fourth quarter revenues would beat expectations.

It’s an unexpected bit of data when many were starting to count the solar sector out – and not for good reason. After our last energy crisis, many alternative energy producers, like solar, were simply forgotten about when gas prices came back down.

With the average price per gallon at around $1.96, who could blame them if they expected the same thing to happen? But the interesting thing is that it hasn’t.

Trinity Solar follows news from Suntech Power (NYSE: STP), the world’s largest solar module producer, that it expects production to increase – almost 60%. That’s quite the opposite of a drop-off.

Granted, there are just as many solar losers, as winners. Canadian Solar (Nasdaq: CSIQ) reported negative numbers along with a number of others, from Applied Materials (Nasdaq: AMAT), JA Solar Holdings (Nasdaq: JASO) and GT Solar International (Nasdaq: SOLR).

But the fact that we are seeing resilience form the solar sector and companies holding their own, means that this time around might be a little different than last. And that’s a good signal for us to keep our eyes on solar.

Because any strength in this market is impressive, regardless of where it is.

Source: Sun Still Shines on Trina Solar (TSL)

How To Profit From Political Games In Eastern Europe

Andrew Snyder — Thu, 06 Nov 2008 18:22:57 +0000

Andrew Snyder says Democrat-fearing investors are now looking overseas for profits. Andrew says Eastern Europe is a hotbed of political conflict. But that could end up creating great money-making opportunities in the energy sector.

This from Today’s Financial News:

What impact will rising taxes, stronger labor unions and increased regulations have on the country’s publicly traded corporations? Well, if today’s trading activity is any indication of what the future holds, we are in for a long road to recovery.

Some investors are taking this as an opportunity to look overseas.

India and the fairly limited impact the global economic crisis has played on the country has been a safe haven for some savvy investors. Even Australia is getting plenty of American investment dollars now that many of its mining stocks are dirt cheap.

While all of these investing notions are solid, international investors can do better. One region you should keep your eye on is Eastern Europe. There is a lot of political activity heating up in the area and smart investors will be able to take advantage of the action.

The fighting never stops

We all know Russia and Georgia are far from good friends right now. They are battling over many issues, but one undeniable fighting point is energy. Russia’s financial stability depends on selling oil and natural gas to its western neighbors at a premium.

But just like you and I do not like paying absurd amounts for our fuel, neither do countries like Georgia. That is why they are hurriedly trying to build out their own supplies. Countries like Turkey, Hungary, Georgia, and Kazakhstan are quickly realizing they are sitting on some very valuable energy reserves.

This does not make Russia happy.

But as investors, we need to look at this situation, not as a political mess, but as a great investing opportunity. Tiny, government-backed companies are about to be sitting on huge windfalls. The kind our new administration would love to tax… but can’t.

America may be getting a new administration that is not too happy with Wall Street, but that does not mean our days of successful investing our over. In fact, I believe there are more profit opportunities today than there were yesterday. You just have to know where to look.

My colleagues and I are currently researching and examining the situation in Eastern Europe. Look for our conclusions very soon.

Source: Obama Presidency: Investors flee overseas

Why Recession Is The Least Of Our Worries

James Howard Kunstler — Tue, 28 Oct 2008 11:49:57 +0000

There is no longer any doubt that we are heading for a deep, deflationary recession. But James Howard Kunstler is more worried about the “tidal wave” of monetary inflation that will follow. With the financial landscape washed clean, the economy will need to be rebuilt on productive enterprise.

James says the economic crises of the future will involve energy shortages and climate change.

In the near term, President Obama (perhaps) will face the unenviable task of preparing America for a change far more dramatic than his campaign slogan ever imagined.

More on the post-financial meltdown world from Whiskey & Gunpowder:

It’s fascinating to read the commentators in mainstream journals like The Financial Times and The Wall Street Journal all strenuously pretending that “the worst is over” (maybe…we hope…fingers crossed…hail Mary full of grace…et cetera). The cluelessness would be funny if it didn’t involve a world-changing catastrophe.

