OPEC says IEA should be ‘very careful’ about discouraging oil investments
OPEC Secretary General Haitham Al Ghais said finger-pointing and misrepresenting the actions of OPEC and OPEC+ was “counterproductive.”
Anton Petrus | Moment | Getty Images
Oil producer group OPEC on Thursday lashed out at the International Energy Agency, saying the world’s leading energy authority should be “very careful” about undermining industry investments.
OPEC Secretary General Haitham al-Ghais said finger-pointing and misrepresenting the actions of OPEC and OPEC+ was “counterproductive.” He added that the influential group of 23 oil-exporting exporting nations was not targeting oil prices, but instead focusing on market fundamentals.
OPEC said that its comments came in response to fresh criticism from the IEA, without providing further details.
In a Bloomberg TV interview on Wednesday, IEA Executive Director Fatih Birol used similar language in warning OPEC about boosting oil prices.
Birol said that the energy alliance, led by Saudi Arabia, should be “very careful” with its production policy, warning that the group’s short-term and medium-term interests appeared to be contradictory. He added that higher crude prices and upward inflationary pressures would result in a weaker global economy, with low-income nations likely to be disproportionately affected.
“The IEA knows very well that there are a confluence of factors that impact markets. The knock-on effects of COVID-19, monetary policies, stock movements, algorithm trading, commodity trading advisors and SPR releases (coordinated or uncoordinated), geopolitics, to name a few,” Al-Ghais said.
Blaming oil for higher inflation was “erroneous and technically incorrect as there are many other factors causing inflation,” he added.
Surprise output cuts
Earlier this month, the Paris-based energy agency said surprise oil output cuts from OPEC+ risked exacerbating a projected supply deficit and could scupper an economic recovery.
Several OPEC+ members announced on April 2 that they were set to tighten global production by an additional 1.16 million barrels per day until the end of the year.
The decision, which the White House criticized, was said to have been made as part of an independent initiative unlinked to broader OPEC+ policy.
The cuts add to Russia’s existing plans to trim 500,000 barrels per day of its production from March until at least the end of the year. It means the combined voluntary cuts of OPEC+ members will be in excess of 1.6 million barrels per day.
“Other energy markets have been far more volatile,” al-Ghais said, “with oil markets less so, mainly due to the stabilizing role of OPEC and the OPEC+ group.”
“If anything will lead to future volatility” he added, “it is the IEA’s repeated calls to stop investing in oil, knowing that all data-driven outlooks envisage the need for more of this precious commodity to fuel global economic growth and prosperity in the decades to come, especially in the developing world.”
Fraught relationship
The relationship between OPEC and the IEA has been increasingly fraught in recent years, with Birol repeatedly criticizing the pace at which the producers’ alliance increased its output rates, as it unwound the drastic production cuts it implemented in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic. The IEA’s condemnations aligned with views held by some consumer nations — most vocally the U.S. — that stressed the strain of high energy prices on consumer households.
The IEA had served as one of the so-called secondary sources whose production data the OPEC+ group used to benchmark the internal compliance rate of its members with their respective output obligations. OPEC removed the IEA as a secondary source in March last year, with OPEC+ delegates at the time citing concerns over the accuracy of IEA production estimates.
In a February interview with Energy Aspects, Saudi Arabia oil minister and OPEC+ chair, Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman, faulted the IEA’s initial predictions of a 3 million barrels per day loss of Russian crude and oil products for a U.S. decision to release volumes from its Strategic Petroleum Reserve.
“Fairly and squarely, the IEA was responsible for it. Because of the, you know, screaming and scaring that they have done, on how much Russia will lose in terms of its production,” he said.
OPEC and the IEA have also diverged in their approach to global decarbonization. The IEA has repeatedly said the pathway to net-zero emissions requires massive declines in the use of oil, gas and coal and warned in a landmark report in 2021 that there is no place for new fossil fuel projects if the world is to stave off the worst of what the climate crisis has in store. The IEA declined to respond to the OPEC secretary’s comments on Thursday.
The burning of fossil fuels is the chief driver of the climate emergency.
By contrast, OPEC+ ministers and officials have repeatedly championed a strategy of dual investment in hydrocarbon and renewable projects, to avoid energy shortages while green resources are insufficient to fully meet consumer demand worldwide.
— CNBC’s Ruxandra Iordache contributed to this report.
As “extreme” weather events become more commonplace, the demand for reliable and portable energy continues to rise. In response to that growing demand for dependable off-grid power, Volvo has developed the new PU500 Battery Energy Storage System (BESS) designed to take electrical power when it’s needed most.
Designed to be deployable in a number of environments at a moment’s notice, the Volvo Energy PU500 BESS is equipped with approximately 500 kWh of usable battery capacity (up to 540 kWh total). More than enough juice, in other words, to power a remote construction site, disaster response effort, or even a music festival – anything that needs access to reliable electricity beyond a grid connection.
That’s great, but what sets the PU500 apart from other battery storage solutions is its integrated 240 kW DC fast charger.
“With an integrated CCS2 charger, the PU500 is designed to work with all brands of electric equipment, trucks, and passenger cars,” says Niklas Thulin, Head of BESS Product Offer at Volvo Energy. “This ensures that no matter what type of electric vehicle or machinery you rely on, the PU500 can provide the power you need, making it a truly flexible solution for any grid constrained site or location.”
The integrated charger in the PU500 has the impressive ability to charge a heavy equipment asset (be that an electric semi truck or something like a wheel loader) in under two hours. Its on-board capacity allows to fully recharge up to 3 electric HD trucks or 20 electric cars per day, making it an incredibly versatile disaster response asset.
