Salient to Investors: Warren Buffett said coal use in the US will continue to fall gradually as electric utilities switch to cleaner alternatives over many years, and when natural gas prices get low enough. Buffett said coal plants produce 38 percent of all US electricity. Coal accounted for 49 percent in 2007.
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: Jim Rogers writes: The oil and gas boom is not quite the boom that the press seems to think it is. Natural gas wells decline very quickly and reserves may not be what we thought. Oil wells decline at the rate of 38 to 69 percent in
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: Jim Rogers says: Natural gas fundamentals are not nearly as good as the hype. The number of rigs on the ground is down 75% over the last two years as the wells are very short-lived, and it takes an enormous amount of money to keep them up.
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: Jeremy Grantham writes: The world, in its reckless use of resources and natural systems, shows many of the indicators of potential failure that brought down many prior civilizations. However, we have two saving graces that may save us – declining fertility rates and progress in alternative energy.
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: 16 of the 29 US states requiring utilities to buy renewable energy are considering paring back those mandates after a plunge in natural gas prices. Read the full article at http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-04-23/u-s-states-turn-against-renewable-energy-as-gas-plunges.html Click here to receive free and immediate email alerts of the latest forecasts.
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: Biotech, fracking and diversity are keys to prosperity for cities. David Albouy at the University of Michigan says Austin is ‘quality of life city’. Austin could lose its crown to Houston if it is unable to take advantage of industries that are on the rise, such as biotechnology
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: Marc Nettelbeck at DZ Bank said the entire energy switch has derailed – the difficulties connecting offshore wind farms to the power grid reduces their profitability and renders the original investment calculations of utilities invalid. Marc Oliver Bettzuege at Cologne University said the offshore expansion in Germany
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: Students at more than 300 campuses, including the eight Ivy League schools, have joined fossil-fuel divestment activist group 350.org demanding that over the next 5 years universities purge their endowments of investments in 200 publicly traded companies with the largest reserves of oil, gas and coal. Scientists
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: Quest Offshore Resources estimate spending on subsea equipment to build underwater oilfields will grow 66 percent in 2013: spending on subsea trees in 2013 is expected to be more than double the amount spent in 2005, and rise another 29 percent by the end of 2017. James Crandell at
READ MORE... →Salient to Investors: Real Capital Analytics said non-US firms bought the most Houston office buildings in the past 3 years, spending 4 times more than US REITs, which ranked second. In 2012, Houston made the top five global cities surveyed by the Association of Foreign Investors in Real Estate for the first
READ MORE... →