All nations that have reached the fork-and-spoon level of civilization are now engineering a vast network of cyber-cables that lead directly from their central bank computers to the Death Star that is hovering above world financial affairs like a giant cosmic vacuum cleaner, sucking up dollars, euros, zlotys, forints, krona, what-have-you.

As fast as the keystrokes create currency-pixels, the little electron-denominated units of exchange are sucked out of the terrestrial economies into the black hole of money death. That’s what the $700-billion bailout (excuse me, “rescue plan”) and all its associated ventures are about.

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To switch metaphors, let’s say that we are witnessing the two stages of a tsunami. The current disappearance of wealth in the form of debts repudiated, bets welshed on, contracts cancelled, and Lehman Brothers-style sob stories played out is like the withdrawal of the sea.

The poor curious little monkey-humans stand on the beach transfixed by the strangeness of the event as the water recedes and the sea floor is exposed and all kinds of exotic creatures are seen thrashing in the mud, while the skeletons of historic wrecks are exposed to view, and a great stench of organic decay wafts toward the strand.

Then comes the second stage, the tidal wave itself — which in this case will be horrific monetary inflation — roaring back over the mud flats toward the land mass, crashing over the beach, and ripping apart all the hotels and houses and infrastructure there while it drowns the poor curious monkey-humans who were too enthralled by the weird spectacle to make for higher ground. The killer tidal wave washes away all the things they have labored to build for decades, all their poignant little effects and chattels, and the survivors are left keening amidst the wreckage as the sea once again returns to normal in its eternal cradle.

So, that’s what I think we will get: an interval of deflationary depression followed by a destructive wave of inflation that will wipe out both constructed debt and constructed savings, scraping the financial landscape clean. There’s no question that stage one is underway. But we can be sure the giant wave of money recklessly loaned into existence in just a few weeks time will wash back through the global economy leaving a swath of destruction.

And then what? The societies of the world will be faced with the task of rebuilding systems of fruitful activity, i.e., real economies based on productive behavior rather than the smoke-and-mirrors of Frankenstein-finance con games. In fact, excuse me while I switch metaphors again, because the Frankenstein story — the New Prometheus — is yet another apt narrative to inform us what we have done. We have “played” with financial fire and brought to life a monster now bent on killing us. One question that this metaphor-narrative raises is: when will the angry peasant mob storm the castle with their flaming brands and cries for blood from the makers of this monster? Rather soon, I think.

Perhaps, in some countries (maybe the USA, if we’re lucky), this will take the more orderly form of systematic prosecutions, bringing to justice persons who perpetrated swindles involving the alphabet soup of investment “products” that have gone bad in so many accounts (and ruined so many individuals, institutions, and governments).

I think it has already begun with the inquisitors summoning the shifty Dick Fuld of Lehman Brothers — but there are hundreds of other characters like him out there, who scored untold millions of dollars in activities that were simply grand swindles. I wouldn’t be surprised if, eventually, Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson found himself in the dock to answer how come, when he ran Goldman Sachs (NYSE:GS), there was a special unit in the company dedicated to short-selling the very mortgage-backed securities that another unit in the company was so busy pawning off to every pension fund on God’s green earth.

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Apart from orderly prosecutions (which can certainly turn harsh and cruel), there is the possibility of sociopolitical upheaval — revolution, violence, civil war, war between nations, the whole menu of monkey-human mischief that afflicts mankind. We are not necessarily immune to it here in the USA, despite our cherished notion of exceptionalism, which would have us inoculated against all the common vicissitudes of history.

Anyway, prosecution through the courts, while perhaps satisfying the hunger for justice (or, more particularly, revenge), is not a productive economic activity. So, the question begs itself again: what will we do? Under the best circumstances we will reorganize our society and economy at a lower level of energy use (and probably a lower scale of governance, too). The catch is, it will have to be a whole lot lower. I think we’ll be very lucky fifty years from now to have a few hours a day of electricity to do things with.

The energy story and its handmaiden, the climate change situation, are both lurking out there beyond the immediate spectacle of the financial fiasco. Both these things imply pretty strongly that the economic relations currently unraveling will not be rebuilt — not the way they were before, or even close to it.

