OIL
Oil prices set for worst daily drop since April on inventories, bearish Fed
Oil & Gas 360, June 11, 2020
Oil prices slumped on Thursday, dragged down by another record build-up in U.S. crude inventories and the U.S. Federal Reserve’s projections that the world’s biggest economy would shrink 6.5% this year.
Russia charges Arctic city mayor with bungling fuel spill response
GAS
North Pole natural gas line network delayed by pandemic
Dan Bross, KUAC, June 11, 2020
The pandemic has delayed when natural gas will be available in the North Pole area.
The Interior Gas Utility has a network of distribution pipe in several neighborhoods in the community, but filling the system awaits completion of two North Pole LNG storage tanks, a project IGU General Manager Dan Britton, told a Fairbanks Economic Development Corporation energy group yesterday, has been slowed by pandemic-related issues. Primarily materials that are the building, steel, the offload skids, a couple of items like that where items like that were shut down for a period of time. Britton said the 150-thousand-gallon North Pole LNG storage facility was scheduled to be completed in September, but the date has been pushed out. “It is looking like it will likely be delayed until December first.”
MINING
Gear to protect athletes from coronavirus
Shane Lasley, MetalTechNews.Com, June 10, 2020
Graphene Composites and G-Form are teaming up to develop and distribute athletic protective equipment that not only guards the wearer against blunt trauma but also from viruses such as COVID-19. G-Form already rides on the cutting-edge of technology when it comes to manufacturing comfortable athletic protective gear. The company’s SmartFlex pads are constructed from materials that can change molecular structure on contact – soft when lightly touched, becoming harder with stronger impact.
Now this “Made in the USA” athletic gear company that embraces “the geeky science” plans to provide athletes with an extra layer of protection by treating its sports gear and apparel with a silver nanoparticle-graphene oxide ink developed by Graphene Composites that captures and kills coronavirus droplets that spread from an infected person.
POLITICS
Colorado group drops plans for anti-fracking ballot measure
Liz Hampton, Reuters, June 10, 2020
A Colorado environmental group dropped plans to place an anti-fracking measure on the state’s November ballot citing the COVID-19 pandemic, the second U.S. state initiative to be put off this year over virus worries. The group Colorado Rising had been exploring several ballot initiatives for more stringent regulations on oil and gas drilling in Colorado, the fifth-largest U.S. oil-producing state, after a 2018 effort failed. The group’s decision comes as the U.S. oil industry is scaling back drilling due to record inventories, falling demand and low oil prices amid the pandemic.
“The end of this constant cycle of divisive battles at the ballot box will bring much needed stability and predictability to our state business climate as we begin to climb out of this economic hole,” said Dan Haley, CEO of the Colorado Oil and Gas Association.