Daily Energy Standup Episode #273 – Duke’s Rate Hike, BlackRock Lawsuit, and Global Supply Chain Concerns

Michael Tanner: [00:00:14] What is going on, everybody? Welcome to another edition of the Daily Energy News Beat standup here on this gorgeous Tuesday, December 19th, 2023. As always, I’m your humble correspondent, Michael Tanner, coming to you from an undisclosed location here in Dallas, Texas, joined by the executive producer, the show, the purveyor of the show and the director and publisher of the world’s greatest website site energynewsbeat.com, Stuart Turley, My man, how we doing? [00:00:39][24.1]

Stuart Turley: [00:00:39] Today is a beautiful day in the neighborhood and I’m whipped. Holy smokes. [00:00:42][3.4]

Michael Tanner: [00:00:43] Absolutely. We’ve had a busy day. The news line has been absolutely buzzing. We have an absolutely packed show and menu burst up on said menu, woke Duke Energy Jacks up electric rates to pay for ESG, zero carbon mandates. Next up, this is an exclusive from the Daily Signal. Conservative state files first in the nation lawsuit against BlackRock over deceptive climate policies. Next up, he fixed California’s power grid for Arnold Schwarzenegger. He’s worried about the energy transition now. Next, an expensive power grid. Update upgrades and expansion threaten the energy transition. And then finally, who these attacks start shutting down Red Sea merchant ship. That’s going to flow nicely into our finance segment because that’s really what drove prices both up today to above $74 and then also has dropped in a little bit was said attack on that Red Sea merchant ship is people are a little bit worried about what might happen with oil flows through the Red Sea. So we will cover all of that in a bag of chips. Guys, Before we do all that, remember all of the news and analysis you are about to hear is brought to you by the world’s greatest website, Energy News Beat.com The best place for all of your energy news. Stu and the team. Do an outstanding job of making sure that stays up to speed with everything you need to know to be at the tip of the spear. When it comes to the energy in the oil and gas business. Hit the description below on all of our podcast. Whether you listen to us on Spotify, Apple Podcasts or YouTube, you can see the description below. Timestamps links to all of the articles and ways to get a hold of the show. That’s [email protected] you’ll see that will link to our dashboard.energynewsbeat.com which is one of our best a bill ways to do kind of data news combos. We appreciate everybody who’s check that out. I’m going to break those too. Where do you want to begin? [00:02:28][105.0]

Stuart Turley: [00:02:29] Hey, let’s start with our buddies over a joke. I mean, Excuse me, Duke. I love Duke Energy. I’m not sure why this article is a little bit slanted, but it says the title Duke Energy jacks up electric rates to pay for ESG zero carbon mandates. This is really not fair on Duke because they have good management and they’re doing the best they can. Duke Energy has thrown consumers under the proverbial electric bus to make their operations carbon neutral by 2050. You can’t blame them. That’s where I thought this article was was kind of hard on the management. I’ll be the first to admit on this. Listen to this. They are attempting to decarbonize the Tar Heel State by 70% by 2030 and full decarbonize by 2050. These are absolutely abysmal guides. Guess who gets to pay for this, Michael? No. The consumer, the consumers, the power grid. This misguided initiative will force everyday families to subsidize a complete overhaul of the state’s power grid at a total cost, approaching $160 billion. This is the government on stupid steroids. They have got some kind of stupid beer in the water there. I don’t know. You know, holy smokes, This is not Duke Energy. This is Duke Energy trying to read the requirements that were put in under the Biden legislation through regulation at 3 a.m. right before COP. This is also part of the coal plan stuff. [00:04:11][102.1]

Michael Tanner: [00:04:12] Yeah, and what I find what I like about this article is they take it is they take the approach of look like we’re all for attempting to clean up for what is a really bad history of these companies. Only to points out that Duke Energy, you know, a few years ago was forced to pay $200 million to clean up its leachate toxic coal waste. It shut off half of the power to residents on Christmas Eve in 2022. They took 1300 megawatts of coal and natural gas offline during that period, all without really, you know, you know, the $200 million is is a pretty small sum relative to the amount of stuff that they’re going after them in the wrong way when they should have been focused on, as this article points out, the other things that they’re doing wrong. [00:04:54][41.6]

Stuart Turley: [00:04:54] Right. But as a general rule, Duke’s got some good things going on for them. Those are mistakes. I’m not going to I’m not going to make any excuses on that. But they have a lot of good things that. [00:05:05][10.6]

Michael Tanner: [00:05:05] They say for $200 million, all at Duke Energy, leached some toxic coal waste into my apartment. So next time they need to just call me up. I’m good. [00:05:13][7.8]

Stuart Turley: [00:05:13] Okay. Hey, we could have a new bathtub. Remember when we. You and I were doing tankers with the bathtubs? You could do that. [00:05:19][5.4]

