In The News

Sasol Shelves Plans for Louisiana Gas-to-Liquids Plant
Wednesday, 01/28/2015

January 28, 2015 – Wall Street Journal

Sasol Shelves Plans for Louisiana Gas-to-Liquids Plant

By Patrick McGroarty in Secunda, South Africa, and Alison Sider in Houston

South African energy giant Sasol Ltd. said Wednesday it was shelving an $11 billion factory on Louisiana’s Gulf Coast, turning one of the largest prospective foreign investments on U.S. soil into another casualty of falling oil prices.

Sasol has spent years planning to expand its chemical factory outside Lake Charles, La into a sprawling...

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Energy Must Hold These Levels
Tuesday, 01/27/2015

January 26, 2015 – Real Money 

Energy Must Hold These Levels

By: Jim Cramer

Oil's pretty much got to hold $45 where it is right now -- or else. And natural gas must stay around $3, roughly its current price, or look out below. Those are the black magic levels where our homegrown shales become uneconomic to drill for most U.S. companies. Those are the make-or-break levels for this once-thriving industry.

This morning we got some pretty amazing aggregate drilling cost numbers from RBN Energy, by far the most authoritative site for...

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How Cheap Oil Changes Economics for Petchem Investors
Friday, 01/09/2015

January 7, 2014 – Energy Intelligence Finance, Vol. XXXVIII, No. 1

“How Cheap Oil Changes Economics for Petchem Investors”

For the past five years, oil and chemical companies have been making multimillion and billion-dollar investments in new petrochemical plants and reopening and upgrading existing ones in the expectation that the price of natural gas would remain a small fraction of oil prices (EIF May14’14).

These investments have been made on the assumption that oil prices would forever be at least 20 times those of natural gas, if not more,...

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Will Low Oil Prices Affect Debate Over Keystone XL Pipeline?
Thursday, 01/08/2015

January 8, 2015 - NPR 

Will Low Oil Prices Affect Debate Over Keystone KL Pipeline?

By: Steve Inskeep

Oil prices continue their slide, falling below $50 a barrel. Does the slump factor into the debate over building the Keystone Pipeline which would carry oil from western Canada to the U.S. Gulf Coast?

STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:

Here is an underlying fact about the proposed Keystone XL pipeline. Congress is preparing for a battle with the president over completing that pipeline intended to bring oil from Canada across the U.S....

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High Noon on the Gulf Coast: Canada, Saudi Oil Set for Showdown
Wednesday, 01/07/2015

January 6, 2015 – Reuters 

High Noon on the Gulf Coast: Canada, Saudi Oil Set for Showdown

By: Catherine Ngai

As a test of wills between OPEC nations and U.S. shale drillers fuels a global oil market slump, a brewing battle between Canadian and Saudi Arabia heavy crudes for America's Gulf Coast refinery market threatens to drive prices even lower.

While the stand-off between the oil cartel and U.S. producers of light, sweet shale oil has captured the limelight in recent months, the clash over heavier grades - playing out in the...

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