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New research shows major lenders are accelerating their investment in Big Oil as the industry turns toward plastics and petrochemicals.

For most of the modern era, capitalism justified itself through growth. Industrial societies converted vast amounts of fossil energy into production, wealth, and rising living standards. Roads, bridges, power grids, schools, and public institutions expanded alongside the economy. Inequality and exploitation remained deeply embedded in the system, but they were partly obscured by a broader story of material progress.

Exxon warns oil inventories will hit dangerously low levels in weeks, forcing prices to shoot higher. […]

Norway’s energy minister says country has a ‘responsibility’ to address shortfalls caused by wars in Ukraine and Middle East

The world has become well versed in the importance of the strait of Hormuz to the world’s energy flows, but attention is increasingly turning to its vital role in another market – the fertiliser on which harvests depend. A third of the global trade in raw materials for fertiliser passes through the maritime choke point, which is also the route for 20% of shipments of natural gas, which is required to make it.

Oil prices could jump to $200 per barrel and even higher if the Strait of Hormuz remains near-closed as it is at the moment, Fereidun Fesharaki, Chairman Emeritus of energy consultancy FGE NexantECA, told Bloomberg on Tuesday. Although the oil market is moving on sentiment and U.S. President Donald Trump’s social media posts about the war, the fact is that “every week, 100 million barrels of oil is not going through, and every month, 400 million barrels are not going through,” Fesharaki told Bloomberg Television.

We can’t know how long the war in the Middle East will last. Nor can we know who will “win” it, and in which terms. What we know is that the destruction already wreaked on things and people is immense, and it keeps escalating. The longer the war, the bleaker their perspectives in a region already plagued by all sorts of problems, including drought, soil degradation, ecosystem damage, scarce agricultural resources, declining fertility rates, and more.

Oil has empowered capitalism, and some of the world’s most exploitative regimes. Move away from it and we can solve some of the key issues we face

Wael Sawan warns of pressure on diesel and petrol if strait of Hormuz does not reopen to oil and gas shipping

​"Extreme heatwaves like the one impacting the Western US this month are one of the catastrophic disasters these companies predicted their conduct would bring about," said Public Citizen.

Today, we are close to the critical moment when conventional economic growth becomes impossible on a finite planet, constrained by two parallel factors: resource depletion and pollution. Tthe depletion of fossil fuels and other mineral commodities is placing heavy constraints on both industrial and agricultural production. We are not running out of anything yet, but the cost of extraction is increasing, just as the damage that extraction causes to the ecosystem. On the other side, pollution is appearing in more than one form. Chemical pollution is growing in terms of heavy metals, endocrine-disruptors, and other poisoning substances, while climate change can be seen as another form of pollution generated by the excess of CO2 in the atmosphere.

The Global Environment Outlook, Seventh Edition: A Future We Choose, the product of 287 multi-disciplinary scientists from 82 countries, is the most comprehensive scientific assessment of the global environment ever carried out.

Short-Term Energy Outlook

Legal action has brought important decisions, from the scrapping of fossil fuel plants to revised climate plans

It has the world's largest reserves, produces comparatively little, and has a type of oil that the US needs. […] Over the weekend, the United States bombed Venezuela, and captured its president Nicolás Maduro. There has been a lot of speculation about the legality, true motive and implications going forward. Oil has been a central part of the discussion. I wanted to get a quick overview of what the global picture looks like. So here are five(ish) simple charts that give some context on the history of oil in Venezuela, and why the United States — which is, by far, the world’s largest producer itself — would care so much.

UN GEO report says ending this harm key to global transformation required ‘before collapse becomes inevitable’

The International Energy Agency works with countries around the world to shape energy policies for a secure and sustainable future.

Delegates made minimal headway on timetable for replacing oil and gas or on firm commitments to reducing carbon emissions

A deal is welcome after talks nearly collapsed but the final agreement contains small steps rather than leaps

Watchdog’s flagship report says rise in low-carbon electricity will make transition ‘inevitable’, despite Trump’s calls to carry on drilling