Zeetrade News

By  Nick Cunningham U.S. shale is surging, threatening to take even more market share away from OPEC. But the prospect of U.S. oil edging out barrels from the Middle East is not nearly as simple as it might seem. Oil coming from the major shale plays in the U.S. is light and sweet, while a lot of oil coming from OPEC is medium or heavy, and often sour. A lot of refining capacity along the U.S. Gulf Coast, built up over years and decades, is equipped to handle heavier forms of oil. Before the shale revolution, refiners made their investments in downstream assets assuming the oil they would be using would come from places like Saudi Arabia and Venezuela. Lighter shale oil is perfectly fine for making gasoline, but not the best for making diesel and jet fuel. Medium and heavy oil is needed for that. But refiners have a tidal wave of light sweet oil on their hands, perhaps too much. The U.S. refining industry could max out its ability to swallow up light sweet oil from the shale

By   Baibhav Mishra (Image Courtesy: Marine Traffic) Even as the LPG shipping market is witnessing a depression affected by oversupply of transport vessels, the projection for demand of seaborne LPG trade appears impressive. This growth will turn the market from oversupplied to very tight within the next 12 to 18 months. Investors will soon have an opportunity to generate outsized returns through 2018 and 2019. LPG shippers expect a better freight market in 2018 than in 2017, and are not willing to make any new long term contracts below USD 20,000 per day for very large gas carriers (VLGC). The VLGC freight market has been weak in 2017 due to numerous newbuildings entering the market after VLGC rates peaked above USD 100,000 per day in 2015 as compared to the current levels of approximately USD 12 to 13,000 per day in the spot market. Operating Cost of Vessels in 2018 Vessel operating costs are expected to rise in 2018 with repairs and maintenance and spares

Patti Domm |  @pattidomm The global energy industry descends on Houston on Monday for the annual CERAWeek conference, where a hot topic will be the record-level surge in U.S. energy production. This should be a great year for oil companies, with higher prices, less regulation and a White House that is friendly to the industry. But the focus for U.S. energy companies will also be on discipline, when it comes to drilling and their balance sheets. Daniel Acker | Bloomberg | Getty Images A Nabors Industries floor hand uses a towel to wipe drilling fluid from a section of pipe on a crude oil rig outside New Town, N.D. By many measures, the U.S. oil industry should be having a great year. It is emboldened by higher crude prices, a White House favoring deregulation, and improving energy demand. But the industry has a different sort of challenge — to not drill too much. With the relative boom in oil prices, despite recent fluctuations, investors are judgi

OPEC was meeting with rival U.S. shale producers on the sidelines of the annual CERAWeek energy conference for a second year in a row, in an effort to learn what the industry can do to avoid the type of painful downturn faced in 2015. OPEC's Secretary General Mohammed Barkindo said that downturn was the worst in six oil price cycles, and the most injurious to producing nations. The OPEC/non OPEC production agreement is as "solid as the Rock of Gibraltar" and the producers hope to make their partnership more permanent. Patti Domm |  Tom DiChristopher Source: OPEC OPEC Secretary General Mohammad Barkindo OPEC wants to have an open dialogue with upstart U.S. shale drillers and learn from oil market players, after the most painful downturn in six oil price cycles. OPEC Secretary General Mohammad Barkindo said he planned to meet Monday evening with shale produces, after an initial meeting at the conference a year ago. The meeting is not about prices

By  Robert Rapier Between 2010 and 2015, annual oil production in the U.S. grew by four million barrels per day (BPD). Production dipped in 2016, but then U.S. crude oil production again rose by 1.2 million BPD between January and December 2017, to levels that haven’t been seen since the early 1970s. The surge in production is a result of growth in tight oil (more commonly known as shale oil). Many, including myself, never imagined that oil production could grow enough to threaten the U.S. oil production peak from 1970. But that looks inevitable at this point. This production increase raises the question: Just how much will U.S. tight oil production increase before it peaks and begins to decline? Another million BPD? Three million BPD? The Energy Information Administration’s latest  Annual Energy Outlook  (with projections to 2050) attempts to answer this question, modeling several scenarios for future oil production. The Reference case projection assumes that known techn

U.S. oil production rose to an all time high above 10 million barrels a day, revisions to monthly data showed on Wednesday. American output slipped back below 10 million barrels a day in December, according to the first reading for the month. The United States is now producing roughly on par with Saudi Arabia as the two vie for the title of the world's second largest oil producer. Tom DiChristopher |  @tdichristopher U.S. oil production surged to an all-time high in November, topping the previous record set nearly half a century ago, government data showed on Wednesday. The nation's drillers pumped 10.057 million barrels a day in November, the U.S. Energy Information Administration said in a monthly report. That edges out the previous record of 10.044 million barrels a day set in November 1970. The record-setting output comes after a revision to last month's report showing November's output leaped to 10.038 million barrels a day. Whil

By  Ellen R. Wald, Ph.D. A new  report  from the International Energy Administration (IEA) forecasts that  oil production in the United States is on pace to overtake Russian and Saudi Arabian oil production as soon as 2019. As U.S. production surpasses that of other major countries, we will see more and more talk—reminiscent of the claims in  2014  and  2015 —that the American shale oil industry has become the new “swing producer” of the oil market. I had this  discussion  recently. These claims are and will be wrong; American shale cannot constitute a swing producer. The idea behind a swing producer is that one particular supplier (or a group of suppliers working together) can have enough control over changes in supply that it can increase or decrease the price of oil on its own. A swing producer can set the price of oil by either: Decreasing its own production to raise prices at a time when other producers have no spare capacity to make up for the global supply loss, or Incre