Halliburton leaving Russia

[erikjohnson61y]

K- The economics of the e-plants is a bit different because of the inputs and products. Pipelines are the safest, cheapest, and second most NIMBY way to move most crudes and liquid products like gasoline and diesel, as well as petrochemical feedstocks. However, unlike crude oil, you can't transport corn by pipeline. Further, crude oil is concentrated in the fields like the Athabasca sands or the Permian basin or the Williston basin in North Dakota, while corn production is spread over 90 million acres. The DDG product from the e-plants also cannot be transported by pipeline, and even the ethanol itself cannot be transported by pipeline because it is hygroscopic and will pick up moisture travelling in a pipeline. Plus, the volumes of ethanol really aren't sufficient to justify pipelines anyway (20 million barrels a day of oil versus 1 million barrels a day of ethanol).  So trucks and unit trains, as you say, are the right solution for ethanol. Finally, the one thing that may be more NIMBY than a pipeline is a refinery. Everyone wants gas, but no one wants a refinery. Everyone wants electric vehicles, but no one wants a copper mine. 

You are right that the Canadians *could* build a refinery and make value-added products themselves, but they seem to prefer to export the crude product instead.

[rickgthf]

 ... allow an additional 200,000 barrels per day (800K-600K) to move south. Russia exports about 7.5 million barrels per day, typically 670,000 to the US.  We use 12 million barrels per day of gasoline & diesel alone, 20 million total so the Russians supply about 3.5% of our daily total.  I'm not sure increasing the supply by 1% will have a significant effect on available supply or price given that oil price is a world price.

  It looks to me like the Keystone issue is just a political tool to bludgeon the Biden Administration.  Besides, it literally takes half the energy contained in tar sands just to extract what oil recovered is recovered.  

[rickgthf]

Halliburton's own comments say they are leaving Russia in part because of the sanctions, and because they don't want to be seen to be supporting Putin.

Likewise, quote, "Instead, the key phenomenon hurting the Russian oil industry is what experts refer to as “self-sanctioning,” as private traders refuse to buy and sell the product even though Western sanctions were designed to allow them to continue to do so. Oil traders have said they are voluntarily turning down Russian oil in part because of the uncertainty of future Western sanctions, and in part because they do not want to be seen as providing financial support for Russia’s invasion of Ukraine."

  What is interesting are the countries that continue to buy Russian crude. Several European refineries are either locked into buying Russian crude by pipeline or are controlled by Russian companies.  Some counties & companies are rapidly transitioning away from Russian crude but it is India who has stepped up to buy Russian oil but at a steep discount (?), and of course, China & Turkey.  Even so, some estimates suggest Russian exports have dropped 3 million barrels per day.

[k-289]

So ,  refining  and  exporting  the   '' stuff  ''  at  the  Texas  Gulf   gives  US  exactly  what  ?   More  Xpert ,  shortsighted  - Just  In  Time -  logistical  nightmares ,  I'm  assuming - ? 

This  Hair  Ball ,  seems  bigger  than  the  cat  can  cough  up - - - 

[erikjohnson61y]

Rick - Actually, the Keystone XL is more about safety and efficiency. Canadian tar sands syncrude is already moving to the US, but on unit trains by Canadian Pacific and Kansas City Southern.  Just like the shale oil crude from North Dakota. The bitumen is mined near Fort McMurray, mixed with diluent so it can flow in a pipeline, and then sent down to Alberta. There, ConocoPhillips built a diluent recovery plant, and the diluent-free bitumen is loaded on to rail cars bound for Port Arthur, TX.

https://www.trains.com/trn/news-reviews/news-wire/05-cp-kcs-to-move-canadian-oil-sands-bitumen-to-te....

Rather than making the bitumen more liquid to flow it through pipelines, some people are now looking at technology that could make it into small bricks instead that could be transported in coal hopper cars. 

Commodities are by their very nature extremely sensitive to supply/demand imbalances. 1% doesn't sound like a lot, but I'm sure you've seen how the market can react to a 1% change in intended corn planted acres, up or down. One good rain in Brazil can tank a soybean rally. 1% matters (although in this case it's more about how the Canadian crude gets here, not how much). So IMO the symbolic act of cancelling a permitted project was stupid, not on the merits of whether or not Keystone XL makes a difference to our energy independence but that the "we can cancel your project on a whim whenever we want" message was received loud and clear by energy producers.

[rickgthf]

Remind me but wasn't trump's approval essentially "a symbolic act" as well?  The Obama administration's refusal to approve Keystone was based on the argument that tar sand oil is one of, if not the most carbon-intensive sources of petroleum.   Like it or not climate change due to petroleum use is a legitimate concern.  Only the climate deniers say otherwise.  Biden's canceling it merely reversed trump's ill-considered approval.

