science

Authored by Irina Slav via Oilprice.com

• Focus on China’s oil demand, predicted to peak in 2025 or 2027, is expected to keep a lid on oil prices next year.

• Supply disruptions from OPEC+ or renewed sanctions on Iran could challenge price stability in 2025.

• India’s rising oil demand and potential for a supply glut are other factors to consider in the 2025 oil price outlook.

This year in oil has been marked by chronic trader pessimism about Chinese demand and an equally chronic downplaying of supply disruption risks. This has made for a rather stable year in prices—and the stability could continue in 2025, on a few conditions.

Brent crude and West Texas Intermediate appear set to end the year at nearly the same levels that they started. WTI started 2024 at a little over $70 per barrel and is about to end a little below that. Brent crude looks like it will post a little more noticeable loss, starting the year at $77 per barrel and ending at a bit over $74 at the time of writing.

The biggest reason for this somewhat unnatural stability in oil prices has been the focus on China. Every single report on oil prices this year has featured Chinese economic data or oil import figures in its lead. This is set to continue in 2025 amid a flurry of reports predicting peak oil demand growth for the world’s biggest importer.

China’s very own state oil giants are saying it. CNPC said earlier this month that it expected demand growth to peak in 2025, moving the peak year from 2030, which was its prediction in 2023. The company cited electric vehicle adoption and LNG truck growth as reasons for its predictions, even though the record share of EVs in total car sales this year has failed to reverse China’s oil demand growth.

Sinopec was next, publishing a report a week ago saying that oil demand growth in China was about to reach its peak in three years in 2027. The peak will occur at a daily demand level of some 16 million barrels or a total of 800 million metric tons, the Chinese state oil major said. A year ago, Sinopec saw Chinese oil demand peaking at around 800 million metric tons sometime between 2026 and 2030. China’s oil demand this year is seen reaching 750 million metric tonnes, according to Sinopec.

So, focus on China and pessimism about its demand has kept a lid on prices this year and is likely to keep that lid in place in 2025 as well—unless all the stimulus that the government in Beijing is throwing at the economy doesn’t spur greater demand for the key commodity. As one analyst from Brokerage Pepperstone put it to the Wall Street Journal, “The apparent calm in the oil market hides a complex interplay of macroeconomic factors that could trigger sharp movements at any moment.”

“Attention is focused on the evolution of macroeconomic data and future OPEC+ decisions, which will determine the market’s direction in the coming months,” Quasar Elisundia told the WSJ. In macroeconomic data, the focus will remain on China but also on India, which is shaping up as the next leading demand driver globally. Indeed, S&P Global Commodity Insights recently forecast that India’s oil demand growth rate was set to exceed China’s this year.

“India will be the leading driver, along with Southeast Asia and other parts of South Asia, of the region’s future oil demand growth,” SPGCI’s global head of macro and oil demand research, Kang Wu, said.

But even weaker growth markets such as the European Union, continue to see growth in oil demand, as suggested by import figures. The latest available, for the second quarter of the year, showed a decline in natural gas imports but a pickup in what the EU categorizes as “petroleum oils”. The EU is not the oil market traders look to for insight into demand trends, but this may be an oversight.

On the supply side, the focus, of course, remains on OPEC+, even as forecasters keep repeating how they expect great production growth things from non-OPEC majors such as the United States, Guyana, Canada, and Brazil. These forecasts have started to moderate with regard to the U.S., however, as the industry gives repeated signs that there will be no drilling at will just because there is a pro-oil president in the White House.

The situation with OPEC+ is quite similar. Forecasters have been making traders nervous and bearish for months, reminding them of all that spare capacity that OPEC could bring back online when it decides to roll back its output cuts. What they’ve consistently forgotten to mention is that OPEC and its OPEC+ partners made it clear from the start of the cuts that output would only be brought back online when prices rose high enough. This basically means that several price routs this year were entirely the result of unrealistic expectations, with zero relation to actual oil fundamentals.

In the current context, fundamentals appear to be largely in balance. Many expect a supply glut next year, but that’s based on assumptions about EV adoption that have consistently tended to disappoint. Trump sanctions on Iran could tighten supply from the Middle East further and lend some upward momentum for prices, but chances are that the idea of that big spare capacity cushion of 5 million bpd or more is going to play the role of a market blowout preventer once again.

