OSHA has issued a record $87 million fine against BP saying it is not complying with terms of a settlement over the 2005 blast at the Texas City refinery that killed 15. BP has said it is in compliance with the settlement terms and will contest the new fines. Here are some documents related to [...]  More »

Bryan Marsal was in his living room watching a Giants football game the night of September 14, 2008 when the phone rang. On the other end of the line was the board of directors at Lehman Brothers. The reason for the call: would the co-head of turnaround firm Alvarez & Marsal would be willing to [...]  More »

• Shell to cut 5,000, Exxon reports lower profits. • KBR beats quarterly forecast despite 14% profit drop. • Chesapeake Energy reports record Barnett Shale output. • How much natural gas does Turkmenistan have? • BP plans first Libyan well by 2nd half 2010. • Repsol makes 2 oil finds in Gulf of Mexico. • [...]  More »

This morning, Houston attorney John O’Quinn died instantly in a car crash on Allen Parkway.  O’Quinn was a controversial and flamboyant attorney, who made hundreds of millions of dollars representing plaintiffs, and was particularly noted for his breast implant lawsuits and representing the state of Texas in its successful suit against tobacco companies.  Many, particularly [...]  More »

* Update The U.S. Renewable Energy Group (US-REG) and Cielo Wind Power LP have entered into a joint venture framework agreement with China’s Shenyang Power Group to develop a $1.5 billion, 600 megawatt wind farm on 36,000 acres in Texas. We don’t know many details at the moment but the press release on the event [...]  More »

• Saudis drop WTI as their benchmark price. • ConocoPhillips to get lean after years of bulking up. • Interior chief says royalty relief for deepwater Gulf not necessary. • Enterprise Products Partners sees rise in profits. Finally! Someone who’s doing better than last year. • The oilman who went back to nuts and bolts: [...]  More »

Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar said he is “not closing the door” on the idea of lower royalty payments for deep water oil and gas exploration, but he isn’t so sure it is necessary in the deep water Gulf of Mexico. Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar. (Andrew Harrer/Bloomberg) In a meeting with the [...]  More »

• Senate brawl over climate change legislation begins. • Chevron and Exxon would lose free emissions credits under plan being considered. • Senate climate bill reopens rift between coal, non-coal states. • United Nations signals a delay in climate change treaty. • Can markets save the rainforests? • Chu backs expanding nuclear power loan guarentees. [...]  More »

CenterPoint Energy has been granted $200 million in federal stimulus funding to speed up deployment of new electric grid technology while Houston-based electric retailer Reliant Energy was given near $20 million. Surprisingly Oncor Energy, which runs the power grid in Dallas, didn’t get any of the $200 million it asked to help speed up its [...]  More »

And just in time for today’s sessions in the Senate… O.K., this isn’t really done by the same folks who brought you Conjunction Junction and The Shot Heard ‘Round the world. Rather it’s from Friends of the Earth and they’re not trying to be neutral. And you probably don’t want small kids (or uptight co-workers) [...]  More »

• What to expect from the climate change bill hearings in the Senate this week. • Do people really care ‘climate change’? How about ‘global warming’ or ‘climate weirding’? • Four degress warmer: an interactive map. • Climate warming article challenged. • Climate targets unattainable, says industry. Carbon capture technology isn’t anywhere close to prime [...]  More »

CCS which stands for carbon capture and storage or sequestration has been the great hope of middle-of-the-road characters, people other than radical “greenies” or their “right-wing” adversaries. Oil companies and governments have jumped on this and it has figured prominently in many energy and climate scenaria by think-tanks and universities. In some ways it has [...]  More »