The PetroNerds Podcast

Recorded on October 30, 2024

Episode 119 of the PetroNerds podcast is a US election PetroNerdy special focussed on the impacts to US energy from this consequential Presidential election. Trisha Curtis, CEO of PetroNerds, is joined by Jason Issac from the American Energy Institute and former Texas representative.

This fun election special tries to get into the politics and policies while keeping it relatively entertaining. This podcast is politically focussed but it is not light on passion or data. Trisha does a fliparro where she hands off the moderating and interview to Jason and becomes the guest on her own podcast. Jason asks Trisha a series of questions from her interview with BBC to domestic policy impacts of the US election and foreign policy.

The goal of this podcast was to try and dispel some of the bias Trisha sees on market coverage with regards to energy, the economy, and the election. Trisha and Jason talk about policy impacts to US oil and natural gas as well as electricity prices, Iran and China. They talk about Harris’ flip flopping on fracing, what fracing actually is, and how a Harris Administration will be much harsher on oil and gas than the Biden Administration and how Harris’ domestic energy policies will be a continuation of his policies and much worse.

Trisha gets into inflation, lowering energy costs and electricity bills for the US consumer, and how to make the US consumer and US manufacturing competitive again. They discuss all of this and a lot more!

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Recorded on October 23, 2024 and October 2, 2024

Episode 118 of the PetroNerds podcast is part two of the politics, ESG, and climate special with Paul Tice, NYU Stern Professor, investor, and fellow at the National Center for Energy Analytics.

Trisha Curtis starts this podcast with a complete rip of the current volatility in US and global markets, oil prices, the US election, comments by Paul Tudor Jones on CNBC on debt and economic crises, the Harris team’s comments on not enabling US oil and gas and fracking, Baker Hughes’ CEO comments on the role of natural gas as a “transition fuel” and a “destination fuel,” and Trisha’s contentious interview with the BBC on their Rare Earth program. Trisha Curtis on BBC https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m00244x3

The conversation continues with Paul Tice and Trisha Curtis asks Paul a series of questions on ESG and ESG vs. DEI. Paul talks about companies and climate science and a lack of push back and leadership across the board. They get into regulations, the Paris Climate Accord, SDG rules, and Trisha gets into primary energy consumption in the OECD vs the non OECD. They talk about regulations and politics and fracking bans and the reality of a Harris Administration vs. Trump. Paul says we need to educate the public and use the legal system to push back. Trisha talks about politics, the election, and how the oil and gas industry may not be able to come back from another four years of this. Paul talks about the use of setbacks and other limitations to ban fracking without banning fracking. Paul and Trisha talk about US production, policies against the oil and gas industry, the resiliency of US oil production, and the industry’s need to get real on politics.

Paul says ESG allows the developing world to produce oil and gas while strangling the developed world and the West from producing oil and gas. He talks about the need to challenge the underlying premise of climate. Trisha asks Paul about the proponents of ESG and how it is distorting and impacting business and Paul dispels that ESG is not helpful for financial performance. Paul says oil and gas has to be more outspoken but also more selective in their investors. Paul Tice says “anyone who wants to talk about ESG metrics is not a real investor.”

Paul closes the podcast by saying there are ways to turn the tide with politicians and business leaders getting over the fear factor and pushing back on ESG and climate. There is soo much in this jam packed mic drop podcast you are not going to want to miss it folks. Share this PetroNerdy PetroNerds special with your friends and colleagues.

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Recorded on October 2, 2024

Episode 117 of the PetroNerds podcast is part one of a two-part PetroNerds special on the state of ESG policies and climate politics with Paul Tice. Trisha Curtis, CEO of PetroNerds, is joined by guest Paul Tice, author, NYU Stern Professor, and Fellow at the National Center for Energy Analytics. If you have been looking for a substantive podcast that gets into the politics of ESG and the current election, this is it. Trisha and Paul cover the gauntlet of issues surrounding investing and ESG (Environmental, Social, and Governance), and politics in the energy space, with the thread being Paul’s new book, The Race to Zero: How ESG Investing Will Crater the Global Financial System.

