Peak Oil

BRUSSELS (Reuters) - The United States must take another step towards a global climate change pact when major industrialized countries meet in Japan next week, the head of the European Union's executive said on Friday. "In this G8 summit we will expect the United States to show more ambition t...

For many months, an intense debate has been waged among interest groups and politicians in Washington over the role of corn-based ethanol in higher food prices. The issue is coming to a head now, with the Environmental Protection Agency poised to decide soon whether to roll back the Renewable Fuel ...

IT’S ON US hard and fast, and it’s real. It’s been coming for 35 years, just as those bedraggled environmentalists said, but we chose to ignore it and party on. What do we do now? In the short term, say next winter and maybe many winters beyond, we’re basically on our own. What we can’t do is depen...

SEOUL (Reuters) - These days when customers walk into electronics stores, the first question they ask is how much electricity the fridge, washing machine or laptop computer they are contemplating buying consumes. "Energy savings were not exactly a hot topic among customers last year," sai...

PARIS (Reuters) - European Union energy chiefs considered an accord with Brazil over biofuels on Saturday at the end of a three day meeting in Paris during which they backed away from the EU's controversial biofuels target. Though no concrete changes were made to proposed biofuel legislation, minis...

With gasoline prices high and rising, a new financial milestone has arrived: the $100 tank of gas....

ALBANY, N.Y. - Even as more Americans look to shrink their carbon footprints, relatively few have switched to providers of electricity generated by wind, water and sun. "Green power" programs allow consumers to purchase renewable energy, usually at a premium, without having to go through ...

Remembered more for his apocalyptic pessimism than his economics, 18th-century parson and thinker Thomas Malthus reasoned that too many people and too little food would eventually lead to rampant starvation. It didn't. Two hundred years later, the same rigid law of supply and demand is being applied...

Anthony Squires knows exactly what he wants to do. Squires, 18, attends San Diego City College. He wants to transfer to the University of San Diego. He wants to study medicine. More immediately, though, he wants to volunteer at a hospital so he can start preparing for a future in medicine. But he ...

...Over the last 25 years, opportunities to head off the current crisis were ignored, missed or deliberately blocked, according to analysts, politicians and veterans of the oil and automobile industries. What’s more, for all the surprise at just how high oil prices have climbed, and fears for the fu...

Maine doesn’t have reserves of oil or gas, but that doesn’t mean steps can’t be taken to reduce residents’ heating bills. Environment Northeast, an advocacy group in New England and eastern Canada, has proposed a national efficiency program to reduce heating oil usage. Such programs exist for electr...

Pakistan's textile industry, its biggest source of exports and manufacturing employer, could collapse under the double blow of surging fuel prices and chronic power cuts, industry officials say. Textiles accounts for about 70 per cent of Pakistan's exports and the sector contributed 8.5 per cent t...

Inflation, and not the credit crunch, is the biggest economic concern worldwide, especially in developing countries, US Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson said in an interview Thursday. Speaking to the BBC on a visit to London, Paulson also said the comparison of the current economic climate in the ...

Kazakhstan, which already transports oil through Russia, Azerbaijan and Iran, gives a preference to the last one as an alternative route for deliveries to Europe, a Kazakh diplomat said. Kazakhstan's ambassador to Azerbaijan Serik Primbetov said during a press conference today that alternative and...

The European Union and Russia said Friday they would discuss all aspects of energy cooperation — including access to energy markets — during negotiations on broader political and economic ties. But neither side committed to a deadline for a new cooperation deal that would replace the existing 1997...

Nigeria's subsidiary of oil major Shell has recruit 4,000 people to help protect its network of oil pipelines in the country's oil producing Niger Delta region, company officials said. The manager of pipeline operations in the Shell Petroleum Development Corporation (SPDC), Mr. Godwin Idoko, said t...

Ministers are in talks with supermarkets about emergency food reserves in case fuel protests lead to shortages at shops. The government wants to ensure retailers and suppliers can continue to sell basics such as meat, bread and milk if hauliers bring the country to a halt. They have asked superm...

Truck operators in Germany are planning to follow the transport industry in other countries, demonstrating for government relief from soaring fuel prices, an industry leader said Saturday. Separately, a market-research company said 51,000 medium-sized German companies were close to failure because...

The fish in Lake Erie are having an easier time of it this summer. The fishermen aren't, thanks to fuel prices rising faster than the proverbial creek emptying into the lake after a summer storm. "Yep," agreed Bucyrian Rick Bauer, an avid angler who frequents Ohio's North Coast in search ...

For those who don’t have enough cash to shell out for a new car, buying a second-hand unit is the most appropriate choice. Given the skyrocketing prices of fuel, units that have low-displacement gasoline engines and diesel-run cars, stand out as the most saleable. Second-hand car buyers simply wan...