By Timothy S. Snyder, Matador Economics
In market trends and policy developments, the Global Energy Monitor (GEM) indicates coal powered energy production is growing wildly, as “Asia’s largest economies have three times more coal-fired capacity under construction than gas-fired capacity” according to Alex Kimani in Oilprice.com.
The GEM report also posts that across 10 of Asia’s largest economies, there is just over 1 million megawatts of new power generation, with only 7% of that number coming from natural gas. Is this a trend or just an anomaly?
This is just more of the all-of-the-above approach to power generation and it is focused on the true cost of construction and power generation, and the markets will determine this for each of the economies identified. It appears the single “renewable source approach” has been replaced.
In a related story, while India’s consumption of Russian crude oil has dropped to a two-year low, China’s Russian oil imports are growing again. Once again, single source energy is replaced with traditional alternatives. This is worth watching.
Not surprisingly, OPEC+ is discussing the possibility of not ramping-up their crude oil production, as the threat of U.S. tariffs has market share realities up in the air.
According to a Julieanne Geiger report in Oilprice.com, “OPEC+ is still weighing its Q2 oil production plans, according to eight OPEC+ sources who spoke to Reuters this week—with Trump-incited complications creating an uncertain future for oil market balance.” This is a good development for world energy competition & share balance.
Markets liked this morning’s Personal Consumption Expenditures numbers, even if they only met expectations. Crypto is still taking it on the chin. Personal income was as expected, but personal spending came in -0.5% on expectations of +0.1%.
U.S. winter weather
Harsh cold front is pushing strong winds from Montana to Kentucky and will bring snow this weekend all the way to the Northeast. In the South Central U.S. (DFW-Little Rock) thunderstorms will kick up as March “comes in like a lion.”
More energy commentary is available at www.matadoreconomics.com