In part one, Trisha and Paul cover the SEC rule on climate, and Paul explains the outsized role of weather and transition risks, along with the increase in lawsuits against oil and gas that the SEC admits will happen. He gets into the incredible pressure on the oil and gas industry and what the 806-page SEC rule on climate actually does and is intended to do. They talk about the Fed, climate, and politics, and Trisha asks Paul where we are in the ESG timeline spectrum or stage. Paul says we are in the end stage or the enforcement stage of the Paris Agreements and the UN Sustainable Development Goals, which have not actually been fully ratified by both branches of the U.S. Congress.

Trisha asks Paul to get into manufacturing and utilities and the “transition risk” and the impact of this SEC rule on climate on these industries, their need for energy, and their ability to make things. They talk about the ability of U.S. companies to compete, with Trisha referencing Germany and the fact that half of their auto manufacturing capacity is currently idle. Paul gets into intermittent power, higher prices, less reliable power, outsourcing manufacturing, and companies having to get their own power with an “every man for himself” approach because they cannot rely on the grid.

Paul takes on politics here, explaining that these green climate policies are being pushed through by undemocratic means, largely by the left and the Democratic Party. Trisha and Paul close part one of this two-part PetroNerds special by talking about the themes of the book and whether oil and gas do better under a Democrat or Republican. The old thinking that oil does better under a Democrat needs to be reassessed in the age of aggressive ESG and climate policies.

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Recorded on September 18, 2024

Episode 116 of the PetroNerds podcast is a compact heavy hitting PetroNerds special focussed on explaining the role of traditional fuels in the economy and the reality of power generation and CO2 emissions in the US and China. This is Trisha Curtis’ talk at the Dry Fork power plant in Gillette, Wyoming on September 18th, 2024 to state legislators from across the US who were visiting Wyoming’s energy facilities on behalf of the Wyoming Energy Authority.

Trisha walks legislators through the actual data of US oil and gas production, US oil and gas prices, the dramatic rise in electricity prices, the incredible decrease in US CO2 emissions, and the dramatic growth in Chinese CO2 emissions. Trisha explains that China not only has 1/3 of global power generation, they also have more coal fired power generation than the US has total power generation. And Chinese CO2 emissions and global CO2 emissions are rising as the US and states like Colorado look to aggressively decarbonize and decommission reliable baseload power generation from coal and natural gas.

Trisha does this all in 15 minutes. This is a fast paced heavy hitting podcast that you are going to listen to more than once and share with all of your peers. Trisha gave this presentation and talk as the CEO of PetroNerds and the economist for the American Energy Institute. She introduces this podcast with a brief introduction to discuss the decline in oil prices, the interest rate cut by the Federal Reserve, and China’s stimulus efforts which are not helping oil prices.

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Recorded on September 11, 2024 and July 12, 2024

Episode 115 of the PetroNerds podcast is another jam-packed PetroNerds special you are going to listen to, relisten to, and share. This is the keynote address that Trisha Curtis gave to IPANM, the Independent Petroleum Association of New Mexico in Albuquerque, New Mexico on July 12th, 2024.

This podcast is front-loaded with an energy-dense PetroNerdy market update covering everything from the softness and deterioration in oil prices, the Fed and inflation, weakness in the Chinese economy, lack of attention on geopolitics, and updates on the war in Ukraine, elections in the US, and Chinese power generation stats and CO2 emissions and much more!

In this keynote address and talk Trisha covers the current state of the Biden Administration, global elections, US oil production, the health of the US economy and the consumer, inflation and the non recession, the non-ESG friendly energy transition, whack-a-mole CO2 emissions, the real problems with China, Russia, Iran, the war in the Middle East, Houthi attacks on ships in the Red Sea, Chinese CO2 emissions and exports of cheap green tech, the resilience of US shale, and everything in between.

