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  • Beyond Diesel............

    Thats a phase you will be hearing a lot about in the coming weeks/months. I have no doult that the timing of this "Bomb-shell" was DECOY for the invasion of Europe & the total F*ck up that is the middle-east.

    However, this anti-Diesel project has been cooking on the back ring for some time.........i flagged it up mid last year. I suspect "They" asked the car producers to go eletric.....trouble is the battry tec is no there. "They" know we will NOT allow "Tax by mile" use via GPS......so "They" need something else.

    Again i guess, but i suspect "They" don't want to pay real money (Gold) for Oil. Importing Diesel from Russia etc............However there is rather a lot of (local produced) Natural gas about the place.

    Merc has already said they intend to move away from Diesel, (" We get the message, don't come after us!").................thus i suspect Natural Gas will become the new "Green" fuel.
    In the meantime
    http://www.autocar.co.uk/car-news/in...al-world-tests
    Mike

  • #2
    Re: Beyond Diesel............

    The BIG Taxes will come on those who make & use Diesel cars, there is answer:-
    http://www.autoexpress.co.uk/vauxhal...bo-2015-review

    Comment


    • #3
      Re: Beyond Diesel............

      Originally posted by Mega View Post
      Thats a phase you will be hearing a lot about in the coming weeks/months. I have no doult that the timing of this "Bomb-shell" was DECOY for the invasion of Europe & the total F*ck up that is the middle-east.

      However, this anti-Diesel project has been cooking on the back ring for some time.........i flagged it up mid last year. I suspect "They" asked the car producers to go eletric.....trouble is the battry tec is no there. "They" know we will NOT allow "Tax by mile" use via GPS......so "They" need something else.

      Again i guess, but i suspect "They" don't want to pay real money (Gold) for Oil. Importing Diesel from Russia etc............However there is rather a lot of (local produced) Natural gas about the place.

      Merc has already said they intend to move away from Diesel, (" We get the message, don't come after us!").................thus i suspect Natural Gas will become the new "Green" fuel.
      In the meantime
      http://www.autocar.co.uk/car-news/in...al-world-tests
      Mike
      Shell (Pennzoil) has a gigantic plant in Quatar using natural gas to produce gas-to-liquid basestock for their synthetic oils. Some recent tests by PQIA on Pennzoil's conventional motor oil (yellow bottle) show extremely low NOACK volatility numbers for the 5w20 and 10w30 grades. Has some people wondering if Pennzoil might have an oversupply of synthetic GTL basestock and is putting it in their conventional oil.

      I don't know enough about oil to know if GTL basestock in and of itself can make such low NOACK numbers, but there's definitely something "different" about those conventional oils. Maybe GRG55 will chime in with some wisdom.

      Be kinder than necessary because everyone you meet is fighting some kind of battle.

      Comment


      • #4
        Re: Beyond Diesel............

        May be, but GRG55 tends to be a bit "EJ"............suddenly post when you lest expect it..

        Comment


        • #5
          Re: Beyond Diesel............

          Originally posted by Mega View Post
          The BIG Taxes will come on those who make & use Diesel cars, there is answer:-
          http://www.autoexpress.co.uk/vauxhal...bo-2015-review

          Really impressive...

          Comment


          • #6
            Re: Beyond Diesel............

            VW UPDATE

            German authorities have given the VW Group just more than a week to prove that all its cars meet emissions regulations, amid reports in the national press that the company was warned as long ago as 2007 that using the software that cheated testing processes on production cars would be illegal.

            According to a report in German national newspaper Bild am Sonntag, Kraftfahrt-Bundesamt (KBA), the federal motoring authority, has told VW to demonstrate how it will meet emissions standards without using illegal software by October 7. If it fails to do so, the KBA has warned it could withdraw type approval for the affected models in Germany.

            The newspaper is also reporting that it has seen a letter in which VW supplier Bosch warned the VW Group in 2007 that the software was illegal for road use, and highlighting that it was only being made available for test purposes.

