Politics

Macroeconomic and political uncertainty could stymie development of Argentina’s vast Vaca Muerta shale play in western Argentina, leading to a greater need for natural gas imports. “There is a lot of uncertainty because of the exchange rate, macroeconomic conditions, and fracking activity which is almost halted, not only due to the pandemic effect but because…

Argentina’s President Alberto Fernández, in a meeting with new energy secretary Darío Martínez last week, said the country needed to stimulate oil and gas production as a road to national economic development. In the presidential residence in Olivos last Thursday, Fernández echoed what he said last year during campaigning. The energy sector was key to…

President Trump is betting that, by touting deregulation and deriding his Democratic opponent as an extremist who will raise taxes and throw wrenches into oil and gas development, he will galvanize domestic energy industry support ahead of the November election. Culminating the Republican National Committee (RNC) convention Thursday night in Washington, DC, Trump claimed his…

The oil and gas industry is bracing for a possible November victory by Joseph R. Biden Jr., who is leading in the polls and who officially accepted the Democratic nomination last Thursday from Wilmington, DE. President Trump was officially nominated for a second term on Monday as the Republican convention began.  Although energy policy has…

The oil and gas industry is bracing for a possible November victory by Joseph R. Biden Jr., who is leading in the polls and who officially accepted the Democratic nomination Thursday from Wilmington, DE. Although energy policy has taken a backseat to the Covid-19 pandemic and economic hardship facing Americans, climate change has nonetheless garnered…

Recently announced rollbacks of Obama-era methane controls for the oil and gas industry appear destined for a legal and political onslaught, particularly if Joseph R. Biden Jr. is elected president. In a two-part rulemaking, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) last week rescinded the regulations enacted under the 2016 Oil and Natural Gas New Source Performance…

President Trump intends to nominate Mark Christie, the current chairman of the Virginia State Corporation Commission, and Allison Clements, the founder and president of energy policy and strategy consulting firm Goodgrid LLC, to become FERC commissioners, the White House said Monday. Christie previously was president of the Organization of PJM States Inc. and served on…

Mexico’s Comisión Reguladora de Energía (CRE) is losing its independence and failing to carry out its constitutional mandate under the current government, according to a former chairman and two former commissioners of the energy regulator. Created in 1994 under the liberalizing economic reforms of former president Carlos Salinas de Gortari, the CRE performs similar functions…

The White House’s Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) on Wednesday announced a final rule updating the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) regulations, a controversial move designed to limit reviews of proposed infrastructure projects, including natural gas and oil pipelines. The final rule would modernize environmental reviews, streamline infrastructure approvals and “reverse years of burdensome overregulation…