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ENB Pub Note: George McMillan, an ENB news contributor on energy and geopolitical topics, wrote this article. You can find my interviews with George on his landing page here: https://energynewsbeat.co/george-mcmillian/. He has an interesting view on the next steps President Trump needs to take in ending the Russian/Ukraine war. George and I will be recording another podcast this week to cover the next steps in the peace talks. This impacts energy on a global level. 

George McMillan, Copyright © February 23, 2025/March 27, 2025

Foreword—to the “Why the Rubio Ceasefire Plan is DOA” Series of Papers that Supercedes the Kellogg Series

The rationale of the “Russian Natural Gas and Global Geopolitical Realignment” series of papers that placed the role of affordable Russian natural gas delivered via pipeline into Ambassador George Kennan’s “industrial power center” framework described in his “long telegram of 1946” and his famous “X” article in Foreign Affairs in 1947 was originally posted on Energy News Beat beginning on December 10, 2023.

The “Why the Kellogg Plan is/was DOA” series of papers and videos derived from a series of slide sets and videos regarding “The Role of Energy in the Kennan Five Industrial Power Center Strategies” and a series of “Sea Power versus Land Power Grand Strategy” slide sets and videos recorded on various small high informational-low production value YouTube channels arising from the February 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine.

By the sheer volume of television generals and cable news anchors that routinely parrot the Bill Kristol and Kagan family narrative that the “Russian invasion of Ukraine was unprovoked, illegal and unjustified for the purpose of expanding the Russian empire” one can tell that none of the television generals know anything about 1) the Sea Power versus Land Power Grand Strategies; nor 2) the role that trading blocs play in the superpower, major power vassal state hierarchies that define superpower status; nor 3) the role that energy plays in integrated geoeconomic-geopolitical-unrestricted warfare targeting package strategies.

The Russiagate, Russian Collusion, and Russia Invaded For No Reason Hoax Trilogy 

Since Frederick Kagan’s interview with Jordan Peterson on March 1, 2022, the Western television generals and news anchors have taken up the “Russians invaded Ukraine for no reason” hoax just as they did the “Russiagate” hoax and the “Russian Collusion” hoax.

In retrospect, the “Russia invaded for no reason” hoax narrative seems to have been advanced by General Jack Keane on Fox News and David Petraeus on CNN and other cable news programs. Both Keane and Petraeus are on the Board of Directors of the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) founded by Robert Kagan, Bill Kristol, John Bolton, and David Petraeus.

The short story here is that the Brzezinski/Wolfowitz/RAND 2019 strategic plans of encircling the Russian and Belarus borders with the European Union trading bloc’s tariff and non-tariff trading barriers to restrict virtually all Russian trade from entering Europe have succeeded.

However, the plan intended that the Russian Federation would collapse economically and politically into numerous separate oblasts, which would then expand the West’s superpower, major power vassal state hierarchy throughout Eurasia. This has failed as Russia and China formed an overland logistical supply route counterstrategy instead, yielding the result that the Brzezinski/Wolfowitz/RAND 2019 is bankrupting and disintegrating the Western alliance system instead.

Compounding the problem is that Europe in general, and Germany in particular, has created an energy calamity in Europe all of its own making and there is no reason for President Trump to let the American economy parallel the “strange death of Europe” with “the strange death of America” to borrow the phrasing of Douglas Murray’s 2017 book.

In this context, the “Russia invaded for no reason hoax” was developed as a false cover-for-action narrative to conceal the Brzezinski/Wolfowtiz/RAND 2019 strategic plans to break apart Russia into independent oblasts and then integrate the petroleum and mineral-rich lands into the superpower, major power vassal state hierarchy system that will be explained systematically in this series of papers.

The Overview of Energy and Geopolitical Realignment

The current energy crisis reality stems from the Greens shutting down the coal-fired energy plants and the nuclear energy plants in Germany and the Groningen natural gas field in the Netherlands, as the neoconservatives and neoliberals were weening themselves from Russian natural gas via pipeline across Europe, followed by the Baltic states unilaterally removing themselves from the Russian electrical grid more recently.

Another little-known reality is that the purpose of moving the EU Eastward to the Russian and Belarussian borders to was erect tariff and non-tariff barriers to stop all Russian trade to Europe including energy. The EU has been successful in this endeavor and has created the conditions under which “all Putin has to do is nothing” but let the European and British economies continue their respective downward spirals.

Throughout this multiyear process from the COVID-19 lockdown period that broke logistical and manufacturing supply chains that preceded the present energy price crisis in Europe, the German industry has been declining for multiple reasons, but cannot stay in business as Europe switches from reliable fossil fuels to unproven renewable energy forms.