            Meanwhile, another German newspaper, Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung, has made claims that a Volkswagen technician raised concerns about illegal practices in connection with emissions levels in 2011. Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung cited VW’s internal investigators as the source of its information.

            Comment


            • #7
              Re: Beyond Diesel............

              Originally posted by shiny! View Post
              Shell (Pennzoil) has a gigantic plant in Quatar using natural gas to produce gas-to-liquid basestock for their synthetic oils. Some recent tests by PQIA on Pennzoil's conventional motor oil (yellow bottle) show extremely low NOACK volatility numbers for the 5w20 and 10w30 grades. Has some people wondering if Pennzoil might have an oversupply of synthetic GTL basestock and is putting it in their conventional oil.

              I don't know enough about oil to know if GTL basestock in and of itself can make such low NOACK numbers, but there's definitely something "different" about those conventional oils. Maybe GRG55 will chime in with some wisdom.
              What you are referring to is the Pearl GTL joint venture between Shell and the Qatari government (through state-owned Qatar Petroleum). This was Shell's second attempt to commercialize gas-to-liquids (GTL); the first being Bintulu in Malaysia. The plant produces a number of products, the most prominent by volume being a "clean" middle distillate that can substitute for motor diesel, and can be blended in small quantities with conventional jet fuel (about 10%).

              Airbus completes first commercial aircraft test flight using alternative fuel
              Fri 1 Feb 2008 – An Airbus A380 test aircraft has flown between Filton, UK and Toulouse, France with one of its four Rolls-Royce Trent 900 engines powered by an alternative, or synthetic, gas-to-liquid (GTL) jet fuel...

              ...
              Shell International Petroleum provided the GTL jet fuel and the tests are running in parallel to the agreement signed at the Dubai Air Show last November with the Qatar GTL consortium partners, who also include Rolls-Royce and Qatar Airways...

              ...
              During the flight, one engine was fed with the blend of GTL and ordinary kerosene jet fuel and the other three with conventional jet fuel. GTL, which looks like kerosene but is clear coloured, is a natural gas that has been cleaned and undergone the Fischer-Tropsch process...


              The plant and its products are a completely uneconomic proposition, even at $100/crude. It was heavily subsidized by the Qatari government as one of its many, many vanity projects at a time it thought it could afford to spend indiscriminately on such things. It was supposed to cost something close to US $5 Billion when first proposed. At the time I left the Persian Gulf in 2008 it was already over budget by a factor of three. It is now rumoured to have cost US $25 B to date, and produces about 150,000 barrels per day of synthetic products. The Qatari's also funded a second plant, Orex GTL, in a joint venture with South Africa's Sasoil about the same time. Orex produces 35,000 barrels of product per day. By comparison Bintulu GTL produces about 15,000 barrels per day of product and Shell has published total investment in that facility at US $1.3 B.

              All of these processes use some variation of the above mentioned Fischer-Tropsch process, which was used by Germany during WWII to convert coal gas to liquid fuel in an effort to keep the Panzers moving. It was also used in South Africa during the apartheid sanctions period, hence the expertise within Sasoil, and there is a 45,000 barrel per day plant in operations at Mossel Bay in RSA.

              One of the drawbacks of GTL is that a significant portion of the input energy is consumed in the conversion processes. As long as natural gas is seen as an abundant, zero value by-product (as it was at the time by Qatar Petroleum, who agreed to supply gas to the Shell plant free of any charge) then this high energy consumption is irrelevant. In the real world it matters.

              So what we have today are a few small GTL manufacturing plants, some of which cost a fortune to build, that uses a material portion of the input feedstock to produce a minuscule amount of product that is too expensive for most anyone to purchase. Almost makes hydrogen motor fuels look good.
              Last edited by GRG55; September 28, 2015, 11:02 PM.

              Comment


              • #8
                Re: Beyond Diesel............

                Way beyond . . . .

