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MORNING ENERGY NEWS | 02/18/2021
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** The battle for what's left of the left's soul.
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American Spectator ([link removed]) (2/14/21) column: "Joe Biden isn’t the most important man in Washington. In fact, he isn’t even the most important man in Washington named Joe. That distinction belongs to the senior senator from West Virginia, Democrat Joe Manchin. Manchin is perhaps the final incarnation of the Democratic Party old school. He’s a self-described “moderate-conservative” — a blue dog’s blue dog who wheels, deals, horse trades, and log rolls for the people of his state. And his political issue picking-and-choosing probably puts him closer to the median American voter than either Republicans or his fellow Democrats care to admit. With the Upper Chamber split 50-50 between the two parties, Manchin in the Middle has leverage over every bill that hits the Senate floor. That inconvenient truth puts some serious hurdles in the way of the Democratic Party’s climate agenda. West Virginia, of course, sits at the heart of coal
country and atop the Marcellus shale basin. Now chairman of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, Joe Manchin has no intention of selling out his state. Just two weeks into the Biden presidency, Manchin has already sent Washington’s more famous Joe a letter cautioning him against the abandonment of America’s energy workers. Manchin argues that we ought not to jettison 'responsible energy infrastructure development, including of oil and natural gas pipelines,' and he encourages Biden to 'take into account the potential impacts of any further action to safety, jobs, and energy security.' The tale of two Joes reveals a fundamental change in Democratic Party politics and a rift in our national culture."
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** "Far from being an economic win–win, climate policy is a lose–lose. Replacing energy derived from hydrocarbons with wind and solar energy shrinks the economy’s productive potential."
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– Rupert Darwall, Real Clear Energy ([link removed])

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Like Texas, but everywhere and all the time.

** Washington Examiner ([link removed])
(2/16/2021) reports: "Lynn Allen was one of the lucky ones. Despite much of the county surrounding his Ringgold, Texas, home losing power during the ice and snowstorm Monday, his house was fully powered because he was hooked up to a different power supply than most of his town was. 'Not that long ago, a pump station was put in about a mile and a half to 2 miles as the crow flies from my home, and they put me on their circuit,' said Allen, a rancher. 'And, guess what? I don't lose power anymore, but the whole town lost power.' On Tuesday morning, Montague County, where Ringgold is located, reported nearly 24% of its customers were still without power, joining 4 million other Texans who became victims of an energy supply system that collapsed under the pressure of the frigid winter storm. The images of frozen wind turbines and solar panels brought to life how one of the most independent and powerful energy states in the country could fall to its knees when snow, ice, and frigid temperatures
battered its power grid. It was imagery that tells a cautionary tale of what the future in this country could look like if the Biden administration continues its dismantling of fossil fuel and related infrastructure industries. In short, what happened in Texas could happen anywhere, whether under the strain of a winter storm in Texas and Oklahoma or a heat wave in California."

It's time to reopen the skies.

** Reuters ([link removed])
(2/17/21) reports: "Hopes of a speedy aviation recovery this year have been knocked back by global travel restrictions after the emergence of new coronavirus variants and a slower than expected vaccination rollout, dimming the outlook for jet fuel demand and oil prices. Jet fuel suffered the biggest demand decline among oil products as aviation activity collapsed last year and is seen by market participants as one of the main factors influencing 2021 oil demand growth, given the lingering uncertainties. Almost 10% of total oil demand in OECD countries was for jet fuel in 2019, dropping to 6% in 2020, International Energy Agency (IEA) data shows. By comparison, gasoline demand remained around 30% in both 2019 and 2020. Goldman Sachs last month lowered its forecast for first-quarter global oil demand by 700,000 barrels per day (bpd), or 0.7% of total consumption, mainly because of renewed travel restrictions."

Biden chooses green jobs in China over energy jobs in America.

** Real Clear Energy ([link removed])
(2/17/21) reports: "Of all the states that will be most impacted by President Biden’s decision to halt new oil and gas drilling on federal lands and waters, New Mexico may the one with the most to lose. That’s because at least half of the state’s oil and gas production occurs on federal lands and the revenue generated from oil and gas funds almost 40% of the state’s budget. An updated analysis of the potential fallout from a moratorium on new oil and gas drilling shows New Mexico stands to lose tens of thousands of jobs and more than $1 billion in state revenue...Then, there’s China. Biden’s green energy scheme calls for the U.S. to be carbon neutral by 2050 and the power generating sector to be carbon neutral by 2035. While western states like New Mexico lose out, the regime in Beijing stands to gain, Dan Kish, a senior fellow with the Institute for Energy Research, explains. 'Biden’s American oil embargo only helps China and people who hate us,' he said. 'New Mexico jobs are being wiped
out so Chinese workers can burn coal to manufacture and export solar panels to the U.S. It makes no sense.'"

Note to those reporters linking the Texas storm to climate change: "It is indefensible to continue to rely on past short-term trends, which have since disappeared, as evidence of a large influence of Arctic warming on mid-latitude winter climate and extreme weather."

** Nature ([link removed])
(11/16/20) reports: "The idea that rapid Arctic warming might be changing weather patterns at lower latitudes rose to prominence in 2012. At that time, amidst rising global temperatures and record low Arctic sea-ice cover, parts of the mid-latitudes had just experienced a run of extremely cold winters1. Some scientists speculated that these cold snaps were driven by Arctic-induced changes in the atmospheric circulation, pointing to an unexpected 25-year winter cooling trend over Eurasia, an ostensible shift in the Arctic Oscillation and increased meandering of the jet stream as evidence2,3. These tendencies would continue as the Arctic warmed further, they predicted. Such ideas were controversial from the outset...So, six years on, what has changed? Arctic amplification and sea-ice loss have indeed continued. But predictions of a more negative Arctic Oscillation, wavier jet stream, colder winters in mid-latitudes or, more specifically, in Eurasia, and more frequent and/or widespread cold
extremes have not become reality."

Energy Markets


WTI Crude Oil: ↑ $61.44
Natural Gas: ↑ $3.25
Gasoline: ↑ $2.57

Diesel: ↑ $2.80
Heating Oil: ↑ $185.29
Brent Crude Oil: ↑ $64.62
** US Rig Count ([link removed])
: ↑ 449



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