The automotive industries are collapsing across Europe due to several longstanding inefficiencies and the rising energy costs seem to be the final nail in their collective coffins. They were becoming less competitive globally over the last two decades, but the movement of the EU Eastward to cut off all trade with Russia to thwart a natural gas and oil-funded export-led growth and economic modernization strategy, as the means of breaking apart Russia into separate oblasts, is proving to be a disastrous foreign policy.

The first problem is that far too few people outside of the energy and geopolitical space are aware of the geoeconomic, geopolitical, and unrestricted warfare strategies to redirect Western foreign policy away from a policy that is backfiring. The second problem is that too few people are even aware that this is the policy so they cannot recognize that a policy has backfired because they don’t realize that the policy existed in the first place.

The Kellogg Plan is DOA and so is the Rubio Cease-Fire Plan

The television generals and news anchors have fallen for a series of Russia hoaxes that are becoming increasingly absurd for the reasons explicated in the series of “Why the Rubio Ceasefire is DOA” series of papers and parallel Sea Power vs Land Power slide sets. Since Kellogg has been sidelined the series of papers had to be renamed, but the underlying causation has not changed at all.

There is simply no reason for President Trump to go along with the “Russia invaded for no reason” hoax since he has already been the target of the “Russiagate” and “Russian Collusion” hoaxes. One would think that Keith Kellogg would have advised against that, but he didn’t understand the fundamental aspects of the Sea Power versus Land Power Grand Strategies so he never realized that the Brzezinski/Wolfowitz/RAND 2019 policies were implemented in the first place, so he never realized that the Russia invaded Ukraine for no reason hoax” was a false cover-for-action narrative in the second place.

Kellogg was sidelined only after the Trump administration realized that Putin and his staff were in no hurry to meet with Donald Trump or any Western leader. The reason is obvious, since the EU moved Eastward and restricted all Russian trade to Europe, Russia has no business with the West and hence no reason to discuss anything further.

Putin and Xi Jinping’s best option is to “do nothing” and watch the European economies collapse as a consequence of their own logically incoherent foreign and domestic policies implemented by the neoconservatives, neoliberals, and the Greens.

President Trump is contending with the same Western coalition of neoconservatives, neoliberals, and Greens domestically as well as in the UK and European Union. His best option is to extract the United States from the Brzezinski/Wolfowitz/RAND 2019 disaster in Eastern Europe and expose the “Russia invaded for no reason” hoax of the ISW instead.

Part 7: Foreword to “Kellogg Plan is DOA” series of papers—the main talking point

Part 6: Why the Kellogg Plan is DOA Part 6: Keith Kellogg Mistook the Mission to End the War in Ukraine Instead of Ending the Globalists

Part 5: Keith Kellogg Understood Neither the Role of Energy in Geopolitics Nor the Role of Trading Blocs in Geopolitics.

Part 4: Keith Kellogg Had a Layman’s Understanding of the Wolfowitz Proxy War with Russia in Ukraine – All Putin has to do is nothing

Part 3: Understanding the Catastrophic Downside Risk of the Kellogg Plan and Exploring Alternatives

Part 2: Why Keith Kellogg’s Plan is DOA: Shifting the Global Political Center of Gravity Part 2

Part 1: Why Keith Kellogg’s Plan is DOA: Avoiding the Catastrophic Downside Risk of Russo-Ukraine Negotiations

George McMillan Articles and Interviews: https://energynewsbeat.co/george-mcmillian/

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Energy News Beat

U.S. refineries produced a record-high share of jet fuel in 2024, reflecting increased demand relative to other transportation fuels.

Motor gasoline, distillate fuel oil, and jet fuel make up more than 85% of U.S. refinery output, with gasoline making up the largest share and distillate fuel oil making up the second largest. Refiners can shift yields among those three products in response to market conditions but are limited by refinery configuration, crude oil inputs grades, and the high costs of modifying refinery infrastructure. Refinery yields reflect the volumetric ratio of a finished product to a refinery’s combined net inputs of crude oil and unfinished oils. Changes in U.S. refinery yields reflect both changes at individual refineries and shifts in the U.S. refining fleet due to refinery openings and closures.

Changes in demand are an important factor driving changes in refinery yields. Increased air travel, measured by both TSA passenger volume and flight departures, has increased U.S. jet fuel consumption every year following the steep decline in 2020. Although jet fuel consumption has not yet recovered to its pre-pandemic 2019 volumes because of efficiency gains and changing flight patterns, among other factors, we expect jet fuel consumption will reach a record high in 2026, based on our March Short-Term Energy Outlook.

