Crude oil futures neared $75 a barrel ahead of an expected decline in U.S. oil inventories, Bloomberg reports.
China makes another move to ensure energy supplies, signing a deal with Venezuela to help develop offshore oil fields, in the WSJ. With Iraqi elections looming, the country has another chance to put its oil wealth at the service of its citizens, writes a former oil minister in the WSJ.
Who was really to blame for the meltdown in Copenhagen? China, without a doubt, says Mark Lynas in an insiders account of how Beijing sabotaged the climate summit, in The Guardian: The truth is this: China wrecked the talks, intentionally humiliated Barack Obama, and insisted on an awful deal so western leaders would walk away carrying the blame.
In any event, the Copenhagen Accord is coming under increasing fire, with the very developing countries who helped draft it now criticizing the agreement, in the FT.
The real lessons from Copenhagen werent in the summit, but in Denmarks ability to chart a new energy course, writes Tom Friedman.
If cleaning up the electricity sector is so hard, why not target oil instead? By focusing on the transportation sectorand expanding the use of alternative fuelsthe rich and poor world alike would benefit, in Foreign Policy.
Copenhagen didnt kill the chances of the climate bill in the U.S. Senatethe health-care debate did. Thats the take from both sides of the aisle (except the always optimistic John Kerry) in Politico.
The clean-tech sector regroups after the disappointment of Copenhagen. Luckily, there are plenty of local, state and national clean-energy policies that could be more important than vague global agreements, in the WSJ.
And the Copenhagen fiasco amounts to a stay of execution for coal-fired utilities, which seem undervalued by the market, in the WSJ.
Finally, Whole Earth founder Stewart Brand talks with Yales Environment 360 about the new generation of environmentalists and the allure of nuclear power.