[erikjohnson61y]

Rick,

I did not mean to get into the climate side of the energy debate, just commenting on the need for affordable energy. We can agree to disagree. I also support the development of alternatives to hydrocarbons, but mainly because they are a finite resource.  We WILL run out of them some day, just not soon. In the mean time, without oil the planet can only sustain about 2 billion people. The immediate consequences of stopping oil production (mass starvation, no private jets for Hollywood Elites) FAR outweighs the immediate consequences of continued hydrocarbon use (atmospheric CO2 levels going from 0..04% to maybe 0.06%).  Adaption to whatever the CO2 consequences will be (so far WAY less than predicted) while transitioning to non-fossil fuel sources of essential energy over the next 50-100 years is the smart way to go. Anyone who says we can make the transition in less than 50 years hasn't done the math. 

BTW I like your Ukrainian flag icon.

[rickgthf]

... transportation energy is cost.  My EV "fuel" costs me 56 cents per gallon equivalent (1.25 cents per mile), I collect it using 500 sq ft of my barn roof, and my price is fixed for the next 25 years, unless some time, I get a more efficient vehicle, then it will even be less.

   The thing is Erik, my whole setup cost me less than the price of a new pickup truck, the fuel for which currently costs that pickup owner roughly  22 cents per mile.  Climate change deniers aren't just wrong, they're foolish.

[erikjohnson61y]

Again, you are conflating economic issues with climate issues. Not that they are totally unrelated, but to say "my EV is cheaper to operate than your ICE vehicle, therefore you're a climate denier" is a fallacious argument.

I have said many times here that we need to transition smartly away from fossil fuels simply because they are a finite resource and without an alternative, life it going to get bad for a whole lot of humans in a few hundred years. But again, lets do it smartly. Which almost by definition means we should keep the government out of it. I have friends in the Netherlands who tell me that their country passed a law that makes purchase of an ICE-powered vehicle illegal after 2030. I feel fairly safe in predicting that 2030 will be a banner year for ICE-powered car sales.

To me, the obvious low hanging fruit is coal for electricity generation and daily commuters for electricity consumption. Continue to ramp up wind and solar farms (with natural gas backup) to retire coal plants. That's a big step forward on the supply side of the electricity ledger. Target city dwellers that pretty much only use their cars for their daily commute (less than 200 miles/day) to replace their ICE vehicles with EV's. Couple the existing tax credits for solar with a tax credit for the EV and let them decide if they want to recharge their vehicle with solar panels like you do or take it off the grid (apartment dwellers with no space for panels, for example). 

So what kind of vehicle do you have?? Is it a commute vehicle or do you have one that can actually do work? The 2024 Chevy Silverado EV claims 400 mile range AND 10,000 pound towing capacity. I rather suspect it is more like 400 miles OR 10,000# capacity. I'd like to know how far you can actually pull a stock trailer full of cattle with that. Chevy claims that with the right charging station you can add 100miles of range in 10 minutes. That's over half an hour waiting to charge if you're on the road, and can find the right charging station, and there's not a line in front of you. Oh, and that truck is over $100K.  IMO - EV's are NOT ready to do real work yet, primarily due to battery energy density and recharge rates. But for personal transportation, there's no reason we shouldn't see a wholesale adoption of EV's.

Do you have a battery pack that you charge with your panels, or is it straight to your vehicle? I assume you also got a tax credit for putting in the solar panels, foisting part of the cost onto other taxpayers? 

Another issue to solve is your cheating. By driving an EV that you charge with your own solar panels, you are no longer paying for the construction and upkeep on the roads you drive on.  At some point in the EV transition we will have to figure out a new way to pay for the roads. I am not ready to accept your 56 cents/gallon equivalent number until we add in the cost of the government subsidy for your panels and the equivalent cost of the road taxes you're not paying. 

I have two pickup trucks - a 2001 Dodge Ram 3500 Dually and a 2005 Dodge Ram 2500, both with the Cummins 5.9 turbo diesel. I put an Edge tuner on each one, both in "towing" mode. I get 17mpg in the tonner and 21 mpg in the 3/4 ton when I'm not towing something. I pull a 30' flatbed with my backhoe on it with the tonner, and I pull an 8x14 dump trailer with the other. The 2001 has 312,000 miles on it, so it likely has another 150K miles before it is shot. The 3/4 ton only has 130,000 miles on it so it will probably outlast me. We have a winter place in Texas, and if I fill the 3/4 ton up before I leave, I can refuel once in Ardmore, OK and get to our place west of San Antonio and still have a 1/4 tank left (about 680 miles/tankful). When an EV truck can come anywhere close to being able to do all that, I'll be interested.