RBN Energy
Early Access
Monday, 9/29/2025
Friday, 9/26/2025
Before data centers were the hot topic everywhere, Virginia was already rolling out the red carpet and it seemed that tech firms were constructing facilities as fast as humanly possible, drawn by the state’s robust fiber-optic network and low power prices. But while other states are racing to catch up, Virginia may be hitting the brakes. In today’s RBN blog, we’ll look at what makes Virginia so “sweet” for data center developers, their impact on the state, and efforts by some to slow progress.
Analyst Insights
Analyst Insights are unique perspectives provided by RBN analysts about energy markets developments. The Insights may cover a wide range of information, such as industry trends, fundamentals, competitive landscape, or other market rumblings. These Insights are designed to be bite-size but punchy analysis so that readers can stay abreast of the most important market changes.
By Jeremy Meier - Friday, 9/26/2025 (3:00 pm)
US oil and gas rig count climbed to 549 rigs for the week ending September 26, an increase of seven rigs vs. a week ago and the largest gain since July according to Baker Hughes data.
By Jason Lindquist - Friday, 9/26/2025 (10:00 am)
Report Highlight: Hydrogen Billboard
Low-carbon steel that utilizes green hydrogen in the production process will be used in Microsoft data centers under an agreement announced this week with Swedish steelmaker Stegra.
Daily Energy Blog
Thursday, 5/16/2013
Category:
Crude Oil
Two years ago in June 2011 Bentek forecast that crude production in the Williston Basin would grow to 900 Mb/d by 2016. Today’s production in North Dakota and Montana is already at that level. What we are learning about US shale production is that it has been growing at twice the rate of every forecast out there. Today we begin a new series looking at what we are learning about the accelerating pace of North American shale production.
Wednesday, 5/15/2013
Category:
Crude Oil
By Al Troner, President Asia Pacific Energy Consulting (APEC)
U.S. production of field (lease) condensates is growing like crazy, especially in the Eagle Ford. There is way too much of this material for it to be absorbed into traditional crude blending markets. At the same time the production of plant condensate, a.k.a. natural gasoline, is also increasing along with the yield of all other products from natural gas processing plants. A glut of condensates has developed and is getting worse. Clearly this is an opportunity for new market development, and the bizdev community is hard at work coming up with concepts, projects and proposals to use all of this material in the U.S. and in export markets. But there is a problem. Condensate markets in different geographies seem to have little in common with each other. It’s like walking through the looking glass. One term can have several meanings. One meaning can be ascribed to several terms. Today we launch a RBN blog series to make sense of it all.
Tuesday, 5/14/2013
Category:
Crude Oil
Houston is getting swamped with crude that isn’t being consumed by area refineries. Light sweet crude prices are being discounted by up to $6/Bbl versus St James, LA. There is no pipeline capacity to move crude from Houston to Louisiana so it can only go by barge. The reconfiguration of terminalling and storage capacity on the Texas Gulf Coast to handle rising volumes of incoming crude more smoothly is underway but far from finished. Enterprise Product Partners (EPP) announced their latest expansion plans for their ECHO terminal earlier this month. Today we review progress on the Enterprise Texas crude network.
Monday, 5/13/2013
Category:
Natural Gas Liquids
A few months back we introduced Whoville, the emerging NGL hub in a small corner of Pennsylvania and West Virginia. Now that hub is coming on like gangbusters. Between now and 2015 nearly 4.7 Bcf/d of additional cryogenic natural gas processing capacity is due to come online along with 500 Mb/d of fractionation capacity and 500 Mb/d of NGL pipeline takeaway capacity to support growing Utica and wet Marcellus production. As a result, NGL production from the Northeast is due to exceed 400 Mb/d by 2015, a six fold surge from EIA’s 63 Mb/d February production number. In today’s blog, we examine growing Northeast NGLs production.
Sunday, 5/12/2013
Category:
Crude Oil
During the past two years the US domestic crude transportation business has been revitalized by a huge increase in shipments of crude oil by rail. In the Bakken region alone over 600 Mb/d of crude is shipped to market by rail. The number of rail terminals in producing regions loading crude oil onto rail tank cars has increased from a handful at the end of 2011 to 88 and growing today. A further 66 crude oil unloading terminals have been built or are under construction. Today we summarize the crude oil terminal build out by region and by railroad.
Thursday, 5/09/2013
Category:
Energy
Last week (May 3 2013) a very late winter snowstorm crossed the Rocky Mountains into the upper Midwest, dropping over a foot of spring snow from Colorado to Wisconsin. So-called winter Storm Achilles smashed snowfall records across the Upper Midwest. The storm was only the second May snowstorm on record for Kansas City and Des Moines. Today we look at the impact of this year’s late winter weather on energy markets.
