** A federal judge has canceled the Biden administration’s late 2021 sale of new oil-and-gas drilling leases in the Gulf of Mexico. The ruling that the greenhouse gas emissions analysis by the Interior’s Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) was insufficient is a win for green groups that challenged the decision, as they seek to curb fossil fuel production.
** Exxon Mobil Corp and the United Steelworkers union (USW) have swapped proposals as they work toward possibly ending a nearly 10-month lockout by the company of Beaumont, Texas, refinery workers, Exxon said.
** Elon Musk tweeted frustrations with President Biden for highlighting electric vehicle production by GM and Ford, but not Tesla. Commenting on a video of Biden talking with GM CEO Mary Barra, Musk called the president “a damp sock puppet in human form.”
** U.S. oil producer Hess Corp posted quarterly profit that handily beat Wall Street estimates, boosted by crude prices surging on the back of recovering demand and fears of a supply crunch.
** Chevron Corp on Friday reported a fourth quarter profit that missed Wall Street estimates despite sharply higher oil and gas prices. The first of the major oil companies to report quarterly results posted adjusted earnings of $5.1 billion, or $2.65 a share, on profits from pumping oil that soared about five times the pandemic-depressed results of a year ago.
** Former Democratic senators Heidi Heitkamp (N.D.) and Mary Landrieu (La.) are joining a group that promotes natural gas. A press release from the group, called Natural Allies for a Clean Energy Future, said the ex-senators would be joining its leadership council, which seeks to promote the use of the fossil fuel in the energy transition.
World
** China will jail forty-seven steel company officials for faking air pollution data, in a sign that Beijing’s crackdown on firms that are flouting environmental rules is intensifying.
** Exxon plans to begin oil production from a second platform offshore Guyana next month, Reuters reported this week, citing an unnamed source familiar with the company’s plans. The second production facility would increase Guyana’s oil output threefold to 340,000 bpd, the report noted.