One claim frequently heard regarding extreme heat waves goes something like this: “Since this heat wave broke the previous record by 5°C, global warming can’t have much to do with it since that has been only 1°C over the 20th century”. Here we explain why we find this logic doubly flawed.One can ask two different questions about the influence of global warming on heat waves (Otto et al. 2012), and we take them in turn.1. How much hotter did global warming make this heat wave?We have some trouble with framing the question…

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An oil spill off the coast of Brazil has sparked a political firestorm in what may one day be a global production leader. The Brazilian government is throwing the books at Chevron, while the U.S. supermajor tries to dodge legal bullets. There’s no such thing as too much caution in the wake of the 2010 oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico but Brasilia might be inhibiting its own potential in an effort to send the warning that it means business offshore. Roughly 3,000 barrels of oil spilled off the coast of Rio de Janiero in November at the Chevron-operated…

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Sometimes it’s the obscure items about news reports that catch one’s eye. On 17 March a senior official of the Cameroon’s state-run National Hydrocarbons Corporation (SNH) told China’s Xinhua news agency the private Anglo-French oil and gas company Perenco subsidiary Perenco Cameroon will raise its Cameroon oil production to 50,000 barrels per day by March 2012. The increase is because of soaring production from its Baf-3 oilfield offshore in the Kribi/ Campo basin on the country’s southern Atlantic coast. The…

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When President Obama took office, regular gasoline cost $1.85 a gallon. Now its hit $4.00 per gallon in many cities, and some analysts predict it could reach $5.00 or more this summer. Filling your tank could soon slam you for $75-$90.This winter was warm. Our economy remains weak. People are driving less, in cars that get better mileage, even with mandatory 10% ethanol. Gasoline is plentiful.  Misinformed politicians and pundits say prices should be falling.  They claim our pain at the pump is due to greedy speculators and greedier oil…

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Overrun by a Touareg separatist rebellion and an increasing threat from Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), the government of Mali has been overthrown in a coup d’état by mutinous soldiers who seized the presidential palace on 21 March and installed a transitional council, promising to hand over power after new elections. On some level, this is partly fall-out from the conflict in Libya, from whence Touareg rebels who fought alongside Gaddafi returned home new empowered and emboldened. The Touareg are seeking independence for the…

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Last week looked promising for May Natural Gas following the previous week’s closing price reversal bottom, but even after a confirmation, the market could not follow-through to the upside. Early in the week, the market took out 2.468 to confirm the closing price reversal bottom at 2.306, but sellers came in at 2.502, slightly ahead of downtrending Gann angle resistance at 2.524. The inability to gather enough buying power to push through this price forced the market to turn sellers, driving natural gas lower for the week.Before getting too…

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It is well known that as part of a coordinated campaign the US and EU have pressured Iran with their sanctions to restrict any country importing Iranian crude oil. Under the sanctions law president Obama must cut off foreign financial institutions, who continue to trade with Iran’s central bank without an official exemption, from the US financial system. Exemptions are available to countries that make significant reductions the amount of Iran crude that they import before the end of June. No official figure has been released to indicate what…

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