The best outcome will be societies that can practice small-scale “process-intensive” organic agriculture and equally small-scale process-intensive modes of manufacture in the context of very local sociopolitical networks. An accompanying hope is that we can remain civilized in the process. Personally, while I recognize the appeal (to others, not me) of the “singularity” narrative, which has the human race making a sudden evolutionary leap into some kind of cyborg-nirvana, I regard it as an utter bullshit fantasy that has zero chance of occurring, given our stark predicament.

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But returning to the short term, or “the present,” shall we say, there is the matter of how the U.S. gets through the election and then the first months of a new government, even while the larger fiasco continues. I’m voting for Mr. Obama. While I believe he will make a much better president than the addled old mad dog Mr. McCain has become, I feel sorry for anyone who is placed nominally “in charge” of things this coming year. The best a President Obama can do is offer some reassurance to a public that is totally unprepared for the convulsion now upon us. Mr. Obama will certainly not have “money” to “spend” on any of the promised social support programs that have been endlessly debated.

But he could clearly articulate the reality we’re facing, and ask not necessarily for “sacrifice,” as the common plea goes, but for something more and better: for bravery and resolute spirit, for intelligence and resilience, for kindness and generosity — among a people long unused to consorting with the better angels of their nature. He’s already begun to set the example by appearing in public with his sleeves rolled up. The change that has been in the air all year — that Mr. Obama has talked so much about — is coming in a bigger dose than anyone expected. I hope we’re ready to get with the program.

Source: What Now?

US Gas Prices Hit Record of $4.05

Marc — Fri, 13 Jun 2008 16:53:28 +0000

US gas prices have reached a record of $4.05 and energy wonks now say that US gas prices could rise to a national average of $4.25 a gallon by the Fourth of July and are unlikely to fall as long as oil prices keep surging.

Jennifer Yousfi explains how US gas prices could keep on rising…

If oil stays near $140 per barrel, gas prices could easily top $4.75 a gallon by the Fourth of July holiday, Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody’s Economy.com (MCO), said in a recent research note.

And while the thought of gas at almost $5 per gallon is distressing enough, Money Morning’s Investment Director Keith Fitz-Gerald thinks gas prices could go even higher. In fact, U.S. motorists could easily be looking at $7 a gallon gasoline within just two years. And that could have a disastrous impact on the U.S. economy.

“The bottom line is that the effect on the economy is going to be a lot worse than anyone’s talking about right now,” said Fitz-Gerald, a longtime energy bull who recently boosted his oil-price projection to $225 a barrel. “The bottom line is this: Until someone develops a truly [interchangeable] alternative for oil and gasoline – something that works the same, costs the same and is just as effective – Americans are just going to have to face the fact that over time they’re going to pay more.”

By fixating on near-term prices, and near-term fallout, Fitz-Gerald says that investors and economists alike are missing the bigger point: Long-term – or at least until a true replacement for oil is found – the U.S. economy is going to be badly stung, and U.S. consumers who don’t take steps to protect themselves are looking at a markedly reduced standard of living.

Moody’s Economy.com’s Mark Zandi agrees.

“Unless oil prices soon recede and Washington changes its views and acts to shore up the housing market and broader economy, the outlook for 2009 will weaken further in coming months,” Zandi said.

Zandi added that the U.S. Federal Reserve “will sacrifice near-term growth for the sake of stable prices and the economy’s longer-term prospects” and that the high cost of oil will prevent any further interest rate cuts.

But don’t look for gas prices to move up in a straight line to $5, $6 and $7 a gallon, Fitz-Gerald says. Prices will continue to fluctuate. There will be rallies, and retrenchments, as is the case with the price of any commodity.

But prices will rise, as there is still no truly “fungible” – interchangeable – replacement for petroleum. That’s what’s needed, Fitz-Gerald says.

In the interim, investors should: be “long” on oil and other commodities; have alternative-energy-related investments; and look for profit plays in ancillary sectors, Fitz-Gerald says.