Michael Tanner: [00:05:20] All right, let’s start. [00:05:20][0.7]

Stuart Turley: [00:05:20] An action here. Yeah, let’s go. What’s next? Before I get a hook, Now that I’ve lost all my stories. Yeah. Still gets a hook film. Here we go. Conservatives. State files. First in the nation lawsuit against BlackRock over deceptive climate policies. Well, I know this is kind of You cannot be this kind of entertainment tent. City Attorney General Jonathan Carmody on Monday sued the investment company BlackRock. Here’s a quote. BlackRock has said two things that can’t both be true. Giamatti, a Republican, told The Daily Signal in an interview Monday. The first is that they are taking investors money and investing it purely for the purpose of maximizing the return on the investment. But they’ve also put out a statement saying that they are committed to net zero carbon emissions to combat climate change by a certain date. Both things can’t be true and I agree that he is is hitting on that. The here’s where it gets a little funny. I’m going to be wondering how it’s going to pan out in the courtroom, Michael, because pledge member of the climate groups is to force companies to disclose their targets for net zero emissions for environmental political reasons. This is coming down into the carbon tax. It’s coming down into the MP operators. But here’s where this I get a little confused on this article. The Larry said it’s okay to invest in ESG, in oil and gas. So where I think this is really going to need a follow up is the requirements for carbon neutral for reporting from oil companies. [00:07:03][102.4]

Michael Tanner: [00:07:04] This is a serious question. So to take this, it’s again, this is a serious question I’m asking are companies are are companies required to make a profit? [00:07:12][8.4]

Stuart Turley: [00:07:13] Yes. If they are says who they are, they have a requirement to their. [00:07:17][4.1]

Michael Tanner: [00:07:18] To their shareholders. But it’s not like a law, Not like if you don’t produce a profit, you’re going to go to jail. Or we have seen a lot of tech companies be out of business and B, we’d have a lot of tech people. So I asked this question seriously, I’m all for. I think what BlackRock is doing is obscene. They’re they’re fleecing the world, so to speak. They’re greenwashing, the whole ESG movement to take money from investors under the ruse of ESG, but deploy it as they see fit. Yes, that’s shady business practice. Question, though, is it actually illegal? There’s a difference between stoop. So illegal to be stupid. It’s not illegal to necessarily not necessarily invest the money wisely as it should. So this is where I understand that it looks good on a headline that we’re going to go sue BlackRock. I’m all for it. I think what they’re doing is a travesty. The question is, is it illegal? And that’s where I think the difference becomes, you know, is he in this process of you know, and, you know, Stu disagrees with me so much, he just left the point of the matter, I think when it comes to, you know, whether or not this lawsuit is worthwhile, I mean, I mean, this guy’s, you know, Jonathan and he’s probably got a little bit of time on its hand when it comes to it. But the real question is, is these, quote, deceptive practices? I mean, this guy’s going to know. But the real question is, you know, what’s a jury going to think? I think the interesting thing is that, you know, we know BlackRock has walked back a lot of these, you know, so-called targets that they want to push. You know, they they haven’t necessarily followed through as much as maybe they would have. They would have you would have thought, you know, two years ago, I mean, two years ago, you know, they they were attempting to influence companies like Chevron, United Airlines, Wal-Mart in order to, you know, push these shareholder proposals that were much more climate related. But in 2022, they said that in a response to the state’s attorney general, the company, quote, doesn’t dictate to companies what suspicions are or what specific emissions targets they should meet or what type of political lobbying they pursue. So they’re speaking out of both sides of their mouth. The question I go back to is, are your I think you were allowed to speak out of both sides of your mouth. There’s no law that says you can’t. [00:09:32][134.5]

Stuart Turley: [00:09:33] But they do have a fiduciary responsibility for not I. That’s a good question. Do they are they legally responsible? Yes. Depends on a shared responsibility. [00:09:43][10.3]

Michael Tanner: [00:09:44] But that’s different than being illegal. Right. I’m not a lawyer. It’s a dumb question. But, you know, when we talk like like, for example, bankruptcies, bankruptcies, it’s not illegal to be an idiot and drive your company into bankruptcy. Now, you’re going to probably never raise money again. But the question is, is being incompetent illegal? I don’t. [00:10:04][19.8]

Stuart Turley: [00:10:04] Know. Well, it does take a village to raise an idiot. [00:10:07][2.8]

Michael Tanner: [00:10:08] So I’ll tell you this, though. If it’s illegal to be an idiot, Stu, we’re in trouble. And we’ve been he’s going to be knocking on our door very quickly. Oh, wait, that’s them. [00:10:17][9.2]

Stuart Turley: [00:10:19] I just had to go get the door. It was actually. It was actually the FBI. [00:10:23][3.9]

