Reuters

Testifying before the Senate Energy Commitee, Dow Chemicals CEO Andrew Liveris said, “The short-term outlook for natural gas consumers is grim. If prices remain at or near current levels, manufacturers will be driven out of the market and many may not return.”…
The government should also “declare a national emergency” to shock consumers into awareness of tight supplies, he said.

“I think they’re [the Saudis] near capacity, and so we’ve just got to get a straight answer from the government as to what they think their excess capacity is,” Bush said, adding that he would not characterize the Saudi production as “flat-out” yet. (updated 21 April)

Oil company BP’s existing oil and gas fields are posting production declines of about 3 per cent, Tony Hayward, the company’s chief executive for exploration and production, said on Wednesday.

Yemen’s economy could survive without policy adjustments in the short term but falling oil production means the government would have to make economic corrections further down the road, the International Monetary Fund said yesterday.

Solar electricity production growth jumped 67 percent last year as established industry players increased output and new players entered the industry, a survey said.

As U.S. crude oil prices soared past $56 a barrel to an all-time high on Wednesday, the government said that hedge funds and speculative traders were not to blame for rising crude costs.