 

Authored by Pepe Escobar,

It’s a dazzling Tuscan winter morning, and I am inside the legendary Dominican church of Santa Maria Novella, founded in the early 13th century and finally consecrated in 1420, in a very special place in History of Art: right in front of one of the monochrome frescos painted in 1447-1448 by master of perspective Paolo Uccello, depicting the Universal Deluge.

Paolo Uccello: Universal Deluge. 1448 fresco at Santa Maria Novella, Florence. Photo by Pepe Escobar

It’s as if Paolo Uccello was depicting us – in our current times of trouble. So inspired by neoplatonic superstar Marsilio Ficino – immortalized in a chic red robe by Ghirlandaio at the Cappella Tornabuoni – I tried to pull off a back to the future and ideally imagine who and what Paolo Uccello would feature in his depiction of our current deluge.

Let’s start with the positives. 2024 was the Year of the BRICS – with the merit for all the accomplishments going for the tireless work of the Russian presidency.

2024 was also the Year of the Axis of Resistance – until the serial blows suffered during the past few months, a serious challenge which will propel its rejuvenation.

And 2024 was the year that defined the lineaments of the endgame in the proxy war in Ukraine: what remains to be seen is how deep the “rules-based international order” will be buried in the black soil of Novorossiya.

Now let’s turn to the auspicious prospects ahead. 2025 will be the year of consolidation of China as the paramount geoeconomics force on the planet.

It will be the year where the defining battle of the 21st century – Eurasia v. NATOstan – will be sharpened in an array of unpredictable vectors.

And it will be the year of advancing, interlocking connectivity corridors – the defining factor in Eurasia integration.

Not by accident Iran is central to this interlocking connectivity – from the Strait of Hormuz (through which transits, daily, at least 23% of the world’s oil) to the port of Chabahar, which links West Asia with South Asia.

Connectivity corridors to watch are the return of one of the top Pipelineistan sagas, the 1,800 km-long Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) pipeline; the International North South Transportation Corridor (INSTC), which links three BRICS (Russia-Iran-India) and several aspiring BRICS partners; the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), the flagship Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) project; and last but not least, the fast advancing Northern Sea Route (or Northern Silk Road, as the Chinese call it), which will eventually become the cheapest and fastest alternative to the Suez canal.

A few days before the start of Trump 2.0 in Washington, Russia and Iran will finally, officially sign a comprehensive strategic partnership deal in Moscow, over two years in the making: once again, a key deal between two top BRICS, with immense, cascading repercussions in Eurasia integration terms.

A completely sealed channel of negotiation

Dmitri Trenin, respected member of Russia’s Foreign and Defense Policy Council, has what is so far the most realist road map for an acceptable end of the proxy war in Ukraine.

“Acceptable” does not even begin to describe it – because from the point of view of the collective West political “elites” which bet the farm and the bank on this war, nothing is acceptable except Russia’s strategic defeat, which will never happen.

As it stands, President Putin is in fact containing elite sectors in Moscow who favor not only cutting off the head of the snake but the body as well.

Trump for his part has less than zero incentive to be dragged into a further quagmire; leave that to the clueless European chihuahuas.

So a possible drive towards a wobbly “peace” agreement also suits the Global Majority – not to mention China, which understands how war is bad for business (at least if you’re not in the weaponizing racket).

When it comes to an always possible “existential” escalation, we’re not out of the woods yet; but there are still three weeks left for some major terror-fueled coup, as in a false flag.

The first two months of 2025 will be absolutely decisive, when it comes to sketching a possible compromise.

Elena Panina from RUSSTRAT has offered a concise, and sobering, strategic assessment of what may pan out.

What Trump essentially craves, like a trashy McDonald’s burger, is to look like the ultimate Alpha Male. So Putin’s tactical negotiating strategy will not be focused on undermining Trump’s tough guy act. The problem is how to pull it off without undermining Trump’s pop star power – and without adding more fuel to the NATOstan warmongering pyre.

Putin holds an array of trump cards close to his chest – related to Europe, the Brits, China, Ukraine itself and the Global South as a whole.