As the U.S. refinery fleet shifted operations toward increased jet fuel production, the U.S. refinery yield for motor gasoline decreased to its lowest share since 2015, the refinery yield for distillate fuel oil was about flat, and the refinery yield for residual fuel oil increased slightly from the previous year.

Principal contributor: Jimmy Troderman

EIA

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Energy News Beat

• BP, Shell, Exxon, and Chevron are boosting fossil fuel investments after disappointing returns on green energy ventures.
• BP is increasing oil and gas spending by 25% and Shell is prioritizing LNG growth.
• U.S. supermajors stayed the course and are now outperforming.

Ever since BP admitted that its attempt to go green had ended in a disaster, the flow of news from the energy industry has been in one single direction: back to oil and gas, which make money. Indeed, Big Oil has finally accepted it will not transform into Big Green Power and has gone back to what it does best: hydrocarbons.

In late February, when it made its very unsurprising admission, BP said it would boost spending on oil and gas production by 25% annually while slashing investments in transition-related business by 70%. The new strategy did not come easily to BP’s leadership, by the way. It came as the result of a pressure campaign from activist investor Elliot Management, which called BP out on its unrealistic expectations from the transition gamble.

As part of turnaround plans, the supermajor eyes launching an impressive 27 new oil and gas projects over the next five years, the FT reported in an overview of the company’s midterm strategy, noting, however, that even with these projects, BP’s 2030 oil and gas production will be slightly lower than its 2019 production—per plans. The important bit, however, is that it will not be reducing this production as it previously intended to do amid its green pivot.

Now, while BP has made no special mention of natural gas as a focus for its strategy, the overall shift in targets to refocus on the core business speaks volumes, and these volumes are not in favor of switching from hydrocarbons to electricity. The supermajor just announced the final investment decision on a Trinidad and Tobago gas project, due to start producing in two years with a peak output of 62,000 barrels of oil equivalent daily. It also got an approval from the Iraqi government to start the development of two oil fields in the north. BP is very much back.

Meanwhile, Shell is acting like it never left. Another troubled European supermajor, the Anglo-Dutch company has had a less winding path to the realization that any massive bets on an energy transition from hydrocarbons to the weather are high-risk. Shell was ordered by a court to cut its oil and gas production to reduce emissions, but it got lucky with its appeal, and the second court struck down that order right about the time it was becoming clear investments in wind and solar were not living up to expectations.

Now, Shell is focusing on gas. The company recently updated its immediate plans, reducing its spending target for the next three years and prioritizing natural gas. Between 2025 and 2028, the supermajor plans to spend between $20 and $22 billion, which is down from a 2023 annual spending plan of between $22 and 25 billion per year. For its production targets, Shell is eyeing a 4-5% increase in annual LNG sales in the years until 2030.

Despite this return to business as usual—which the U.S. supermajors never departed from—some commentators continue to argue that the days of the oil and gas industry are numbered. Despite mounting evidence to the contrary, arguments are being put forward that the energy transition is “unstoppable”, that it is successfully displacing oil and gas, and that the traditional energy business is doomed, despite the right short-term outlook. In this context, “short term” actually refers to at least two decades.

In truth, the fact that Exxon, Chevron, and the rest of the big U.S. oil and gas players have been consistently outperforming their European peers is evidence enough that the above arguments are questionable, to put it mildly. The supermajors that continued to focus on their core business while making some concessions to the transition camp but without overexerting themselves financially have done a lot better than the green pivoters in Europe.

Exxon is planning to boost its oil and gas production by 18% over the next five years—to which end it will increase spending, defying the argument that Big Oil is cutting spending because it knows oil is doomed. Chevron is in the process of buying Hess Corp. and its prolific assets in Guyana, and it just started a major expansion at the Tengiz field in Kazakhstan that will add 260,000 bpd to the mammoth field’s production. American Big Oil does not seem to be buying the peak oil scare.

Neither does the company that may be the one exception to the rule that the transition doesn’t work for Big Oil. TotalEnergies has been an enthusiastic adopter of a diversification away from oil and gas, and into low-carbon electricity. However, while doing this, the French supermajor has somehow managed to keep focused on its core business. In a recent update, TotalEnergies boasted substantial emission reductions while booking the highest return on average capital employed among its peers, at 14.8%. As luck and reality would have it, TotalEnergies’ EACOP project in Uganda just got the first tranche of much-needed financing. Peak oil is still not on the horizon if the biggest in the business and their plans are any indication.