                Shell Exits Arctic as Slump in Oil Prices Forces Industry to Retrench

                By CLIFFORD KRAUSS and STANLEY REED

                “This first dry well seems to have been the trigger for the C.E.O. to pull the plug on their Alaska exploration campaign,”
                Oswald Clint, an analyst at Bernstein Research in London.


                As oil prices have continued their steady decline this year, rig after rig has been shut down, costing thousands of jobs in the United States. Yet major oil producers have been loath to pull the plug on their most ambitious projects — the multibillion-dollar investments that form the backbone of their operations.

                Until now. On Monday, Royal Dutch Shellended its expensive and fruitless nine-year effort to explore for oil in the Alaskan Arctic — a $7 billion investment — in another sign that the entire industry is trimming its ambitions in the wake of collapsing oil prices.


                At a time when global markets are glutted with oil, thanks to the advent of new drilling techniques, the announcement also confirmed major oil companies’ increasing willingness to turn their backs on the most expensive new drilling prospects in the Gulf of Mexico and suspend plans for new projects in Canada’s oil sands.

                The industry has cut its investments by 20 percent this year and laid off at least 200,000 workers worldwide, roughly 5 percent of the total work force. Companies also have retreated from less profitable fields in places like the North Sea, West Africa, and some shale prospects in Louisiana and North Dakota.

                American oil companies have decommissioned more than half of their drilling rigs over the last year, and production is beginning to drop in the United States. Even exports from Saudi Arabia are beginning to ebb because of a glut in its Asian markets.

                “The decision by Shell to abandon its Arctic drilling program for now primarily reflects the realities of lower global oil prices,” said Michael C. Lynch, president of Strategic Energy and Economic Research, who advises oil companies and investment banks. “When prices go down, the oil industry shortens their list of projects in development by removing the most expensive ones.”

                This year, industry executives held out hope that the oil price, which has fallen more than 50 percent to below $50 a barrel since last summer, would recover before too long. But in recent weeks, a growing number of executives have warned that the downturn could last well into 2016 and perhaps beyond, especially if the Iran nuclear deal leads to a flood of new oil on world markets.

                With demand dwindling, the current market of 94 million barrels a day has roughly two million barrels in surplus supply.

                When Shell first leased a huge portion of Alaska’s Chukchi and Beaufort Seas after they were opened up by the George W. Bush administration, oil prices were soaring. Middle classes in China and the developing world were demanding more liquid fuels every year. At the same time, a growing number of oil fields around the world were aging and in decline.

                Then, just as Shell began its Alaskan effort, the shale revolution began in the United States. Independent oil companies found ways to fracture hard rocks to produce oil, nearly doubling domestic production. That surprise development, along with the slowing Chinese and European economies, drove the oil price down just as Shell returned to drilling in the Chukchi this year. The environmental movement delayed Shell at every turn, but the 2010 BP disaster in the Gulf of Mexico pushed the company off several years as well.

                Industry experts say that there is plenty of oil in offshore Alaska and that renewed efforts are still possible if and when the oil price recovers.

                Shell has spent more than $7 billion on an effort that has been plagued by blunders and accidents involving ships and support equipment, reaching a climax with the grounding of one of its drilling vessels in December 2012 in stormy seas. Even after ConocoPhillips and the Norwegian oil giant Statoil suspended their Alaskan offshore drilling operations, Shell carried on, asserting that the Chukchi Sea potentially represented the next great global oil find.

                But the company announced that its one well drilled this summer “found indications of oil and gas, but these are not sufficient to warrant further exploration.” In a statement, it also acknowledged “the high costs associated with the project and the challenging and unpredictable federal regulatory environment in offshore Alaska.”

                The decision represented a major turnaround from the faith in the project that Ben van Beurden, Shell’s chief executive, expressed as recently as August. At the time, he said that Shell’s holdings in the Alaskan Arctic could be “multiple times” more bountiful than the enormous fields in the Gulf of Mexico. “We can’t be driven by today’s, tomorrow’s, or next year’s, or last year’s oil price,” he said.