Determining spheres of influence will be part of a possible agreement. The thing is no specific details should be leaked – and must be kept impermeable to Western intel.

That means, as Panina notes, Trump needing a completely sealed channel of negotiation with Putin, which even the MI6 cannot crack.

A tall order, as privileged Zio-con silos across the Deep State are dizzy with the latest Old Testament psycho-pathological victories in Lebanon and Syria, and the way they enfeebled Tehran. Yet that does not mean the Iran-Russia-China-BRICS link is in jeopardy.

The dynamics are set; tread carefully

Putin and the Security Council should be ready to implement a quite complex, step-by-step diplomatic game, as they know that the trifecta of defeated, supremely angry Democrats, Brits and Bankova will apply maximum pressure on Trump and turn him into “an enemy of America” or some similar crap.

Moscow will accept no truce and no freeze: only a real solution.

It that doesn’t work, the war will continue in the battlefield, and Moscow has no problems with that – or with more escalation. The final humiliation of the Empire of Chaos will then be total.

Meanwhile, Cold War 2.0 between China and the U.S. will advance more on the pop sphere than in substance. The sharpest Chinese analysts know that the real competition is not over ideology – as in the original Cold War – but over technology, from AI to upgrading seamless supply chains.

Moreover, Trump 2.0, at least in principle, has less than zero interest in unleashing a proxy war – Ukraine-style – on China in Taiwan and the South China Sea. China has way more geoeconomic resources than Russia.

So it’s not exactly intriguing that Trump is floating the idea of a G2 between the U.S. and China. The Deep State blob will see it as the ultimate plague – and fight it to death. What’s already certain is assuming this goes ahead, the European poodles will be left drowning in a dirty swamp.

Well, political “elites” that appoint braindead specimens like the Medusa von der Lying and the batshit crazy Estonian chick as top representatives of the EU; who start a war against their most important energy supplier; who fully support a genocide broadcast 24/7 to the whole planet; who are obsessed on eradicating the culture which has defined them; and who at best pay only lip service to democracy and freedom of speech, these “elites” do deserve to wallow in filth.

On the Syrian tragedy, the fact is Putin knows who the real enemy is; certainly not a bunch of Salafi-jihadi head-chopping mercenaries. And the Sultan in Ankara is also not the enemy; from Moscow’s perspective, for all his lofty dreams of replacing “Central Asia” with “Turkestan” in Turkiye’s school textbooks, he is a minor geoeconomic and even geopolitical player.

To paraphrase the inestimable Michael Hudson – perhaps our Marsilio Ficino dressed by Paolo Uccello as a writer in a chic red robe – it’s as if in this pre-deluge juncture American elites were saying, “The only solution is total war with Russia and China”; Russia is saying, “We hope there’s peace in Ukraine and West Asia”; and China is saying, “We want peace, not war.

That may not be enough for reaching a compromise – any compromise. So the dynamics are set: the U.S. ruling class will keep imposing instances of chaos while Russia, China and BRICS will keep testing in the “BRICS lab” de-dollarization models, alternative set ups to the IMF and World Bank, and eventually even an alternative to NATO.

An anarchy and War of Terror cornucopia on one side; cool-headed, coordinated realism on the other. Be prepared – for anything. From Renaissance Florence, one of the – few – peaks of humanity, now living in memory, tread carefully across this flame-filled 2025.

Not content to The Department of Justice’s (DOJ) Office of the Inspector General (OIG) revealed this week that three senior DOJ officials violated internal policies and engaged in misconduct by leaking non-public investigative details to the media “days before an election.”

The OIG, led by Michael Horowitz since 2012, conducted the investigation following a complaint alleging politically motivated disclosures related to ongoing DOJ matters.

“The OIG investigation found that three then Senior DOJ Officials violated DOJ’s Confidentiality and Media Contacts Policy by leaking to select reporters, days before an election, non-public DOJ investigative information regarding ongoing DOJ investigative matters, resulting in the publication of two news articles that included the non-public DOJ investigative information,” the OIG stated in a brief investigative summary.