By Irina Slav for Oilprice.com

Is Oil and Gas An Investment for You?

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Wolf Richter with Adam Taggart on Thoughtful Money.

Recorded on March 20.

Here is one of my articles, published on March 14, that discusses in detail what I talked about in the interview… “We’re focused on the real economy,” Bessent said. “Ouch,” stocks said. Where did the Trump put go? Read: Will Economic Detox Lead to a Recession? Maybe Not. But a Long Deep Stock Market Rout Will (See Dotcom Bust)

Enjoy reading WOLF STREET and want to support it? You can donate. I appreciate it immensely. Click on the mug to find out how:

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• President Trump is using the threat of tariffs to pressure countries to increase their imports of U.S. LNG.
• Several countries, particularly in Asia, are responding by pursuing new LNG deals with the U.S. to avoid trade penalties.
• While some nations are complying, others, like the EU, are exploring diversifying their LNG sources to enhance energy security.

During his first two months in office. U.S. President Trump has made several threats to impose tariffs on trade partners who do not purchase more U.S.-made products. One of Trump’s main focuses is energy. As the U.S. produces record levels of liquified natural gas (LNG), Trump is hoping to boost exports of the energy source. While some countries are searching for alternative trade partners to improve their energy security, some governments are responding to Trump’s calls by increasing their U.S. LNG imports.

President Trump has been bold in his calls for countries worldwide to purchase more U.S.-produced energy or face his wrath. In January, he said that the European Union should purchase more LNG from the U.S. to avoid the imposition of tariffs. “The one thing they can do quickly is buy our oil and gas,” Trump told media sources. “We will straighten that out with tariffs, or they have to buy our oil and gas,” he added. This is a sentiment he has reiterated to several countries.

On his first day in office, Trump removed a pause on new LNG export terminal construction, which was implemented by the Biden administration, to increase gas production and export. The U.S. has become the biggest global exporter of LNG, driven largely by a rise in demand in Europe following the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine and subsequent sanctions on Russian energy products. U.S. LNG exports to Europe averaged 25 million tonnes a year before 2022, while they totaled 55 million tonnes in both 2022 and 2023. Trump’s moves support a production growth of nearly 100 million metric tonnes a year of additional LNG by 2031.

This month, Trump signed an executive order stating that from 2nd April, the White House will impose 25 percent tariffs on all goods imported into the U.S. from any country that imports Venezuelan oil, either directly or indirectly through third parties. Restrictions on the import of energy from other countries could also put pressure on governments to increase the share of energy imports coming from the U.S.

Governments worldwide are already responding to Trump’s calls. At an annual energy industry conference in Houston in early March, energy executives said that companies from around the globe are looking to buy more U.S.-produced LNG in response to trade pressure from President Trump.

The CEO of Australia’s Woodside Energy, Meg O’Neill said that countries with a trade imbalance with the U.S. are “all asking themselves, ‘What can we do to try to level the playing field?’” O’Neill added they are making deals now mainly “so their government can say, ‘We’re taking action. We hear you, Mr. President.’” This view was echoed by other industry leaders.

This month, companies in Japan, Taiwan, and South Korea revived a $44 billion gas project in Alaska that was long thought impossible. The project would include the development of a massive gas terminal in Alaska to export LNG to Asia. Earlier this month, Alaska Governor Mike Dunleavy said that Alaska LNG could begin exports by 2030.

At least six Asian countries have shown interest in buying more LNG from the U.S. to boost their trade ties and avoid tariffs, including India, Bangladesh, and Vietnam.

South Africa has also stated its intention to expand the drilling rights of U.S. companies in its waters in response to Trump’s decision to freeze aid to the country. Ukraine also signaled plans to purchase more American gas.

Europe has already increased its import of U.S.-produced LNG since 2022, as it moved away from a dependence on Russian gas to alternative supplies. Russia contributed around 40 percent of the EU’s gas imports in 2021, a figure that fell to less than 10 percent in 2023. Meanwhile, in December, half of the 10.89 million tonnes imported by the EU came from the U.S., and, in January, almost nine out of every 10 cargoes from the U.S. were destined for Europe.

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Energy News Beat

In Europe, firms face lawsuits for not being green enough, while in the U.S., banks and asset managers are sued for pushing climate goals too hard.

​The biggest bank in the Netherlands is being sued for not taking strong enough action to tackle climate change, it was told on Friday, as corporate environmental strategies increasingly become a hotbed for legal action. [emphasis, links added]

ING joins a list of companies and other organizations that have been sued for not doing enough to tackle climate change in Europe and the U.K.