Make sure to check out the article Trisha Curtis published with Real Clear Energy as the Economist for the American Energy Institute: “America’s Energy Success has Nothing to do with the Biden Harris Administration” https://www.realclearenergy.org/articles/2024/09/03/americas_energy_success_has_nothing_to_do_with_the_biden-harris_administration_1055870.html and the US shale paper Trisha Curtis did for the Oxford Institute for Energy Studies that was published in their September 2024 Forum Journal. The paper is called “US Shale Oil – Relentlessly Resident” https://petronerds.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/US-Shale-Oil-Resiliency-PetroNerds-Trisha-Curtis-September-2024.pdf

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Recorded on August 16, 2024

In episode 114 of the PetroNerds podcast, Trisha Curtis, CEO of PetroNerds, is joined by Chris Brown, VP of Policy and Research at the Common Sense Institute, to discuss the recent report Trisha co-authored on Colorado’s declining energy competitiveness.

Energy is not just a sector of the economy; it is the sector upon which all businesses rely. Colorado, along with the rest of the US, has witnessed a dramatic escalation in electricity and natural gas prices, despite natural gas prices being near all-time lows, below $/mcf, for multiple months this year.

In this podcast, Trisha and Chris discuss the main themes of this report, including the rising electricity and natural gas prices in Colorado, which are making the state less competitive from an energy cost standpoint. They also discuss where electricity is coming from in Colorado and the direct correlation between rising electricity costs and the increase of wind power into the grid.

Finally, they talk about Colorado’s CO2 emissions, which account for less than 0.3 percent of global emissions, and how Colorado shutting down coal-fired power plants is actually enabling higher CO2 emission growth out of China, increasing the cost of electricity and power generation in Colorado, decreasing grid reliability, and reducing the affordability of energy in the state.

The data is damning and alarming, and folks in Colorado need to be reaching out to the PUC, Xcel, and their local representatives, demanding a halt to more wind and solar power being added to the grid at the expense of the Colorado consumer, taxpayer, and household. The report, along with all the detailed charts and analysis, can be found here: https://commonsenseinstituteco.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/CSI-Report-CO-Energy-Competitiveness.pdf.

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Recorded on August 14, 2024

Episode 113 of the PetroNerds podcast is a must listen to episode to get you caught up on everything happening in the economy, oil prices, geopolitics, and escalation globally in hot wars.

Trying to figure out why oil prices seem to want to go down even when wars in the Middle East and Europe continue to escalate? Saw the sell-off a couple of weeks ago when oil prices dropped to $72? Trisha Curtis has you covered. Trisha walks listeners through current oil prices and recent volatility, what is happening with Iran, the US, and Israel, and Ukraine’s penetration into Russia.

She spends the first half of the podcast diving into the economy, the freshly dropped CPI/inflation print, jobs cuts at Cisco and Intel, the Federal Reserve, unemployment ratcheting up to 4.3 percent, and interest rates. She pivots into geopolitics by talking about oil and why oil prices or real oil prices less the geopolitical risk premium are probably lower.

She covers the IEA and OPEC monthly reports released this week as well as housing and refinancing of mortgages in the US, and the biggest trends in the market right now including weakness in the US consumer and a slowing China. She also talks about the Chinese economy and breaks down some of the figures inside the US inflation read and much more. This is your one-stop shop folks! And lastly Trisha talks about recent podcasts, forthcoming podcasts, and upcoming public speaking engagements.

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Recorded on July 31, 2024 and June 21, 2024

Episode 112 of the PetroNerds podcast is the keynote address Trisha Curtis gave to AAPL, the American Association of Professional Landmen (Trisha still calls it Petroleum). This is an absolutely jam-packed energy-dense podcast filled with intel to get you up to speed on oil prices, the economy, geopolitics, and war.