The summary further noted that one of the officials compounded the misconduct by using a DOJ social media account to share links to the resulting news articles, a violation of both the Confidentiality and Media Contacts Policy and the DOJ’s Social Media Policy.

Of course, in typical Horowitz fashion – we have no clue who leaked what to whom…

The investigation faced limitations as the three implicated officials were no longer employed by the DOJ at the time of the probe, and either declined or failed to respond to interview requests. The OIG does not have the authority to compel testimony from former employees.

Horowitz’s office confirmed that the findings have been referred to the Office of the Deputy Attorney General and the Professional Misconduct Review Unit for appropriate action. Additionally, the report has been shared with the U.S. Office of Special Counsel for further investigation into potential violations of the Hatch Act, which restricts political activities by federal employees.

Unspecified Investigation at the Heart of the Leak

The nature of the investigation leaked by the former officials remains unclear. However, similar concerns have been raised in other high-profile cases involving DOJ leaks. In September, Senator Chuck Grassley (R-IA) sent a letter to Attorney General Merrick Garland and FBI Director Christopher Wray, as well as Horowitz, accusing the DOJ and FBI of leaking information about a now-closed investigation into President-elect Donald Trump.

The investigation in question involved allegations that Egyptian President Abdel Fatah El-Sisi attempted to bolster Trump’s 2016 campaign with $10 million in cash. Initially handled by Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s team, the probe was closed in June 2020 due to insufficient evidence, but details of the case were reported by The Washington Post in August 2024. The newspaper’s reporting cited “people familiar with the case” and “thousands of pages of government records, including sealed court filings.”

Broader Pattern of DOJ Leaks and Misconduct

Leaks have been a recurring issue within the DOJ. Trump, while campaigning for the 2024 GOP presidential nomination, accused Special Counsel Jack Smith of having “illegally leaked” information about the classified documents investigation against him. This included allegations that Smith leaked an audio recording of Trump discussing a classified document related to Iran, which was later included in a now-dismissed indictment.

During Trump’s first term, leaks about the FBI’s investigation into alleged collusion between Russia and his 2016 campaign led to scathing reports by the OIG and subsequent investigations by Mueller and Special Counsel John Durham. Notably, former FBI Director James Comey was referred for prosecution in 2019 for leaking internal memos to the media, though the DOJ ultimately declined to press charges.

Now France is getting in on the Syria action in the wake of President Bashar al-Assad’s overthrow on December 8. Currently the hardline Islamist movement Hayat Tahrir-al-Sham (HTS) holds Damascus and major cities across southern, central, and coastal Syria.

The Turks hold parts of the north near the border (and Turkey’s proxies, particularly the the Syrian National Army, or SNA), while the United States still occupies the northeast (also through its proxy the Kurkish-led Syrian Democratic Forces, or SDF). The Israeli military holds an expanse out of the Golan Heights in the south.

France’s defense ministry announced Tuesday that its warplanes launched airstrikes against Islamic State (ISIS) over the weekend.

This marks the first such French strikes in Syria since HTS took over Damascus:

“On Sunday, French air assets carried out targeted strikes against Daesh sites on Syrian soil,” the minister said in a statement on social platform X, using an Arab acronym for ISIS. He also published a video showing the military operation. “Our armies remain engaged in the fight against terrorism” in the region, Lecornu said.

French Rafale fighter jets and American Reaper drones “dropped a total of seven bombs on two military targets belonging to Daesh in central Syria,” the statement specified.

The ‘ISIS threat’ has also been cited by the Pentagon as ongoing justification for keeping some 2,000 or more American troops in Syria. The rationale for occupying Syria’s oil and gas fields has also been the ‘counter Iran’ mission, according to US officials.

But we should note the fact that ISIS has been relatively quiet since the HTS Jolani takeover of the country. Where are the big ISIS terror bombings of prior years when Assad held the country?

The reality is that ISIS terrorists are actually embedded with HTS and its foreign fighter affiliates, as recent American television footage has demonstrated.

The French government released footage of preparations for its weekend strikes on ISIS targets:

France says it carried out missile strikes against ISIS in Syria last weekendpic.twitter.com/iSECAEaz3Z

— Guy Elster (@guyelster) December 31, 2024

ISIS is the threat that keeps on giving: Western allies will stay in Syria for the time being while continually claiming that the coalition (Operation Inherent Resolve) must battle terrorists, even while giving tacit support to HTS in Damascus.

