Commodities Focus

In the latest installment of the S&P Global Platts Commodities Focus podcast, Harry Weber, a Platts senior natural gas writer in Houston, is joined by Dania El Saadi and Claudia Carpenter in Dubai. Dania is a Platts senior editor, Middle East news, and Claudia is Platts editorial lead, Middle East crude. They discuss the recently completed Gastech, the biggest in-person gathering of gas market participants since the coronavirus pandemic erupted almost two years ago. While there were nibbles around the edges of the market, the conference did not produce any major firm long-term offtake agreements that might help developers sanction a new liquefaction or regasification project. The attendees shared their outlooks, ideas for controlling fossil fuel emissions, technical innovations for cutting project costs, and thoughts about geopolitical and regulatory opportunities and challenges facing the industry.

As Europe struggles to replenish natural gas inventories, prices reach all-time highs, with Platts Analytics forecasting even more gas-to-oil switching throughout the coming winter. While European gas and power supply and demand hangs in balance, market participants look to controversial Nord Stream 2 for a sign of hope, as the project enters certification proceedings. S&P Global Platts Managing Editor of European Gas Gary Hornby, Platts Analytics Senior Gas Analysts Valentina Bonetti, and UK Power Analyst Shubh Shukla discuss the outlook for gas and power with Felix Fernandez.

Global polyethylene prices and trade flows have been hit by challenge after challenge, from the coronavirus pandemic since early 2020, the deep freeze in the US in February, to the recent container shortage that has driven freight rates to record highs. With the hurricane season still on in the US, new quality standards expected to be implemented in India, logistical issues in Europe, and polyethylene plant startups in the coming months, the question on when prices and trade flows will normalize continue to hound market participants. S&P Global Platts market experts Heng Hui, Ashna Mishra and Sarah Trinder join Kristen Hays to share their insights on what's shaping global polyethylene markets today. For more commodity news and analysis, visit https://www.spglobal.com/platts/en

A lack of vessel space, high freight costs, port backlogs and a shortage of truck drivers, the logistical challenges facing the plastics industry have multiplied across 2021. Join Platts petrochemical editors Aziz Ehtaiba, Sarah Trinder and Callum Colford as they discuss what this has meant for polymers and ask Platts Analytics Yi-Jeng Huang what's next for the markets.

Emerging economies and their successful vaccine rollouts will be key to the short-term recovery of the oil tanker market, after the highs of 2020, as it works through a period of low freight rates. International Seaways CEO Lois Zabrocky and Platts EMEA senior writer for transport fuels Tom Washington discuss the state of the market and where it is pointing.

California has one of the most aggressive clean energy goals in the US and the state leads the US in utility-scale solar capacity and battery storage capacity. More recently, discussions have picked up regarding offshore wind in the West. Platts power news editor Kassia Micek discussed with Commissioner Karen Douglas the work the California Energy Commission is doing to develop offshore wind along the West Coast.

Germany goes to the polls on September 26 in the most open contest for years. As Chancellor Angela Merkel prepares to step down, S&P Global Platts' news and analytics experts discuss the daunting energy challenges facing her successor. The rally in natural gas prices adds uncertainty and may overshadow coalition talks that will set the framework for the coming four years as the new government has to put Europe's biggest economy on track for the new 2045 net zero target.

Leaders in the public and private sector are faced with the possibility of more frequent and intense weather events -- winter storms, heat waves, cyclones, wildfires -- as anthropogenic climate change continues, and must decide whether they should "price in" the risk of such events in building more robust and sustainable energy infrastructure. Michael Webber, chief technology officer at Energy Impact Partners, discusses the opportunities and challenges to that approach with Mark Watson, S&P Global Platts senior editor for North American electricity and gas, and Kieran Kemmerer, power sector analyst at Platts Analytics.

Tariff uncertainty, high freight rates, labor issues and other dynamics have combined with supply constraints and healthy demand to elevate global aluminum premiums. And all that's happening as the value chain -- from producers to end-users -- is grappling with decarbonization and other big-picture challenges. Hear from S&P Global Platts senior North America aluminum editors Tina Allagh and Sarah Baltic, along with Christopher Davis, Platts Regional Pricing Director for Metals in the Americas, about how US market participants are navigating these difficult times and more.

Companies operating in Latin America have set their eyes on nascent opportunities in the region like Guyana and Brazil, as Mexico has put the liberalization of its upstream sector on hold. But the attractiveness of the 25 billion barrels of oil equivalent found in the deepwater Gulf of Mexico has not been lost because of politics. We talked with Sergio Pimentel, a partner at Mexico City consultancy Agon and a former official at CNH, Mexico's energy regulator, about the country's regulations and how they can still be used to bring investment into the country. We also talked with Bill Fuller of S&P Global Platts Analytics about the potential for Mexico's reserves and how private companies who have production contacts have performed in recent years.