Wednesday, 5/08/2013
Category:
Crude Oil
The proposed $2 Billion Kinder Morgan Freedom pipeline project is conducting an open season for shipper commitments from West Texas to California. The California refining market has long operated like an island within the US and has so far received few supplies from new domestic production. To proceed with the project Kinder need shippers to make long term commitments but today’s unsettled markets place a premium on flexibility. Today we conclude our two-part analysis of the chances that the pipeline will get built.
Tuesday, 5/07/2013
Category:
Crude Oil
Kinder Morgan is conducting an open season to convert an El Paso Natural Gas pipeline to crude oil service from the Permian Basin in West Texas to California refineries. The ”Freedom Pipeline” project would cost as much as $2 Billion. Before going ahead they need to convince crude producers in the Permian and/or refiners in California to make long term commitments to the pipeline. Today we begin a two part assessment of the chances that this pipeline will get built.
Monday, 5/06/2013
Category:
Crude Oil
Bakken gas flaring is still close to 30 percent of production. At the end of April the North Dakota State Assembly passed legislation providing tax incentives for producers to reduce flaring by finding alternative uses for gas that would otherwise be flared. Analysis by the North Dakota Pipeline Authority shows that 45 percent of flaring occurs from wells that are already connected to gas processing plants. Today we describe efforts to reduce gas flaring in the Bakken.
Sunday, 5/05/2013
Category:
Crude Oil
Last week (April 29, 2013) the economics of crude-by-rail began to get real interesting as the differentials between inland crudes priced against West Texas Intermediate (WTI) and coastal crudes priced against Brent narrowed to less than $9/Bbl. The Brent/WTI differential traded at about $17/Bbl on average during 2012 and helped to justify the expansion of crude by rail to allow producers to reach higher priced coastal markets. Now the spread is less than the cost of rail transport from the Bakken to the East Coast. Today we delve into the costs of rail transportation and build a netback comparison for Bakken producers.
Thursday, 5/02/2013
Category:
Crude Oil
Gulf Coast diesel crack spreads (the margin between diesel prices and Light Louisiana Sweet crude - LLS) are averaging just under $16/Bbl this year – about 75 cnts/Bbl lower than 2012 but still pretty healthy. Gulf Coast diesel exports increased by 25 percent in 2012 – mostly to meet increased demand in Latin America. By December Gulf Coast refineries were running at 95 percent capacity to meet export demand. Yet during the first 2 months of 2013 refinery utilization plummeted to 80 percent, diesel production fell and Gulf Coast diesel exports dived by 300 Mb/d. Today we describe the impact that a heavier than usual Gulf Coast refinery repair season had on product exports.
Wednesday, 5/01/2013
Category:
Crude Oil
RBN blog pages are replete with discussions of the Shale–Rail revolution. We’ve shown how rail has become a formidable competitor to pipeline transportation. Twice as much crude oil moves by rail out of the Bakken versus pipe. Almost 100 new rail terminals will be built during 2012-13. But that’s not the only impact that shale is having. Most of the vast quantities of materials that support shale drilling arrive by rail. Among these are proppants (sand, ceramics), pipe, lubricating chemicals, and water. Today we examine the other end of the shale-rail revolution – the inbound material supply chain.
Tuesday, 4/30/2013
Category:
Natural Gas
Early in 2012, soon after Japan’s Fukushima disaster, two California nuclear power plants called SONGS 2 and SONGS 3 (stands for San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station) shut down for the foreseeable future. This pulled roughly 2,200 MW of base load generation out of the Southern California supply stack. The California System Operator (CAISO) scrambled for several weeks to bring replacement power into the system, and succeeded admirably. The grid held together and weathered last year’s hot summer. Now as the summer of 2013 starts to come into focus, there are lots of questions about the SONGS units –which are still off line – and what California’s overall power generation load will mean for natural gas demand and prices. Today we survey the measures that made things work last year and examine the most likely market developments expected for Summer 2013.
Monday, 4/29/2013
Category:
Crude Oil
Yesterday the Intercontinental Exchange Brent premium to WTI NYMEX closed at $9.31/Bbl, its lowest value since January 2012. Spread watchers have long anticipated this narrowing but it throws a spanner in the economics of crude by rail shipments from North Dakota. Today we suggest that the Brent/WTI spread may have narrowed before crude supply fundamentals justify the move and that it could widen again quickly to $15 or higher.
Sunday, 4/28/2013
Category:
Natural Gas Liquids
Natural gas liquids (NGL) production from the Bakken has increased from only 20 Mb/d two years ago to almost 50 Mb/d today. And that is with nearly one-third of the natural gas in the region being flared and no outlet for ethane. For years gathering, processing and pipeline constraints have held back production growth. But that’s all changing. ONEOK has completed their NGL pipeline and plant expansion project and more outlets are on the way. Production could rise to more than 300 Mb/d by 2018. In today’s blog, we examine the Bakken NGL situation.