                Shell’s efforts to drill in Alaska have long seemed quixotic. It came closest to finding oil in 2012 when it drilled two shallow wells but had to stop short of deeper oil zones after several bizarre accidents, including the crushing of a containment dome during a vital test. This summer, a storm whipping though the Arctic Ocean forced Shell to suspend drilling, and the United States Fish and Wildlife Service made a regulatory ruling that cut back the company’s drilling plans.

                After a Finnish icebreaker hired by Shell struck an uncharted shoal in the Aleutians in July, it was forced to go to Portland, Ore., for repairs. Protesters there tried to block the vessel, going so far as to suspend themselves from a bridge over the Willamette River.

                Shell’s current venture into the Alaska offshore began under Mr. van Beurden’s predecessors, and he has always been concerned about the project’s costs and risks. Soon after he became chief executive in 2014, he temporarily halted drilling in Alaska because of legal and regulatory issues.

                He came around to the view that the potential bonanza was worth the expense and headaches, but now that drilling has produced an unexpectedly poor result, he may have decided to follow his original instincts and call a halt.

                http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/29/business/international/royal-dutch-shell-alaska-oil-exploration-halt.html?ref=todayspaper

                Comment


                • #9
                  Re: Beyond Diesel............

                  Originally posted by don View Post
                  Way beyond . . . .

                  Shell Exits Arctic as Slump in Oil Prices Forces Industry to Retrench

                  ...
                  Shell's chronic underperformance, discussed numerous times in years past on various iTulip threads (including this one), has continued.

                  Layer on top of that the enormous distraction of the merger with BG (formerly British Gas). Although the deal has regulatory hurdles in various jurisdictions that must be overcome, and won't close until some time next year, Shell has to start a capital re-allocation plan now based on the assumption it owns the BG assets. That means it is re-ranking every investment opportunity within a combined Shell and BP asset portfolio, examining what capital can be deferred without permanent loss of opportunity, and deciding what assets are non-strategic/non-core and therefore candidates for divestment to raise capital.
                  Ben van Beurden says only ‘something cataclysmic’ would stop $70 billion acquisition
                  Sept. 9, 2015 12:39 p.m. ET

                  LONDON—Royal Dutch Shell PLC’s chief executive has told investors privately that only “something cataclysmic” could derail the company’s $70 billion takeover of BG Group PLC, according to a person familiar with the matter...


                  In that context, the decision to suspend high cost, high risk offshore Arctic exploration is not surprising. As I have mentioned elsewhere, the notion that Saudi Arabia left the taps open to shut down North American shale oil is nonsense. The drop in prices is going to have the greatest effect on the most expensive, longest timeline oil supplies - deepwater Gulf of Mexico, deepwater offshore Brazil & Africa, Arctic (especially Russia), high cost development such as Kashagan in the Caspian Sea and the expensive oil sands in Canada. Once again, onshore North America shale oil is the "just-in-time" oil inventory management supply source and that's the stuff that is going to be tapped first as prices move up and temporarily suspended as prices move down in these volatile times. All the big, expensive projects are either dead, or dead money.

                  Last edited by GRG55; September 29, 2015, 01:22 PM.

                  Comment


                  • #10
                    Re: Beyond Diesel............

                    Originally posted by GRG55 View Post
                    What you are referring to is the Pearl GTL joint venture between Shell and the Qatari government (through state-owned Qatar Petroleum). This was Shell's second attempt to commercialize gas-to-liquids (GTL); the first being Bintulu in Malaysia. The plant produces a number of products, the most prominent by volume being a "clean" middle distillate that can substitute for motor diesel, and can be blended in small quantities with conventional jet fuel (about 10%).

                    Airbus completes first commercial aircraft test flight using alternative fuel
                    Fri 1 Feb 2008 – An Airbus A380 test aircraft has flown between Filton, UK and Toulouse, France with one of its four Rolls-Royce Trent 900 engines powered by an alternative, or synthetic, gas-to-liquid (GTL) jet fuel...

