** The Energy Department announced on Wednesday that it will make a major loan to a facility that would create and store clean hydrogen energy. It will loan $504.4 million dollars to the Advanced Clean Energy Storage Project, which will be located in Delta, Utah.
** Goldman analysts say crude-oil prices will need to average $135 a barrel, up from $125, in the 12 months starting in July for inventories to normalize by the end of next year.
** U.S. renewable energy developers have delayed or scrapped several big battery projects meant to store electrical power on the grid in recent months, scuttling plans to replace fossil fuels with wind and solar energy.
** From $60 at the end of last year, to more than $104 at Wednesday’s close, shares of oil giant Exxon Mobil Corporation (XOM) have surged 75% in less than six months.
** The nation’s solar-panel industry isn’t celebrating President Biden’s relief plan, calling it a “pittance” of aid. The federal funding may not even be available for the president’s new solar initiatives. That same pot also may be needed to address other supply shortages and national-security needs.
** A trade group representing Minnesota auto dealers petitions the state Court of Appeals to overturn the state’s clean cars rules that will require automakers to ship more electric and plug-in hybrid vehicles to the state.
** North Dakota regulators approve a permit for a landfill to begin storing radioactive oilfield waste.
World
** Oil prices could enter a “parabolic state,” posing a threat to global economic growth, the head of commodity trading giant Trafigura warns.
** -Russia’s Rosneft is holding back on signing new crude oil deals with two Indian state refiners, three sources with knowledge of the matter said, as it has committed sales to other customers.
** After two years of regular oil discoveries in Guyana, it seems its deep waters may hold even more crude, adding to its reputation as the next big oil-producing state.
** Iran expects an oil cargo confiscated by Greece to be returned in full, the semi-official Tasnim news agency reported Tehran’s ambassador to Athens as saying on Thursday, following a Greek court ruling quashing the original decision to confiscate it.