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 John Abeln - Monday, 9/29/2025 (3:30 pm)
Report Highlight: NATGAS Permian
Dry natural gas production in the Permian Basin averaged 22 Bcf/d for the week ended September 29, down slightly from the week prior, with small changes across most pipelines in the basin last week. The past few weeks, El Paso Pipeline has been the primary driver of lower supply.
By Martin King - Monday, 9/29/2025 (2:15 pm)
For the week of September 26, Baker Hughes reported that the Western Canadian gas-directed rig count was unchanged at 60 (blue line and text in left hand chart below), five less than one year ago and is holding at its highest point since mid-March.
Daily Energy Blog
Thursday, 4/04/2013
Category:
Crude Oil
Last June (2012) the largest refinery on the East Coast was on the brink of closing - in part due to higher international crude prices (versus US inland grades). Since then the 330 Mb/d Philadelphia Energy Solutions refinery has reopened and along with several of its competitors the new owners have developed means to get access to lower priced crude from North Dakota and Western Canada using rail. Today’s episode of our continuing crude by rail series is a survey of East Coast rail offloading facilities.
Wednesday, 4/03/2013
Category:
Natural Gas
Earlier this week (see Spring, Spring, Spring is in the Air) we looked at the US natural gas supply demand picture. Our analysis focused on the 25 percent run up in NYMEX natural gas futures prices to $4/MMBtu this year (they have since slipped back to close yesterday at $3.90/MMBtu). Prices rose because high winter demand helped demolish a huge gas storage surplus that hung over the market and depressed prices since last spring. The market should not forget however that for a time last year – with prices below $2/MMBtu and Lower 48 dry gas production through the roof - there was talk of hitting the “storage wall”. A sharp increase in power burn soaked up 6 Bcf/d of natural gas last summer and helped the market out of that scrape.
Tuesday, 4/02/2013
Category:
Crude Oil
Western Canadian heavy crude producers are getting desperate to find markets for oil sands production expected to increase by 1 MMb/d over the next 3 years. Few Canadian refineries can process these heavy bitumen crudes and domestic Canadian conventional crude production exceeds local refining capacity. Of all the current market alternatives, the US Gulf Coast is the most logical. Transporting heavy crude to that market continues to be constrained by a lack of infrastructure. Oversupply into the Midwest market and continued uncertainty about infrastructure have created a volatile price environment. Today we begin a two-part analysis of the Gulf Coast market for heavy Canadian crude.
Monday, 4/01/2013
Category:
Natural Gas
Last Thursday (March 28, 2013) the CME Henry Hub natural gas futures contract closed out the first quarter of 2013 at $4.024/MMBtu (prices slipped 0.9 cents to $4.015/MMBtu Monday). A year ago the futures price was $2.126/MMBtu – about half what it is today. During that same period, US dry gas production has risen by 0.5 Bcf/d to 64.1 Bcf/d and natural gas power burn has fallen by 2.2 Bcf/d (source: Bentek). With production still increasing and demand from power generation falling it seems unlikely that the market can sustain $4/MMBtu prices. Today we look at the supply demand picture at the end of the winter season.
Sunday, 3/31/2013
Category:
Refined Fuels
The start of April marks the traditional summer driving season. Domestic demand for gasoline is waning due to renewable fuels and higher fuel economy standards. At the same time the tight oil shale revolution is delivering greater volumes of lighter sweeter crudes to US refineries – including condensates. Those light crudes produce more gasoline when refined but can cause problems for refineries not configured to handle them. Today we describe a revolutionary process that could potentially bypass refinery distillation.
Wednesday, 3/27/2013
Category:
Crude Oil
Cushing, Ok has historically been known as the “Pipeline Capital of the World”. That was before the pipelines got congested in 2011 and inventory piled up – creating a discount warehouse for crude. As producers waited for pipeline infrastructure to come to the rescue the railroads took up the slack. Now crude rail loading terminals are being operated and built in every production region in North America and it is reported that crude is being trucked out of Cushing and loaded onto trains. Today we complete our survey of crude loading terminals.
Tuesday, 3/26/2013
Category:
Natural Gas
Over the past two years, natural gas production from the Appalachian region has soared with growth in the Marcellus pushing total production beyond 10.5 Bcf/d. Just next door the Utica Shale is coming into focus with attractive economics due to the natural gas liquids, crude oil and condensate production. The looming question is natural gas takeaway capacity. With Marcellus production continuing to grow and Utica supplies coming on, production in the Northeast will soon exceed regional consumption and will need to be moved out of the region to other markets in the U.S. and Canada. To accomplish this, new pipelines have been proposed and reversals of existing infrastructure that was originally built to transport gas into the region are being implemented. Today we review another of the proposed projects.