Gordon Brown’s Barmy Answer To The Oil Crisis

Ben Traynor — Thu, 29 May 2008 16:47:00 +0000

“Captain, we’re running out of fuel!” “Don’t panic! Just burn up what little we have. And burn it faster!” Gordon Brown, crisis buster extraordinaire, has a solution to the energy crisis. Are you ready?

Here it is:

We need to pump 50,000 barrels more each day.

It’s a masterstroke. A policy that manages to be really bad in two different, fundamental ways.

Point one — we don’t have much oil left. This will deplete our reserves faster.

Point two — the world as a whole produces 85 million barrels a day. This extra production will have no impact on the oil price. It’s like throwing a dart at a tank.

Of course, there could be another motive for this. Brown famously sold a lot of our gold in 1999. Since then, the price of gold has soared. It was a really, really bad trade. If Brown was your fund manager, you’d sack him.

Maybe Gordon’s trying to make up for it now. Britain is a price taker in the global oil market. We have no influence on how much a barrel of crude costs. Now oil is hitting record highs. Some, like our own Bill Bonner and our Time Trader, Robin Tracey, suspect we could be in bubble territory.

Perhaps Brown is advocating increased production to capitalise on the high price (though even then, I don’t think it’s at all his call to make). I don’t really believe this… but I’m trying to think of a rationale for this mad policy.

If that is the case… OK. We’ll talk about it.

Just don’t dress it up as the energy solution it clearly, clearly isn’t.

Below, commodities hound Garry White proposes a far more workable solution. He also follows up on yesterday’s Blackout Britain story — why was it that the lights went out in Cleveland?

House prices lose their footing

Woops!

You remember my rock climbing analogy from two days ago? The one that likened the housing market to a climber on a rock face, trying to descend to a sustainable level and groping around for a foot hold?

Well, the climber’s slipped. He’s not at the bottom (at least, we don’t believe so). But he has slipped a bit, and grazed his face on the rock.

According to the latest Nationwide house price index, the average house price has fallen 4.4% since May last year. That’s the biggest fall since December 1992 (when prices fell by 6.3%).

But here’s a line from the FT that puzzles me:

“The price drop makes the position of the Bank of England’s monetary policy committee even more complex as it struggles to set an interest rate policy which is consistent both with surging inflation and a deep slowdown in economic activity”.

Why? Why should it make the Bank’s job more difficult?

I’m going to have to quote from the Bank of England Act again, aren’t I? Here we go…

In relation to monetary policy, the objectives of the Bank of England shall be — (a) to maintain price stability, and (b) subject to that, to support the economic policy of Her Majesty’s Government, including its objectives for growth and employment.

The key phrase is ‘subject to that’. If prices are stable, worry about growth and employment. If they’re not, don’t.

There isn’t an interest rate policy consistent with both surging inflation and a deep slowdown in economic activity. There’s no reason to think there would be. That’s why each policy tool should be used to achieve one, and only one, policy goal.

In the case of interest rates, the goal is price stability. Keeping inflation down.

Falling house prices may make ugly headlines, but that shouldn’t be the Bank’s concern. And besides, house prices got too high anyway.The housing market is trying to find an equilibrium. Let’s go back to my climber on the rock face. He knows there’s solid ground below. He’s making his way down… from time to time he slips, but then the safety rope kicks in.

This “Belay Effect” takes the form, for example, of people desperate to buy, but priced out of the market. As soon as prices slip a little, they’re in!

But our climber’s still searching for a surer footing. So he’ll keep edging downwards. And here’s where the Bank of England might make a nuisance of itself. The equilibrium is below the climber. Cutting rates has the effect of temporarily hoisting him higher up the wall.

But he still has to come down.

Solving Britain’s power crisis — the Garry White two-step

Step one — start building nuclear reactors. But remember — these take over a decade to build. You can’t just throw them up. Best get started, then, however unpopular it may be with environmentalists.

Step two — find a workable solution for the interim period. For Garry, the solution is a four-letter word. Coal!

“Coal’s making a comeback,” says Garry. And that, dear reader, leads me onto step three:

Invest in coal. This is exactly what Garry told his Smart Commodities readers to do last October. But Garry was too far ahead of the curve — his coal stock slumped straight after.

