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Nepal withdraws fuel price hike, country limps back to normalcy
Kantipur Report
KATHMANDU - The government Wednesday afternoon withdrew its Monday’s decision to hike the price of diesel, Kerosene and cooking gas after the decision sparked nationwide protests.

Nepal Oil Corporation has been directed to roll back the price hike through an emergency ministerial-level decision, Supplies Minister Shyam Sundar Gupta said.

A ministerial level meeting was held after Prime Minister Girija Prasad Koirala asked the line ministries to review the decision to hike POL prices, the minister added.

The government will think about addressing the losses incurred by the NOC in the coming days, the minister further said.
(23 January 2008)

Experts warn SA could face ‘huge’ liquid fuel shortage
Matthew Hill, Engineering News
If the economy continues growing at 4%-plus a year then inland residents in areas like Africa's economic powerhouse, Gauteng, should start getting worried about a looming "huge" liquid fuel supply shortage, experts warned on Wednesday.

There would be massive shortages of petroleum products by as early as 2010, Industrial Development Corporation chief economist Lumkile Mondi said.

Johannesburg-based Econometrix economist Tony Twine said that, at current growth rates, "yes, we should start getting concerned" about petrol and diesel supply to the hinterland.(23 January 2008)

Electricity Shortage Halts S. African Gold Mines
Thompson Financial
South African mining companies Harmony Gold Mining Company Ltd, AngloGold Ashanti Ltd, Impala Platinum Holdings Ltd and Gold Fields Ltd have all halted operations after the country's national power utility, Eskom, said that it could not guarantee today's power supply.

In separate statements, all four companies said they have suspended South African mining operations due to this crisis.

Eskom requested its key industrial consumers to reduce consumption to the minimum load possible for the next two to four weeks. "According to Eskom, the current situation arises from reduced generating capacity aggravated by problems associated with coal supplies to power stations caused by unusually heavy rainfall," AngloGold said in a statement.
(25 January 2008)
Contributor Jim writes:
Wet coal mines and 7,000oz's a day goes off line. Essentially you can't send men down a shaft if you can't be sure that the elevator and ventilation will work. Seems that South Africa is hitting "Peak Load" where any ripple in the fuel supply slows things down more than they'd like.

Record power shortage hits China
Jim Bai and Judy Hua, Reuters
China is facing its most severe power shortage ever as some plants struggle to secure increasingly costly coal and others shut down capacity rather than rack up losses by selling electricity at low rates.

The rebellion by power plant managers unwilling to generate at a loss is likely to worry policymakers still haunted by the nationwide diesel supply crisis last autumn, when refiners under similar pressure quietly curbed output and forced the government to make an unplanned and unwanted rise in fuel prices.
(23 January 2008)

In oil-rich Alaska, an energy crunch
Yereth Rosen, The Christian Science Monitor
A shortage of natural gas besets the state's most populous area. In rural outposts, energy costs spike.
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...Raw resources are in the ground, but lack of infrastructure and poor economies of scale hinder access to them, putting Alaska in an energy crunch.

Natural gas at the North Slope - America's largest known but untapped conventional natural-gas supply - is 700 miles away and unavailable. There's no pipeline to convey North Slope natural gas to consumers, in or out of Alaska.

So Alaska's most populous region relies on local energy - Cook Inlet natural gas - for heat and power. But natural gas known to be in Cook Inlet is expected to last eight more years, and local utility costs have risen as markets tighten.

"It's the goofiest thing in the world, to be sitting on top of some of the biggest energy reserves in the world and have these challenges," says Bill Popp, president of the Anchorage Economic Development Corp.
(23 January 2008)

Energy Poverty (video)
Scott Nance, Energy Policy TV
Mark Wolfe, Executive Director, National Energy Assistance Directors Association, is interviewed about how rising energy prices is making it harder for low-income Americans to pay their home heating and cooling bills. He also talks about efforts in Congress and the states to deal with the problem.
(25 January 2008)