19th July 2024

Happy Friday Both Barrels crew. Here’s what hit the wires in oil, gas, and energy today. Have a cracking weekend:

• 👶“We will drill baby drill”

• ⛓️ 5 years for Just Stop Oil protesters

• 🔥Tankers ablaze off Singapore

• 📈Global power demand running wild

• ➕ plus gold hydrogen; Russia’s growing coffers; tanker jam outside Freeport LNG; Tenaz acquires NAM Netherlands, and buckets more.

Let’s go…

📈THE NUMBERS

🗞️ WELL-HEADLINES

🗽North America

• Tanker jam outside Freeport LNG - at least 6 empty LNG tankers are anchored outside Freeport LNG waiting for the damaged facility to restart liquefaction operations. To clear the backlog, Freeport has reportedly canceled at least 10 cargoes for loading through August.

• Most Americans concerned about energy bills - a survey found that 80% of the population are worried about increasing costs of power and fuel. 32% are having to rely on debt or other financial support to pay their energy bills. In a world with abundant energy resources, this is a travesty.

• Betchel lands contract with Sempra for Port Arthur expansion - the EPC contract is for Phase 2 of the LNG terminal in Texas which will take its total capacity from a big 13 mmtpa to a massive 26 mmtpa. Phase 1 start-up is due in 2027.

🏰Europe

• Tenaz Energy snaps up NAM's offshore Netherlands assets - the $180m deal comprises ~11 kboe/d of production across NAM's (a Shell / Exxon JV) offshore exploration and production businesses, as well as its associated pipeline infrastructure, and onshore processing in the Netherlands.

• Russia’s growing coffers - Russia’s July oil and gas revenue jumped 50%, year on year, to $14bn thanks to stronger oil prices. Those Western sanctions are working well then…

• New crackdown on Russian “shadow fleet” - right on cue…more sanctions aimed at hitting Russian oil supply. When will these politicians realize that to hurt Russia they need to push oil prices down, not up?

• Germany hoarding gas? - The Czech Republic (or Czechia as it’s called these days) claims that its neighbor has cut gas some supplies, risking a shortage in the country. The Germans are pretty desperate for energy these days so it wouldn’t be a huge surprise.

• Cash shortage puts Cyprus’ first LNG terminal in doubt - a Chinese consortium that had been building the $320m LNG import terminal has withdrawn, claiming the Cyprus government failed to honor its commitments.

🕌The Middle East

• Large oil slick in the Red Sea - it’s unclear where the 125 mile oil slick is from but it’s in the same waters where Houthis have been attacking oil tankers with explosive drone boats so that would be a good place to start.

⛩️ Asia & Oceania

• Oil tankers ablaze offshore Singapore after collision - its unclear how the incident occurred and rescue teams are evacuating crew from the vessels, the Hafnia Nile and the Ceres I. Not a great day for tankers…

🦁Africa

• Turkey hunts for oil offshore Somalia - optimistic that Somalia holds hidden hydrocarbon riches, Turkey is sending an exploration vessel to the country’s waters later this year following a pact between the two nations. Watch out for the pirates…

🌍 GEOPOLITICS & MACRO

• “Meaningless new green scam ideas” - after Hulk Hogan fired up the crowd, Donald Trump, ear all bandaged up, addressed the RNC and got us all giddy talking about energy: “It will be drill, baby, drill…I will stop meaningless new green scam ideas that are pushing up costs…and end the EV mandate on day 1…We are a nation that has the opportunity to make an absolute fortune with its energy…we have it and China doesn't…We will supply the rest of the world with numbers that nobody has ever seen”.

• Steady as she goes for OPEC+ - a mini OPEC+ ministerial meeting next month is unlikely to recommend changing the group's output policy. OPEC+ is currently cutting production by 5.9 mmb/d, or about 5.7% of global demand, in a series of steps agreed since 2022. The group plans to gradually phase out 2.2 mmb/d of those cuts over the course of a year from October 2024 to September 2025.

• Energy trading hit by global IT outage - energy traders in London and Singapore have struggled to execute trades after a major outage with Microsoft systems. Head home for an early weekend then, I guess.

💨CARBON, CLIMATE, & OTHER ENERGY STUFF

• Just Stop Oil protesters jailed for up to 5 years - the activists blockaded one of the UK’s major motorways for 4 days in 2022, causing collisions, $2.5m of costs, and untold amounts of stress and inconvenience for thousands. The only mistake the judge made was not sending them to a mental asylum.

• Global power demand growing fast - a new IEA report on the global power sector finds that power demand grew by 4% in 2023, its fastest rate since 2007. More coal is being used to meet this demand.

• US major to start producing “gold hydrogen” - a start-up and an undisclosed US major are beginning a pilot project this year to use microbes to turn disused oil and gas wells into underground hydrogen-producing biorefineries. Don’t ask me how it works.

• Repsol and EDF partner up for Iberian offshore wind - the two European energy companies plan to cooperate in future offshore wind tenders in the Iberian Peninsula, which they said offers significant growth opportunities.

🛢️ BOTTOM OF THE BARREL

That’s all from us this week. Catch you Monday and have a blast this summer weekend.

👋 BEFORE YOU GO

Any feedback, requests, terrible jokes? Please just ping a reply to this email and let rip. We read every word.

Oh and if you could share us with your pals who might like a drop of us, then we’d be very happy.

Thanks for reading. Have a day out there. 🛢️🛢️

Was this forwarded to you? Both Barrels is a concise and irreverent oil, gas, and energy briefing, delivered to you daily. It’s free to subscribe.