Miscellaneous
Oil jumps 4% on weaker dollar after seven days of losseshttps://www.cnbc.com/2021/08/23/oil-markets-covid-dollar.htmlCrude Oil Surges; Rebounding After Torrid Weekhttps://finance.yahoo.com/news/crude-oil-surges-rebounding-torrid-092802254.html- Can oil really hit $80 by the end of the year?- Last week's selloff was overdone, so oil is rebounding now.- Plenty of reasons to see demand suffering due to coronavirus- Sentiment is a real thing with the oil market. Perception of how coronavirus will impact demand has a real impact.California's clean grid may lean on oil, gas to avoid summer blackoutshttps://www.reuters.com/business/energy/californias-clean-grid-may-lean-oil-gas-avoid-summer-blackouts-2021-08-11/- Irony of building "temporary" natural gas plants to keep the lights on in California, which claims to have a "clean" grid- could the governor recall impactUS nears proposal of biofuel targets for 2021-22https://www.argusmedia.com/en/news/2246546-us-nears-proposal-of-biofuel-targets-for-202122- biofuel mandates could be lowered for 2021 and 2022- is the RFS really worthwhile at this point?Hydrogen lobbyist quits, slams oil companies’ “false claims” about blue hydrogenhttps://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2021/08/ex-lobbyist-slams-blue-hydrogen-says-it-would-lock-in-fossil-fuel-dependence/- Blue hydrogen is only less carbon intensive if carbon is captured at every step of the way, and that is unlikely.- just because you don't see the pollution at the end result doesn't mean its not a carbon intensive processCarbon taxes could hurt Russia more than sanctions, says oil tsarhttps://www.reuters.com/business/energy/carbon-taxes-could-hurt-russia-more-than-sanctions-says-oil-tsar-kommersant-2021-08-23/- border adjustment taxes for carbon on aluminum, iron ore, pipes, electricity, cement could have major impact on Russian exports.Nord Stream 2: Russia must not use gas pipeline as weapon, says Merkelhttps://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-58301099- Is the concern over Russia's threat to the EU overblown? Is Europe really afraid of Russia?- Is it mostly a Ukrainian-Russian issue and western Europe isn't concerned?- If the EU is confident about doing businesses with Russia to the extent that they are willing to rely on Russia for 40% of their natural gas, then why is the US afraid of Russia?