On the flip side, companies and nonprofits in the U.S. have been sued for focusing too aggressively on commitments to combat climate change, with some facing costly pushback in courts.

The bank, which is being sued by Dutch environmental group Milieudefensie [translation: Environmental Defense], has been one of the biggest players in the financing of commodities projects, including those related to fossil fuels. ‘

Milieudefensie says that as ING is one of the world’s largest banks, it bears responsibility for the impact its investments have on the climate.

ING said that Milieudefensie’s claims were “unrealistic and unreasonable,” adding that it was confident in its climate approach. “We share the concern about the climate but differ in opinion on what action that requires,” it said in a statement.

The suit follows a trial in the Netherlands in 2021 that found oil giant Shell has a responsibility to combat climate change. That litigation was also brought by Milieudefensie.

Last year, a court of appeals ruled that while Shell is obliged to reduce its emissions, the court was unable to determine which percentage should apply and rejected Milieudefensie’s claims.

“Climate change is a direct threat to human rights, and the court has ruled that companies such as ING must take accountability for reducing their emissions,” said Donald Pols, chief executive of Milieudefensie, which is the Dutch wing of environmental group Friends of the Earth.

“ING must align its climate policies with the Paris Climate Agreement to do their part and help secure a sustainable future.”

For ING, a ruling isn’t expected until next year, but if the case against the Dutch bank is successful, it could open the doors to further legal action in Europe against fossil fuel companies and the corporate actors that work with them, such as banks and asset managers.

This is in contrast to the situation in the U.S., where banks and asset managers have been taken to court for being too intensely focused on making green investments, and environmental nonprofits have been thrust into expensive legal battles.

This month, the U.S. fossil-fuel industry secured a victory over environmental charity Greenpeace, which was ordered to pay hundreds of millions of dollars to an oil pipeline company after a jury found the charity liable for defamation and trespassing. Greenpeace has said it will appeal the decision.

In December, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton said BlackRock and other asset managers were avoiding their fiduciary duty to shareholders by making climate-focused investments instead of investing in markets such as coal in their search for profitable returns.

In the U.S. regulatory sphere, the Securities and Exchange Commission paused its defense of proposed climate-disclosure rules under which large companies would report on their emissions, similar to regulations adopted in Europe and California.

The SEC faced lawsuits saying the proposed rules were arbitrary and capricious and violated the First Amendment.

With lawsuits under way on both sides of the Atlantic, companies and charities that operate in both jurisdictions are being put in a bind.

In the U.S., being sued for taking action on climate [change] is becoming more likely, especially amid a Trump presidency. In Europe, litigation working in the opposite way is equally likely.

For many companies, the answer at the moment appears to be to keep their heads below the parapet to avoid criticism and possibly costly litigation.

Read rest at WSJ

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Energy News Beat

The judge ruled the 2023 Gulf lease sale violated environmental law by ignoring climate, CO2 emissions, and whale impacts.

​

A federal district judge has issued a ruling against a Gulf [oil and gas] lease sale conducted by the Biden administration in 2023, saying the Interior Department was in violation of the Environmental Policy Act by failing to take into account the auction’s impact on the climate and whale populations. [emphasis, links added]

Bloomberg reported that Judge Amit Mehta had not proposed any corrective action, leaving open the question of what the agencies responsible for the lease sale should do next.

Per the report, options include invalidating the leases that were sold or revising the contracts in line with the findings.

A total of 26 companies bid for the blocks on offer, with 325 bids submitted for deposits covering 1.7 million acres. In addition to the big players, smaller producers also took part in the tender, teaming up to bid collectively.

The total acreage offered in the auction that took place in December 2023 was 9% smaller than the original lease area, specifically to protect the habitat of an endangered whale species, at 67 million acres instead of 73.4 million acres.

Following this, the American Petroleum Institute, U.S. supermajor Chevron, and the state of Louisiana sued the Biden administration, with API Senior Vice President and General Counsel Ryan Meyers saying the reduced acreage represented “unjustified actions to further restrict American energy access in the Gulf of Mexico.”

Judge Mehta, however, said that the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management had made “a glaring omission” in only assessing the impact of the lease sale on Rice’s whale core habitat when there was “credible evidence” that this habitat spanned beyond that core area.

Also, the judge argued that the BOEM had not considered in full the effects of new oil and gas development in the Gulf on carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions and the impact of energy market changes on these emissions.

The case was brought to court by half a dozen environmentalist organizations.

Read more at Oilprice

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