Electrek’s Take
As we often say over at The Heavy Equipment Podcast, “just because you’re working for the power company doesn’t mean you have power,” and there are hundreds of scenarios where the extra power provided by something like the new PU500 would be useful. Its ability to be palletized and easily moved or swapped out of a larger BESS array, too, just add to its flexibility.
SOURCE | IMAGES: Volvo.
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In a bold bid to combat the crippling air pollution crisis in its capital, Delhi, Indian lawmakers have begun high-level discussions about a plan to phase out gas and diesel combustion vehicles by 2035 – a move that could cause a seismic shift in the global EV space and provide a cleaner, greener future for India’s capital.
Long considered one of the world’s most polluted capital cities, Indian capital Delhi is taking drastic steps to cut back pollution with a gas and diesel engine ban coming soon – but they want results faster than that. As such, Delhi is starting with a city-wide ban on refueling vehicles more than 15 years old, and it went into effect earlier this week. (!)
“We are installing gadgets at petrol pumps which will identify vehicles older than 15 years, and no fuel will be provided to them,” said Delhi Environment Minister Manjinder Singh Sirsa … but they’re not stopping there. “Additionally, we will intensify scrutiny of heavy vehicles entering Delhi to ensure they meet prescribed environmental standards before being allowed entry.”
Making it prohibitively difficult for Dehli’s residents to own and operate older, presumably more polluting vehicles is one way to reduce harmful emissions and air pollution, but Sirsa’s team isn’t just targeting newer vehicles. They’re also planning to deploy more than 900 electric transit buses, part of a larger plan to replace 5,000 of the city’s 7,500 total bus with lower- or zero-emission options this year alone.
The Economic Times is reporting that discussions are underway to pass laws requiring that all future bus purchases will be required to be electric or “clean fuel” (read: CNG or hydrogen) by the end of this year, with a gas/diesel ban on “three-wheelers and light goods vehicles,” (commercial tuk-tuks and delivery mopeds) potentially coming 2026 to 2027 and a similar ban privately owned and operated cars and bikes coming “between 2030 and 2035.”
Electrek’s Take
After a Chinese government study linked air pollution caused by automotive exhausts and coal-fired power plants to more than 1.1 million deaths per year in 2013, the nation’s government took serious action, shuttering older coal plants and imposing strict emissions standards. The country also incentivized EV adoption through license-plate lotteries favoring electric cars and a nationwide EV mandate set to kick in by 2030.
The results were astounding, and the technological innovations that have come from an entire nation of talented engineers all “pulling in the same direction” have put the West to shame, with Western auto executives repeatedly sounding the alarm and lobbying for tariffs and other protectionist policies on both sides of the Atlantic.
To see India make move towards a gas and diesel ban like this, and on such an aggressive timeline, can only mean that they’ve been paying attention … and America is about to fall even further behind.
SOURCE: India Times; featured image by Sumita Roy Dutta.
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Last week, Parker Hannifin launched what they’re calling the industry’s first certified Mobile Electrification Technology Center to train mobile equipment technicians make the transition from conventional diesel engines to modern electric motors.
The electrification of mobile equipment is opening new doors for construction and engineering companies working in indoor, environmentally sensitive, or noise-regulated urban environments – but it also poses a new set of challenges that, while they mirror some of the challenges internal combustion faced a century ago, aren’t yet fully solved. These go beyond just getting energy to the equipment assets’ batteries, and include the integration of hydraulic implements, electronic controls, and the myriad of upfit accessories that have been developed over the last five decades to operate on 12V power.
At the same time, manufacturers and dealers have to ensure the safety of their technicians, which includes providing comprehensive training on the intricacies of high-voltage electric vehicle repair and maintenance – and that’s where Parker’s new mobile equipment training program comes in, helping to accelerate the shift to EVs.
“We are excited to partner with these outstanding distributors at a higher level. Their commitment to designing innovative mobile electrification systems aligns perfectly with our vision to empower machine manufacturers in reducing their environmental footprint while enhancing operational efficiency,” explains Mark Schoessler, VP of sales for Parker’s Motion Systems Group. “Their expertise in designing mobile electrification systems and their capability to deliver integrated solutions will help to maximize the impact of Parker’s expanding METC network.”
The manufacturing equipment experts at Nott Company were among the first to go through the Parker Hannifin training program, certifying their technicians on Parker’s electric motors, drives, coolers, controllers and control systems.
“We are proud to be recognized for our unwavering dedication to advancing mobile electrification technologies and delivering cutting-edge solutions,” says Nott CEO, Markus Rauchhaus. “This milestone would not have been possible without our incredible partners, customers and the team at Nott Company.”
In addition to Nott, two other North American distributors (Depatie Fluid Power in Portage, Michigan, and Hydradyne in Fort Worth, Texas) have completed the Parker certification.
Electrek’s Take
With the rise of electric equipment assets like Bobcat’s T7X compact track loader and E10e electric excavator that eliminate traditional hydraulics and rely on high-voltage battery systems, specialized electrical systems training is becoming increasingly important. Seasoned, steady hands with decades of diesel and hydraulic systems experience are obsolete, and they’ll need to learn new skills to stay relevant.
Certification programs like Parker’s are working to bridge that skills gap, equipping technicians with the skills to maximize performance while mitigating risks associated with high-voltage systems. Here’s hoping more of these start popping up sooner than later.
SOURCE | IMAGES: Parker Hannifin.
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