                    ...
                    Shell International Petroleum provided the GTL jet fuel and the tests are running in parallel to the agreement signed at the Dubai Air Show last November with the Qatar GTL consortium partners, who also include Rolls-Royce and Qatar Airways...

                    ...
                    During the flight, one engine was fed with the blend of GTL and ordinary kerosene jet fuel and the other three with conventional jet fuel. GTL, which looks like kerosene but is clear coloured, is a natural gas that has been cleaned and undergone the Fischer-Tropsch process...


                    The plant and its products are a completely uneconomic proposition, even at $100/crude. It was heavily subsidized by the Qatari government as one of its many, many vanity projects at a time it thought it could afford to spend indiscriminately on such things. It was supposed to cost something close to US $5 Billion when first proposed. At the time I left the Persian Gulf in 2008 it was already over budget by a factor of three. It is now rumoured to have cost US $25 B to date, and produces about 150,000 barrels per day of synthetic products. The Qatari's also funded a second plant, Orex GTL, in a joint venture with South Africa's Sasoil about the same time. Orex produces 35,000 barrels of product per day. By comparison Bintulu GTL produces about 15,000 barrels per day of product and Shell has published total investment in that facility at US $1.3 B.

                    All of these processes use some variation of the above mentioned Fischer-Tropsch process, which was used by Germany during WWII to convert coal gas to liquid fuel in an effort to keep the Panzers moving. It was also used in South Africa during the apartheid sanctions period, hence the expertise within Sasoil, and there is a 45,000 barrel per day plant in operations at Mossel Bay in RSA.

                    One of the drawbacks of GTL is that a significant portion of the input energy is consumed in the conversion processes. As long as natural gas is seen as an abundant, zero value by-product (as it was at the time by Qatar Petroleum, who agreed to supply gas to the Shell plant free of any charge) then this high energy consumption is irrelevant. In the real world it matters.

                    So what we have today are a few small GTL manufacturing plants, some of which cost a fortune to build, that uses a material portion of the input feedstock to produce a minuscule amount of product that is too expensive for most anyone to purchase. Almost makes hydrogen motor fuels look good.
                    Thanks, GRG. You're awesome.

                    Be kinder than necessary because everyone you meet is fighting some kind of battle.

                    Comment


                    • #11
                      Re: Beyond Diesel............

                      I've been using Pennzoil Platinum 5W20 in my wife's Town and Country and didn't realize we were getting such a "bargain."
                      "I love a dog, he does nothing for political reasons." --Will Rogers

                      Comment


                      • #12
                        Re: Beyond Diesel............

                        Originally posted by photon555 View Post
                        I've been using Pennzoil Platinum 5W20 in my wife's Town and Country and didn't realize we were getting such a "bargain."
                        Speaking of bargains... Pennzoil just shipped me a free kit of 6 quarts Ultra Platinum 5W30 and a Blackstone oil analysis kit. All they want me to do is send a sample of the used oil to Blackstone when I drain it so we can see how it performed. They told me contact them a month before before I drain it and they'll send me another free kit to do it again. Two oil changes of this stuff is sure going to clean the Vic's engine...

                        Be kinder than necessary because everyone you meet is fighting some kind of battle.

                        Comment


                        • #13
                          Re: Beyond Diesel............

                          Originally posted by GRG55 View Post
                          Shell's chronic underperformance, discussed numerous times in years past on various iTulip threads (including this one), has continued.

                          Layer on top of that the enormous distraction of the merger with BG (formerly British Gas). Although the deal has regulatory hurdles in various jurisdictions that must be overcome, and won't close until some time next year, Shell has to start a capital re-allocation plan now based on the assumption it owns the BG assets. That means it is re-ranking every investment opportunity within a combined Shell and BP asset portfolio, examining what capital can be deferred without permanent loss of opportunity, and deciding what assets are non-strategic/non-core and therefore candidates for divestment to raise capital.

