Word: petroleum
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What then explains a renewed romance with renewable energy among governments and corporations, especially since oil remains relatively cheap? Shell International Petroleum in London, which forecast the oil shocks of the 1970s, predicts that renewable power, particularly solar, will dominate world energy production by 2050. Japan's electronics giant Canon has formed a joint venture with Michigan's Energy Conversion Devices to commercialize solar technology. Enron, Germany's Siemens and scores of other companies, including aerospace firms, engineering giants and utilities, are also exploring opportunities to plug into the renewable-energy business. Is this collective corporate madness? Perhaps...
Whatever the volume of escaped petroleum, the spill is just part of a much bigger problem. Russia has more than a million miles of gas and oil pipelines, many of them poorly maintained and some in very bad shape. Every year, up to a fifth of Russia's total oil production is lost -- partly to theft, but much of it through leakage. Komineft, the company whose oil is now polluting the northern terrain, is one of the most consistent offenders. For six years, says Stephen MacSerraigh of the oil industry magazine Nefte Compass, "the Komineft pipelines have averaged about...
...huge fire, started after a bridge collapsed over oil pipelines during torrential rains at a government storage depot, surged through the village of Durunka, killing at least 200 people. The flaming petroleum, carried on flood waters 200 miles south of Cairo, was still burning out of control late this afternoon. A local member of Egypt's ruling National Democratic Party criticized the government for building the depot in a densely populated area...
COLOMBIA. The Cusiana field yielded nothing more than a pair of dry holes before the Triton Energy Corp. of Dallas staked a claim in the mid-'80s. Because Triton lacked the capital to explore the area, it sold an 80% share to British Petroleum, which took in France's Total as an equal partner. Today the consortium is part of a joint venture with the state oil company, Ecopetrol, which is developing an estimated 2 billion bbl. in Cusiana and the neighboring Cupiagua field. That could be just the beginning: the partners' plan to invest $6 billion over the next...
...times since 1987, and have lately taken to kidnapping and assassinating local officials in an attempt to extort some of the oil wealth that has flooded into the region. "It's a plague," said Gustavo Wilches, governor of the area where Cusiana is located, in January. "The discovery of petroleum is destroying us." The very day he spoke, guerrillas shot down a helicopter over an oil field and others kidnapped the husband of one of the area's most powerful politicians...