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South Korea's Hyundai Steel building 'green mill'
Lee Jong-Heon, upiasia.com
Hyundai Steel is experimenting with a system that could provide a solution to steelmakers across the globe facing rising energy costs and toughening environmental regulations.

The second-largest steelmaker in South Korea is trying to overcome these challenges by establishing a "tightly closed raw material processing system" in its integrated steel mill under construction in the industrial city of Dangjin on the west coast.

By unloading, conveying and storing raw materials for steel manufacturing, such as iron ore and coking coal, inside the closed facilities, the company can reduce pollution and make the steelmaking process more efficient, company officials say.

The steelmaker spent 400 billion won (US$321 million) to build what it calls the world's first closed raw material processing system that enables the steelmaker to operating all its procedures under airtight conditions...
(4 Sept 2009)

Is Resource Nationalism Back?
Nouriel Roubini, forbes.com
Triggered by Wednesday's OPEC meetings and last week's announcement of new regulations governing Brazil's offshore oil, I am devoting this week's column to examining whether government control of the resource sector is increasing as commodity prices continue to creep up.

Traditionally as commodity prices rise, national governments have sought to boost their share of the proceeds, either to save or to spend. When prices fall, by contrast, they have tended to loosen their fiscal regimes to encourage investment and extraction. The period from 2005 through the middle of 2008 was par for the course, in this respect. As the oil price increased, countries ranging from Kazakhstan to Russia to Venezuela sought to reduce the share of key projects managed by foreign oil companies; even the Canadian province of Alberta tried to change its royalty regime. While these policy changes may be politically popular--and according to some analysts, may even help fund infrastructure development--they also run the risk of further deferring investment in the oil and gas sector. The combination of weak demand, lower prices and tighter credit all contributed to a reduction in investment in hydrocarbons. While the investment outlook is still weak, some countries eased regulations early in 2009 in an effort to boost revenues and increase investment.

Last week's announcement of new rules governing deep-sea oil deposits off the Brazilian coast has reignited debate over resource nationalism. Deposits in the pre-salt layer deep beneath Brazil's seabed are one of the more promising, if expensive, sources of new supply available globally. President Lula unveiled the new rules on what he called an "Independence Day for Brazil." Among other things, they suggest that Petrobras, the publicly traded but state-run oil company, have a majority stake in any new developments of the deep-sea oil. The move, which marks a change to the country's profit-sharing agreement, would not apply retroactively. Brazil also wants to create a new social fund, channeling some of the country's profits into social and infrastructure spending--potentially narrowing extreme income divides...
(10 Sept 2009)
sent in by Calvin Sloan, who says:
.. more evidence of the switch from the familiar "buyers" market to an unfamiliar "suppliers" market.

A Power Station in Your Basement
Frank Dohmen, Der Spiegel
Green-energy provider Lichtblick and German automaker Volkswagen are joining forces and promising to stir up the energy market with an unusual plan. Instead of relying on massive energy facilities, the average consumer may soon have a miniature power station in their basement...

...The ambitious new project could be worth billions of euros and generate enough electricity to replace up to two nuclear power stations or even coal-fired power plants in the near future. The technology required to put this plan into practice is highly complex, but -- depending on demand and the market situation -- the new setup could network 1,000, 10,000 or even 100,000 small natural-gas-powered thermal power stations and, in effect, instantly create a virtual large one...

...To understand how that is an improvement over the current situation, you first have to know that the efficiency factor of your average nuclear power plant is only between 30 percent and 40 percent and that even modern coal- and gas-fired powerplants only reach an efficiency factor of between 40 percent and 60 percent.
(7 September 2009)