But Garry’s stuck with it. And he’s told his readers to stick with it, too. He sees the current energy crisis for what it is — a gap to be plugged… and a great investment opportunity.

Garry’s been rewarded for his patience — his coal stock’s now showing a 19% profit since recommendation, despite the earlier dip. Now, past performance is not a reliable indicator of future results. Perhaps Garry was lucky?

“Not a bit of it!” says the man himself. “Investors are slowly waking up to coal’s profit potential. The world needs energy — and coal, however dirty it may be, is a proven source. This stock has a way to go yet. Get it in your portfolio!”

Find out today what Garry believes is the number one coal investment on the market right now!

Until tomorrow

Ben Traynor

Source: Gordon Brown’s Barmy Answer To The Oil Crisis

How These Two German Scientists Are Solving Our Energy Crisis

Floyd Brown — Wed, 28 May 2008 22:04:45 +0000

Nearly 90 years ago, German researchers Franz Fischer and Hans Tropsch developed a process that will solve our energy crisis. Today the term “Fischer-Tropsch” is seen frequently in articles about synthetic fuels.

It now applies to a wide variety of similar processes for converting coal, biomass and other carbon intensive feed-stocks into usable products such as diesel and jet fuel.

These two scientists at the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute invented the process because of a petroleum shortage, increased demand and skyrocketing prices – similar to what the United States faces today. During World War II, Germany used the technology to keep Hitler’s war-machine running.

By 1944, Germany’s annual synthetic fuel production reached more than 124,000 barrels per day from 25 plants. After the war, captured German scientists continued to improve the process in the United States.

But the technology faded after the 1980s. That’s when Congress passed the Energy Security Act, which birthed the Synthetic Fuels Corp (SFC). SFC spent over $88 billion in government loans and incentives, with the goal of creating two million barrels a day of synthetic oil within seven years.

SFC was launched in 1980 and it folded in 1986 after spending billions without providing any fuel. In the grinding recession of the early 1980s, oil prices sunk from more than $39 a barrel to less than $8 a barrel. Synthetic oil became a financial bust.

Now the economics have changed…

With Oil Trading at $130 per barrel, Synthetic Fuel is a “No-Brainer”

The process works like this: Coal is broken into its components by subjecting it to high temperature and pressure, using steam and measured amounts of oxygen. This leads to the production of synthetic gas.

Because the United States has benefited from years of low price petroleum, the leader in synthetic gas grew up in South Africa. The global leader is Sasol (NYSE: SSL). Sasol uses coal and natural gas as a feedstock to produce a variety of synthetic petroleum products. Sasol produces most of South Africa’s diesel fuel using a modified Fischer-Tropsch process.

This process helped South Africa to meet energy needs during its economic isolation under Apartheid. Sasol’s process has received recent investor attention because they produce a low-sulfur diesel fuel, which minimizes the environmental impacts. As a result its stock has soared.

In the United States, a small firm named Rentech, Inc. (AMEX: RTK) provides technology to produce ultra-clean synthetic fuels and chemicals. It licenses its proprietary derivative process from the Fischer-Tropsch method.

It converts synthesis gas derived from coal, petroleum coke, biomass, natural gas, or municipal solid waste into liquid hydrocarbon products. This includes ultra clean diesel fuel, jet fuel, naphtha, specialty chemicals and other fuel products. Rentech also manufactures anhydrous ammonia, UAN, nitric acid, carbon dioxide and granular and liquid urea.

The US Air Force has been a leader in the utilization of these fuels. Most of the fleet is being certified to fly on a blend of synthetic and jet fuels. Recently, a B-1 Bomber became the first plane to break the sound barrier flying with a mixture that included synthetic jet fuel.

In addition, Rentech has a joint development agreement with Peabody Energy Corporation for the co-development of CTL projects that convert coal into ultra-clean transportation fuels using Rentech’s Process.

As with many companies focused on research and development of new technology, Rentech has yet to post a profit and its shares have traded in a small range for over a decade. RTK is still a highly speculative investment in one of the many potential solutions to our rising fuel costs.