Michael Tanner: [00:10:23] All right. That’s where you left? Yes. He showed up and. [00:10:27][3.4]

Stuart Turley: [00:10:28] He fix California’s power grid for Arnold. He’s worried about the energy transition. Former Albertan says promises made at COP 28 bring risk, higher cost and lower reading liability. I’m not saying don’t do it, but do it right. I like that line. Hey, let’s just be careful. He goes, I don’t work for the governor, but I had to work with the governor. Oh. [00:10:53][25.4]

Michael Tanner: [00:10:55] That’s the type of leadership and ingenuity and working relationships that we need to people. They don’t agree on anything but are willing to put aside their differences to work towards a common mutual goal. [00:11:07][12.8]

Stuart Turley: [00:11:08] It sounds like me and you on his podcast, dude. [00:11:10][2.0]

Michael Tanner: [00:11:11] Maybe. [00:11:11][0.0]

Stuart Turley: [00:11:13] And he sits there and in 1975, he immigrated to Canada, sailed through, graduated. Calgary is near, but too cold for an Egyptian. I thought that was just absolutely a hoot. But he was treating electricity as a commodity and deregulation. That’s where he really helped Arnold out. So when you take a look at the electrical and imagine yourself sitting on a stool with three legs, as long as the three legs are equal in length, you’re steady. If any one of those three legs becomes too long or too short, you will fall. That’s he’s talking about three renewables or just pension out the grid in coal. [00:11:56][42.8]

Michael Tanner: [00:11:56] No, I mean, we need a lot more of this collaboration from people that may be on two opposite sides of the political spectrum. The problem is when we’re talking about energy, it shouldn’t be political. It should be, as you would say, lower energy poverty for the cheapest way possible while attempting to, yes, minimize emissions. We shouldn’t just go ahead and burn coal. 24 seven. I’m with you there. The problem is the trade offs between, you know, going too far down the renewables path shortens one of the legs. So your chair ends up being slanted. Excuse me, on the renewable. [00:12:27][30.5]

Stuart Turley: [00:12:29] And both of us had our automatic cameras turned off. Otherwise it looked like we had been on a roller coaster. So. Okay. Extensive. Let’s go to the next one. Extensive power grid upgrades and expansions threaten the energy transition. I just want to let you know, I had a deal with some folks at family gatherings that are slightly ignorant when it comes to the grid and electrical. Yeah, you cannot electrify the grid with an electric cars right now if you want to. We have 1% of our cars are electric. You go to two, maybe three, and the grid is going to blow. You can handle. You can handle the truth. I guarantee you they can handle the truth. Then their heads are going to explode if we selling more EVs. Now let’s go into this article. To achieve country’s national energy and climate goals, the world electricity needs to grow 20% faster in the next decade than it did in the previous. Reaching national goals means adding or refurbishing a total of 80 million kilometers of grid by 2040, the equivalent of the entire existing global grid by the IEA. I mean, that is one agency full of chatter heads. So when you sit back and think about this, we barely have enough money to even get our economies going. We’re going to be lucky if we don’t if we avoid bankruptcy. So you can’t afford to redo the grid from ground up, period. It’s just not there’s not enough of it there. And then in the Inflation Reduction Act, the I.R.A., Michael, there was a couple million in there for the grid, 40 million or something like that out of the Brazilian trillion dollars. [00:14:29][119.7]

Michael Tanner: [00:14:29] Well, clearly, they’re going to need way more, because if you’re telling me the world and not just the United States, but the world has to double its electric capacity in order to meet these unquote new, you know, electrification standards. We’re in big trouble. [00:14:41][11.8]

Stuart Turley: [00:14:42] Oh, yeah, it ain’t going to happen. And so anyway, we can reduce and I’ll put you right now, if you and I were made energy czars, we could reduce the world’s carbon output. We need carbon combo carbon. Just giving a shout out to our sponsors. But we would also be able in ensure and have people talk. I’d say nuclear natural gas. Use coal for when you can. And as we transition, get the pipelines built, go to natural gas, use wind, solar. If it’s fiscally responsible, we could do it. You and I. Right now, energy czars dominates ominous. We be it. [00:15:23][40.8]

Michael Tanner: [00:15:23] Love it. Love it. Still. What’s the let’s go somewhere. This last article that really flows. This is where prices went. [00:15:28][5.1]

Stuart Turley: [00:15:29] Yeah Moody’s are out and as Larry the Cable guy would say and then Houti attack starting shutting down the Red Sea merchant shipping. Michael, this brings up two gigantic questions I’m going to kind of touch on the first one, the supply side and then the other one being in the year, there are Arctic in there. Companies at the transport, consumer goods, BP and molar mascot are all having some serious problems. This article goes into the billions of dollars it’s going to cost. And in the weeks that it adds to the trips around the Cape of Good Hope or the Cape of Good Horn, because a lot of those carriers cannot go through the Panama Canal. And if you’re going to cut out the Suez Canal, ooh, this is bad. [00:16:20][51.7]