US-designated terrorist Abu Mohammad al-Julani of course began his jihadist career in Syria as a high-ranking member of ISIS and later al-Nusra Front (Al-Qaeda in Syria). As we highlighted previously, this is putting lipstick on a pig.

Authored by Jack Miller & Michael Poliakoff via RealClearEducation,

The study of American history and government is undergoing an unprecedented renewal, akin to the phoenix – a mythical bird that is reborn by rising from the ashes of its predecessor.

Major universities have recently launched independent institutes, sometimes called “schools of civic thought,” dedicated to the in-depth exploration of an American political tradition that goes beyond partisan politics. These institutes have independent hiring authority and significant state funding.

So far about a dozen civic institutes have sprung up, from Arizona, Texas, and Florida to Tennessee, North Carolina, and Ohio – and others will be founded soon. They not only serve college students, but many also help K-12 teachers learn how to teach American history and government more effectively. Their mission is broad, with wide public programming.

In America, we have the privilege of living in a democratic republic, arguably the greatest the world has known. Citizens can engage in politics, persuade their fellow citizens, and effect real change. Our history offers many such examples.

It is all the more tragic and dangerous, then, that many students know so little about our history and institutions. They feel powerless and disaffected.

Too often, instead of engaging with America’s founding principles and history, students hear about the supposed oppressiveness of Western civilization and the American “slavocracy,” with dogmatic teaching of oppressor-oppressed ideas. Our students are frequently taught to believe the worst of our nation and its people.

By contrast, these new institutes endeavor to tell the complete American story – its warts but also its promise to give freedom and opportunity to all. They highlight our long and torturous journey to get ever closer to achieving the vision in our Declaration of Independence – that all men are created equal and are entitled to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

This phoenix-like story has been long in preparation at the Jack Miller Center for Teaching America’s Founding Principles and History (JMC). Over 1,200 professors working in the academy today have been a part of the JMC network, writing and teaching about the American political tradition. This network has transformed a struggling subfield into a strong, competitive discipline and created a talent pool of faculty to support this movement’s rapid growth.

The pipeline for a new generation of classroom leaders was started 20 years ago when JMC began its program of summer institutes for young postdocs and professors. Now these professors operate at institutions of all types. Seven of the eight Ivy League schools have partnered with JMC, as have 18 state universities, along with many liberal arts and religious colleges.

Over 300 JMC-supported programs enrich the academic lives of students, providing guest speakers, fellowships, courses, and a chance to interact with dedicated faculty who are outside of the stale, progressive academic mainstream.

The Center for American Studies at Christopher Newport University is an example of this transformational work. Begun in 2007 with JMC’s assistance, it has grown to be a major force on campus. Co-directed by Professors Elizabeth and Nathan Busch, it has a full-time faculty of six who mentor many undergraduate students. The Center has brought to campus distinguished scholars and public officials, including the late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, Jonathan Turley, John Yoo, and William J. Perry, for presentations to the university community.

The American Council of Trustees and Alumni (ACTA) works alongside JMC to promote the formation of new independent institutes. ACTA has redoubled its efforts to ensure that all undergraduates pass a required course that covers core American founding principles.

For 30 years, ACTA has warned of the cost of higher education’s malfeasance. In 2000, its extensive survey of students at the 50 most elite colleges and universities revealed a shocking level of historical and civic ignorance. ACTA’s survey report, “Losing America’s Memory,” led to a joint, unanimous resolution passed by Congress that called for improving the civic knowledge of college students.

ACTA’s 2024 survey that polled 3,000 college students shows that we must redouble our efforts.

Our work so far has helped South Carolina adopt the REACH Act. Since 2021, all of the state’s public universities require a course in which students study the key documents and moments in our nation’s story.

The new institutes of civic education, which began at Arizona State University in 2017, have now expanded into eight states on 13 campuses. Most recently, Ohio passed legislation that has already led to new institutes being set up at its five public universities. The goal is to expand civic education programs into many more states.