So while the media hype is focused on solar, wind and even tidal power to solve our energy needs, the likely successor to petroleum will be refined from a black, sooty fuel that has been used since ancient times – coal.

I am happy to report that the United States has lots of coal, and companies operating in our free enterprise profit-incentive world are perfecting the technology to cleanly burn it in our planes, trains and automobiles.

Happy investing,

Floyd

Source: How These Two German Scientists Are Solving Our Energy Crisis

Legendary Oil Man Turns Back on Oil

Mike Burnick — Wed, 28 May 2008 21:14:40 +0000

Recently, legendary Texas oilman T. Boone Pickens made headlines with another big bet on energy…but it was No ordinary oil & gas investment.

I have been extensively researching the global energy crisis that’s now underway. My research is uncovering some very interesting investment candidates with lots of profit potential. The interesting thing is…NONE of these firms are traditional big oil & gas firms that investors are so fond of.

Crude oil soared as high as US$135 a barrel last week – more than double the price of a year ago. But big oil firms like ExxonMobil WILL NOT be cashing in on the next phase of the energy boom.

Instead, the richest investment opportunities can be found in the fast-emerging alternative energy sector.

That’s where oilman T. Boone Pickens is putting his money – his company Mesa Power just placed an order for US$2 billion in wind turbines. And there’s much more profit potential in other parts of the alternative energy sector too – especially alternative fuel.

The market for ALL alternative energy sources grew 40% last year alone to US$77.3 billion and will explode into a US$250 billion industry within 10 years.
Bio-fuel grew to a US$25.4 billion market last with more than 15 billion gallons of ethanol and biodiesel produced globally – more than double the output of just four years ago.
The worldwide Bio-fuel industry will continue to enjoy explosive growth for years to come – expanding into a US$81 billion business within the next 10-years!

But you don’t have to wait two decades or even two years to start making serious money from this energy-sector market shock…

Fossil fuels are dead – the future belongs to alternative energy. Vast fortunes will be made in the “great fuel revolution!”

MIKE BURNICK, Senior Editor & Global Markets Analyst

P.S. I’m pulling the trigger on my first market-shock recommendations to take advantage of the great fuel revolution. My first pick is a renegade oil firm that develops “HemiCell-190″, which already powers 2.6 million cars. My second selection is a “giant killer” that just scooped-up gold-mine in alternative energy assets that ExxonMobil threw away. Subscribers to my signature research investment service Market Shock Trader will be hearing from me about even more ways to profit. Very soon, I’ll be sending them specific rifle-shot plays to cash in on alternative energy!

Source: Legendary Oil Man Turns Back on Oil

Congress Beats Up On Oil Execs

Byron King — Sat, 24 May 2008 12:03:16 +0000

Rotten, no-good Members-of-Congress. In America, the Senators haul oil executives in front of Congress to insult and belittle them.

In Russia, they elect the former president of Gazprom as president of the country.

Hmmm… Russia or the USA… Which country does not have an “energy crisis?”

“People we represent are hurting,” says Sen. Leahy of Vermont to the oil company executives. “The companies you represent are profiting.”

Yeah? So what? Oil companies make about 4-cents per gallon gas. The federal govt makes at least 18-cents, and state govts make much more than that. Besides, most oil companies are actually “losing” money on downstream operations. The refining margins just plain suck right now.

And whose fault is it that people “are hurting?” People in the US have made several generations of bad choices in energy policy, to include electing guys like Patrick Leahy to the US Senate. The Patrick Leahys of the world have never done a darn thing to increase the energy supply of this country. They just sit back, pass legislation to lock up areas the size of Maine — as well as 85% of the US Outer Continental Shelf — and then take potshots at the people who put gas into the fuel tanks of America.

Really, Senator… Would you trade the management team of Chevron or Exxon for the mangers of Pemex? You want gas lines? Try that, genius.

Here is the scoop, if you missed the story.

Until we meet again

Byron King

Note: Byron King is a frequent contributor to the free e-letter Whiskey & Gunpowder. To receive daily insights into energy, oil, commodities and other natural resources sign up here!

Source: Congress Beats Up On Oil Execs…