Monday, 3/25/2013
Category:
Natural Gas
Last week (March 18, 2013) the CME NYMEX Henry Hub futures contract open interest reached a record 1.32 MM contracts. The previous high was in April 2012. Open interest represents the number of positions held by futures market participants that are not yet offset by another transaction, by delivery or by exercise. Today we look at what lies behind the run up in natural gas futures traffic.
Sunday, 3/24/2013
Category:
Crude Oil
The West Texas Intermediate (WTI) discount to Brent has narrowed 30 percent in 2013 to close at $13.95/Bbl on Friday March 22, 2013. At the same time Gulf Coast Light Louisiana Sweet (LLS) prices have moved unexpectedly to a $6.75/Bbl premium over Brent. Is the WTI discount to Brent finally unwinding? If so – then why are LLS prices trading above Brent? Today we update our analysis of the WTI/Brent spread.
Thursday, 3/21/2013
Category:
Natural Gas Liquids
Today’s blog is something different. It is a special feature covering a unique aspect of the NGL/LPG industry, known as the LPG Charity Fund. The organization is an integral part of this community, due both to its good works and its widely attended extracurricular events. In posting this blog we are not asking for contributions, volunteers or anything else. Instead, we just think it is important – when you are trying to understand an industry – that you know something about the people involved and how the market really connects. Today we talk about this important dimension of the NGL/LPG community.
Wednesday, 3/20/2013
Category:
Renewables
When we described the quirky workings of the US renewable fuels mandates back in July and August of 2012 the topic was merely brain food for commodity market theorists and sleep deprived gasoline analysts. This month the market for big brother sounding “Renewable Identification Numbers” (RINS) - credited to refiners when they add ethanol to gasoline blends - is suddenly the hottest thing since sliced bread. The price of 2013 RINS shot from a few cnts/gal in January 2013 to an astronomical $1/gal on March 8, 2013. Earlier this week they were trading in the stratosphere, at about $0.70/gal. Today we look at what lies behind the current RIN furor.
Tuesday, 3/19/2013
Category:
Crude Oil
Western Canadian heavy crude oil producers have a lot of rail tank cars on order but so far none of the loading terminals in the production region can handle unit trains. The pace of terminal development in Alberta is far slower than North Dakota in 2012. Because you can ship raw bitumen without diluent there are potential cost savings over pipelines but the load and offload facilities are more complex. Today we conclude our mini survey of Canadian heavy crude loading terminals.
Monday, 3/18/2013
Category:
Crude Oil
Western Canadian heavy crude production is set to increase by more than 1 MMb/d over the next 5 years. Pipelines out of the region are full and new capacity is not expected online until 2014. Just like the Bakken in 2012, producers are looking more seriously at rail. The economics of getting crudes like Western Canadian Select (WCS) to market by rail instead of pipeline are favorable because of heavy discounts versus Gulf Coast equivalent crudes like Mexican Maya. Today we look at the rail options for Canadian producers.
Sunday, 3/17/2013
Category:
Natural Gas
Henry Hub natural gas futures prices are up 90 percent since their 10 year low of $1.907/MMBtu on April 19, 2012 – closing at $3.872/MMBtu on Friday. Over the same period the price of Gulf Coast ultra-low sulfur diesel fell by 4 percent to $3.027/gal. Nevertheless if you use liquefied natural gas to power a rail locomotive the equivalent fuel cost is about $0.48/gal (before adding in liquefaction and other costs). That is the reason why BNSF is taking a second look at LNG powered locomotive technology and Shell is building LNG plants in Louisiana and Sarnia. In today’s blog we review the appeal of gas-powered locomotives.
Thursday, 3/14/2013
Category:
Crude Oil
Canadian demand for diluent is currently forecast to increase by 300 Mb/d between 2013 and 2020. That picture could change dramatically if pipeline projects to transport heavy Canadian bitumen crude to the US Gulf and diluent to Western Canada are delayed or cancelled. In any case, developing plans to transport “raw” bitumen by rail seem set to reduce diluent demand. The possibility of lower diluent demand threatens the most promising market today for increasing US natural gasoline and lease condensate production. Today we complete a two part series on Canadian condensate demand.