Trisha dives into the push and pull on oil prices, what is driving prices up or holding prices up, what is pressuring prices down or keeping a lid on prices, geopolitics and hot wars, inflation and the consumer, the relationship between Iran, Russia, North Korea, and China and continued attacks in the Red Sea and their impact on the global economy and oil prices.

She gets into the changing political landscape in Europe and across the world, China’s lack of economic growth, China’s production of green tech, the poor understanding of oil and gas, and lack of market coverage of oil and gas, a very anti-domestic oil and gas Administration in America, a slowdown in consumer spending and the economy and the Fed, black swans, the health of the US consumer, and high prices and inflation pressuring the consumer, not interest rates.

She covers the Biden Admin on energy policies and SPR, Chinese EV exports, Chinese oil demand and stockpiling, weapons flows from Iran and North Korea to Russia, and non ESG friendly green tech from China. And last but not least she takes a dive into US shale and the resiliency of production with less rigs and longer laterals despite regulatory headwinds and consolidation.

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Recorded on July 16, 2024 and May 17, 2024

Episode 111 of the PetroNerds podcast is a true PetroNerds special. This is a recorded webinar with the Liquid Energy Pipeline Association (LEPA) hosted by Andy Black, President of LEPA and Tad True, VP of Bridger Pipeline, part of True Companies.

Andy Black and Tad True ask Trisha Curtis a series of market related questions ranging from the macro and oil prices to price differentials and the blowouts seen in the early days of the Bakken shale boom. Tad talks about when he met Trisha, around 2012, and what was happening in the market at the time and asks Trisha to reflect and weigh in.

If you have been wanting to hear about markets and midstream, this is the podcast you have been waiting for. Andy Black starts the webinar off by asking Trisha about the state of the oil market and the drivers in oil prices and Tad True gets Trisha in the weeds on crude flows, the history and evolution of US shale, and the major price differentials and blowouts seen in the Bakken in North Dakota and West Texas Intermediate in Cushing, Oklahoma. Trisha and Tad look back at the massive price differentials between WTI and Brent at the time and the rapid growth in crude by rail.

This is an awesome and incredible conversation you are not going to want to miss folks. Please like it, review it, and share it with your friends and colleagues.

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Recorded on June 19, 2024

Episode 110 of the PetroNerds podcast is a heavy hitting intel dense podcast on everything you need to know about the health of the US economy, the health of the US consumer, inflation, the Federal reserve, interest rates, and how it is all impacting oil prices.

Trisha Curtis walks listeners through the US economy and explains how the consumer is being tapped out by high prices and how inflation, not interest rates, are actually driving down inflation to a degree. She explains the impact of high prices on the consumer and what is happening with supposed interest rate cuts, the stock market, and unemployment and jobs. She gets into the type of jobs being added and why the economy and the consumer is not that healthy. She talks about the Consumer Sentiment Survey from Michigan and how it relates to the problems the Biden Administration is having on convincing the US populace that the economy is good and healthy.

Trisha talks about employment and job gains and the types of jobs being added and the lack of high paying jobs being added in the economy. Trisha gets into the Houthi attacks in the Red Sea and the impact on goods prices, fuel cost. containers, and shipping times. Trisha talks about the Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR) and oil prices and why the Biden Administration will likely tap the SPR again and lower oil prices before the election.

Trisha gets into the “non recession recession” and where the jobs gains are, where they are not, and the fact that a lot of job gains are being filled with immigration. She discusses the impact of immigration on GDP and inflation and housing. She closes this jam-packed PetroNerds podcast by talking about oil prices, risk, the macro, and what is driving oil prices up and down. She covers geopolitics and gets into Russia, North Korea, Iran, and China, Iran and the Houthis, and the push and pull on oil prices. She squeezes in some commentary on US oil production, less rigs, and longer laterals, and Russian and Saudi production and spare capacity.

This is an absolutely intelligence packed podcast that you are going to listen to and re-listen to, like, and share with your colleagues and friends.

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