ACTA’s National Commission on American History and Civic Education is convening 24 of America’s most distinguished scholars, thought leaders, and educators to produce a white paper on the urgency of restoring the undergraduate requirement in American history and government at every college and university in the nation. The white paper will provide guidance on the scope of that course and how trustees and legislators can make America’s civic rebirth a reality. An anthology of essays, “American History and Government: What Every College Student Should Know,” will enhance the national conversation.

The new civic institutes will re-engage students with America’s story of freedom and opportunity for all. The joint contribution of JMC and ACTA, made alongside other civic-minded organizations, private and public, will renew students’ understanding of our nation as the land of the free. This is how Americans can mend our flaws and face the challenges of the future together.

Authored by Melanie Sun via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

With solar storms causing a geomagnetic storm on Earth, the northern lights or aurora borealis could extend beyond the Arctic Circle down into the northernmost U.S. states this New Year’s Eve, according to a Dec. 31 forecast by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).

The moderate-strong G2-G3 geomagnetic storm, with a Kp index of 6-7, forecasted for Dec. 31 by NOAA’s Space Weather Prediction Center, means the aurora could be visible in New York and Idaho, and potentially as far south as Illinois and Oregon.

The Kp-index measures geomagnetic activity in the Earth’s atmosphere. “For Kp in the range 6 to 7, the aurora will move even further from the poles and will become quite bright and active,” according to NOAA.

A minor G1-level geomagnetic storm warning is also active from New Year’s Eve into Jan. 1. These storms typically produce auroras visible only from higher latitudes, in locations such as northern Michigan and Maine.

Multiple solar flares—two X-class solar flares and 17 M-class flares—erupted on the Sun within 24 hours on Dec. 29.

Two of the M-class flares released solar storms, or streams of electrically charged particles and plasma called coronal mass ejections (CMEs), toward Earth.

This prompted the Space Weather Prediction Center to issue two geomagnetic storm warnings ahead of the CMEs’ arrival.

Traveling 93 million miles, the CMEs are expected to reach Earth early in the mornings of Dec. 31 and Jan. 1.

This is when the chance of seeing a turbo-charged aurora will be best.

The aurora, known as the northern lights (aurora borealis) or southern lights (aurora australis), occurs when charged particles released by the Sun during flares arrive at Earth. These particles are directed by Earth’s protective magnetosphere toward the poles, where they collide with gases in the atmosphere. This interaction releases excess energy as colorful glows of light, visible as the aurora.

The stronger the solar flare, the more energy arrives at Earth, and the brighter and more widespread the aurora.

When, Where to See the Aurora

Clear, night skies are best for being able to see the aurora.

The geomagnetic storm early New Year’s Eve morning and night (Eastern Time) may bring the colorful aurora to places above 50 degrees geomagnetic latitude, such as Alaska, Washington, Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan, New Hampshire, Vermont, and Maine.

If the geomagnetic storm is strong enough, parts of Oregon, Idaho, Wyoming, Iowa, and New York may also get a glimpse of the lights early Dec. 31 Eastern Time before the sun rises.

The CME from the first solar flare is forecast to arrive at Earth by midday UTC (7 a.m. ET) on Dec. 31, and the second flare near midday UTC (7 a.m. ET) on Jan. 1.

Those in the upper latitudes in the Eastern Hemisphere will have a chance of seeing a brighter-than-usual aurora on New Year’s Eve.

Updates to the forecast are available on NOAA’s Space Weather Prediction Center website.

Uptick in Solar Activity

The recent uptick in strong geomagnetic storms, seen as strong auroras, marks a period of increased solar activity on the Sun.

The Sun’s activity has been observed to move through an 11-year solar cycle and has reached its solar maximum period.

In May, the Earth was hit by the strongest geomagnetic storm in 20 years—a G5-level storm associated with an X8.7 solar flare—that saw reports of the aurora being visible as far south as Florida.

October saw an X1.8 solar flare and a resulting G3-level storm. X-class flares are the strongest category of solar flare and are 10 times the intensity of the preceding category, the M-class solar flare. They increase the risk of disturbances to satellite communications, power grids, and navigation systems.

The current solar maxima, which started in 2020, is expected to last at least into 2026.