                          Ben van Beurden says only ‘something cataclysmic’ would stop $70 billion acquisition
                          Sept. 9, 2015 12:39 p.m. ET

                          LONDON—Royal Dutch Shell PLC’s chief executive has told investors privately that only “something cataclysmic” could derail the company’s $70 billion takeover of BG Group PLC, according to a person familiar with the matter...


                          In that context, the decision to suspend high cost, high risk offshore Arctic exploration is not surprising. As I have mentioned elsewhere, the notion that Saudi Arabia left the taps open to shut down North American shale oil is nonsense. The drop in prices is going to have the greatest effect on the most expensive, longest timeline oil supplies - deepwater Gulf of Mexico, deepwater offshore Brazil & Africa, Arctic (especially Russia), high cost development such as Kashagan in the Caspian Sea and the expensive oil sands in Canada. Once again, onshore North America shale oil is the "just-in-time" oil inventory management supply source and that's the stuff that is going to be tapped first as prices move up and temporarily suspended as prices move down in these volatile times. All the big, expensive projects are either dead, or dead money.

                          ConocoPhillips to exit deep-water exploration by 2017

                          Posted on October 29, 2015

                          HOUSTON — ConocoPhillips officials say the company will stop searching for oil and gas in deep-water fields by 2017, and it plans to sell the offshore leases it doesn’t intend to drill.

                          Its exit from deep-water exploration would free up roughly $800 million in capital, the amount it has budgeted for exploration next year. Plus, it will save on costs on that side of the business, Matt Fox, ConocoPhillips’ executive vice president of exploration and production, told investors on Thursday.

                          “It’s a strategic decision to exit deep-water exploration,” Fox said.

                          It is part of the company’s plan to sell $1 billion to $2 billion assets a year as it braces for lower oil prices. The Houston company has about 2.2 million acres and three recent discoveries in the Gulf of Mexico...

                          ...“We are exercising flexibility in our capital program, dramatically lowering our cost structure and divesting assets that do not compete for funding in our portfolio,” Lance said...

                          ...Its fields in the Eagle Ford Shale in South Texas and the Bakken Shale in North Dakota picked up a 10 percent increase in production while its Canadian operations bolstered output 39 percent.

                          Comment


                          • #14
                            Re: Beyond Diesel............

                            Originally posted by GRG55 View Post
                            HOUSTON — ConocoPhillips officials say the company will stop searching for oil and gas in deep-water fields by 2017, and it plans to sell the offshore leases it doesn’t intend to drill.
                            In my completely non expert opinion the other day I expressed my view that this downturn in oil prices will last several years. Apparently North American companies are thinking along the same lines. The Saudis know they have one product and will fill the pipeline, (so to speak), as long as possible.

                            Comment


                            • #15
                              Re: Beyond Diesel............

                              Originally posted by santafe2 View Post
                              In my completely non expert opinion the other day I expressed my view that this downturn in oil prices will last several years. Apparently North American companies are thinking along the same lines. The Saudis know they have one product and will fill the pipeline, (so to speak), as long as possible.
                              Yes, and no.

                              Its a bit more nuanced. The price won't stay down where it is today for very long. However, as I posted on Sept 29 on this thread, as the price of oil starts to improve it will be onshore North America unconventional assets that will fill the demand. That is where the capital will be invested, not the expensive, higher risk, longer timeline sources in the deepwater, Arctic, etc. If one is an upstream oil company one needs to be positioned where the investment opportunity and growth will be. To its credit Exxon Corporation was the first to recognize and act on this strategically years ago. ConocoPhillips' latest move is another in the steps it has been taking in this direction since 2013. Shell is playing catchup to the others.

                              Contrary to popular opinion, and the endless histrionics on the Zero Hedge site, it isn't the Saudis/OPEC that caused the drop or have any control over the price. Below a chart I included in a longer post on the subject on another thread earlier today. It speaks volumes.

                              Last edited by GRG55; November 08, 2015, 01:10 PM.

                              Comment

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