Don’t Hold Your Breath Waiting for Grid Competitive Economics At a recent conference, I had the chance to talk with a prospective developer of offshore wind projects in Massachusetts and New Jersey, two states with excellent resource, growing renewable energy requirements (from state legislation), and among the highest electricity prices in the United States. The …
Cratering Costs have Significant Implications The conspiracy theory on Chinese solar industry has long been that the near-hundred producers would use rest-of-world incentives to build volume and cut costs, only to install domestically as costs approach local parity. We’re not there yet, but with local module prices under a dollar a watt (down 75% …
North American Operators Look Abroad As the US shale boom has shifted the gas side of the global energy landscape, US operators and geologists have looked abroad. A recent IEA survey has highlighted the resource opportunities on every continent, with special interest in Europe and China. Most majors and quite a few independent ‘shale-hardened’ E&Ps …
More observations from the IEA’s World Energy Outlook, published in late November: The comprehensive study, outlined above, also forecast that global renewable energy output is likely to grow at 3.5-7% compounded rate (dependent on carbon-target scenarios) over the next twenty five years. By 2035, renewables could provide up to a third of all electricity …
Transportation Politics It’s now old news, but surprisingly underreported outside energy circles but….. former Vice President Al Gore acknowledged that his tie-breaking vote to deny an MTBE waiver, while promoting ethanol as the octane enhancement of choice, was “not good policy.” He noted that massive subsidies of unproven, first generation, fuels, was “too much,” …
The Oil Price What to say? The correlation of the oil price with the US dollar (and QE 2 and beyond) continues to astound, but also moves with global equity markets (88% correlation with the S&P, according to Mike Rothman, Cornerstone Analytics). I would argue that the real driver has finally shifted (from …
Brokers and strategic services (e.g. Stratfor, http://www.stratfor.com/weekly/20111121-syria-iran-and-balance-power-middle-east) have become much louder in their assessment of Iran-related geopolitical risks. With the power vacuum created by the US withdrawal from Iraq, continued turbulence in Iran-backed Syria, and ongoing issues in Egypt, Yemen, and Bahrain, recent events (UK-Iran, explosions at an Iranian missile base, Syrian rockets …
Mid Term Elections Rarely are US political events very important within the Energy Geopolitik, but this week’s mid-term elections have clear implications for several energy matters. With the Republican takeover of the US House of Representatives, several evolving trends are under attack 1) National ‘frac-regulation’ is probably dead. Unless groundwater or other damage …
Some Good News (I think) As if Texas doesn’t have enough energy already (nearly 60% of all oil/gas income occurs in Rick Perry’s home), the state has become (with Iowa) the biggest wind-powered region in the US, with over 9 GW of installed capacity (9% of its total). The state is building a high voltage …
The Poly Silicon Glut Silicon prices are crashing. After five years of accelerating investment, spot prices as much as 20x leading edge costs, the rough estimate is that there is 2x as much ‘PV silicon’ as needed for the 2011 end market demand. Since most steps downstream of silicon have very low capital intensity, most …