Michael Tanner: [00:16:21] And why are in there doing that? Not to spike oil prices, but they’re doing that to just disrupt global trade. Correct. Or what’s the endgame here? [00:16:29][8.3]

Stuart Turley: [00:16:30] I think the endgame is they didn’t eat their Wheaties this morning and they actually were watching the Kardashians because I don’t know what was going on. Maybe they were a little confused. This is part of their their mode, really. Nobody knows. And they’re not shooting at Iranian ships. It does not make any sense. The only thing that I heard that I on the Twitter feeds was that it was enough to split up the U.S. Navy in order to get them sidetracked and spread them out more so that China could do something. I mean, that was a conspiracy theory. It was like, now, why didn’t I think of that? I don’t know, Michael. I mean, this was I’m not a hoodie now. I’m now Hootie and the Blowfish was really good. [00:17:22][51.1]

Michael Tanner: [00:17:22] Well, we hope that we hope they’re not in charge of whatever these efforts are, because that’s not good. [00:17:27][4.8]

Stuart Turley: [00:17:28] Oh, no. That was a good song, though. [00:17:29][1.5]

Michael Tanner: [00:17:30] It was a good song. Anything else for us? [00:17:31][1.6]

Stuart Turley: [00:17:32] No, Just, you know, wrap us up here with the finance. Yeah. [00:17:39][6.4]

Michael Tanner: [00:17:39] I mean, we’re going to be pretty quick today, guys. Oil prices, as we know, moved due to this Red Sea attack. We did see S&P 500 up about 5/10 of a or about a half a percentage point. And we’re only 1.2 percentages off all time highs, which we saw in January of 2022. Nasdaq was actually up 6/10 of a percentage point. The Dow Jones Industrial average topped about 0.86 points. Bitcoin, we saw about up three and a half percent to $42,000. Crude oil, as we mentioned, up and down all day, was down early in the session, all the way to about $71. Rose on this read, see who did attack up to about $75 a little bit below that, 7480 is where it peaked out. And then slowly over the rest of the afternoon session began to trade down where we currently sit, about 70 to 83, you know, outside of of of of where oil prices are going. Again, guys, we’re back to sentiment driven price action. And you can tell is as okay, great. You know prices were up in the wake of this event they did in that afternoon session continue to to slow down. BP did say they temporarily paused all transit through that water. Other shipping forms also said they’re going to avoid that route. So is it necessarily going to drop overall supply of oil? It might just make it longer to come to market. I thought what’s interesting is that the EIA came out today and also announced that they believe that share oil production in a turn of events is actually going to be down in 2024, which is interesting relative to I think where a lot of the different markets are coming from, which is interesting. U.S. they say specifically that U.S. oil output from top shale producing regions is set to decline in January for the third consecutive month, while production from the Permian Basin is still set to rise to a record eighth straight production. So what we’re gaining from the Permian being drilled, we’re losing elsewhere. And what’s that a sign of the sign that there’s very there’s very few profitable basins left. If there’s one thing to snatch from what the EIA is telling you is the fact that there are very few basins that are still profitable right now and one of them still being the Permian Basin or at least what people think. So so they’re they’re continuing to dive in on that. It’s been a long weeks to spend a long year. What do you what should people be worried about going into going into Christmas? [00:19:54][134.8]

Stuart Turley: [00:19:55] Well, I’d say it’s a supply chain, Michael, this Hootie and the Blowfish thing going on over there. Ooh, Hootie and the blow up fish. [00:20:02][7.1]

Michael Tanner: [00:20:02] We got to add that to our our nonexistent merch. [00:20:05][2.7]

Stuart Turley: [00:20:06] Yeah. There you go. Hootie and the blow them up fish. I mean, when you sit back and kind of think that’s horrible because remember when the evergreen you and I were having a lot of fun with the names on that bad dog, the Scooby, the Captain, Scooby and all that kind of good stuff. That was a lot of fun. This is not so fun because they’ve actually got missiles in their launch animal ships and our our guys are in harm’s way. That’s the part. Snakes. [00:20:30][24.2]

Michael Tanner: [00:20:31] It is. So. Well, you know, we’re covered for everybody, guys. We get a few more shows this week before we finish out before the end of the year. We appreciate everybody who’s who’s checked in with us and stop by this week and year. But with that, we’re going to let you get out of here, get back to work, start your day. Appreciate everybody. Again tuning in for Stuart Turley. I’m Michael Tanner. We’ll see you tomorrow, folks. [00:20:31][0.0][1184.3]

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