Was Brexit just the beginning?

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MORNING ENERGY NEWS | 07/14/2021

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The Brits aren't the only ones who will want out.

New York Times (7/14/21) reports: "Europe on Wednesday laid out an ambitious blueprint for a sharply decarbonized future over the next nine years, marking the start of what promises to be a difficult and bruising two-year negotiation among industry, 27 countries and the European Parliament. The political importance of the effort, pushed by the European Commission, the E.U.’s bureaucracy, is without doubt. It puts Brussels in the forefront of the world’s efforts to decarbonize and reach the goal of a carbon-neutral economy by 2050. To force the issue, Brussels has committed to reducing its emissions of greenhouse gases 55 percent by 2030 compared with 1990 levels."

"The complexity, uncertainty, and ambiguity of the existing knowledge about climate change is being kept away from the policy and public debate. The solutions that have been proposed are technologically and politically infeasible on a global scale."

– Judith Curry, Former Chair, Georgia Tech School of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences

Mayor Pete will be a very sad boy.

Cato Institute (7/13/21) column: "Americans drove nearly 96 percent as many miles in May 2021 as in the same month in 2019, indicating a return to normalcy. Transit ridership, however, was only 42 percent of pre‐pandemic levels, which is making transit agencies desperate to justify their future existence and the subsidies they depend on to keep running. The pandemic accelerated several trends that were already happening and that had contributed to declines in transit ridership in every year since 2014. First, even after getting vaccinated, more people are working at home at least two or three days a week. Second, those who commute to work are finding less congested roads, so driving is more attractive than it once was. Third, people are increasingly moving to areas where transit doesn’t work very well: Redfin data show that home prices in 'car‐dependent' (I prefer 'auto liberated') areas are growing twice as fast and homes are selling in half the time as in transit‐accessible areas."

There's no tellin' with Yellen.

Reuters (7/13/21) reports: "U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen acknowledged on Tuesday the use of carbon-pricing schemes such as a planned new European border levy but stressed such moves should take into account emission-cutting progress made in other ways. Yellen was in Brussels a day before the European Union unveils a major package of measures to tackle climate change. Among them, it will outline what a carbon border adjustment mechanism (CBAM), designed to cut emissions by creating financial incentives for greener production and by discouraging 'carbon leakage,' as the transfer of operations to countries with less onerous emission restrictions is known. 'A carbon tax or carbon pricing cap-and-trade is a very efficient way to go about addressing emissions reductions, but there's nothing that requires countries to proceed in that way,' she told Reuters in an interview."

You mean politicians say one thing on the campaign trail and do another in office?

AP (7/12/21) reports: "Approvals for companies to drill for oil and gas on U.S. public lands are on pace this year to reach their highest level since George W. Bush was president, underscoring President Joe Biden’s reluctance to more forcefully curb petroleum production in the face of industry and Republican resistance. The Interior Department approved about 2,500 permits to drill on public and tribal lands in the first six months of the year, according to an Associated Press analysis of government data. That includes more than 2,100 drilling approvals since Biden took office January 20. New Mexico and Wyoming had the largest number of approvals. Montana, Colorado and Utah had hundreds each. Biden campaigned last year on pledges to end new drilling on federal lands to rein in climate-changing emissions. His pick to oversee those lands, Interior Secretary Deb Haaland, adamantly opposed drilling on federal lands while in Congress and co-sponsored the liberal Green New Deal."

Energy Markets

WTI Crude Oil: ↓ $74.81
Natural Gas: ↓ $3.69
Gasoline: ↑ $3.15

Diesel: $3.26
Heating Oil: ↓ $216.76
Brent Crude Oil: ↓ $76.17
US Rig Count: ↓ 531

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