In the past few weeks, much has been made of the fact that the United States has become a net exporter of petroleum products. Not of oil mind you -- we still import about nine million barrels a day of crude and ship out a tiny fraction -- but of refined products, such as diesel, gasoline, and jet fuel. According to the AP, they've become our most valuable export.

CHEYENNE, Wyo. — A U.S. Environmental Protection Agency draft finding that it may have detected groundwater pollution resulting from a controversial technique that plays a huge role in modern oil and gas development isn't settled science yet.

Did you know that when someone posts something on the LDAR.COM Forum that it can send you an email notification automatically? Never miss a beat. Always be in-the-know, a part of the action, the person others look to for knowledge. All of that.

It’s easy. I’m going to tell you how.

1) Click on Forum like you always do (it’s just to the left of the green Blog button).

2) Click on the LDAR Community discussion to open and show all the threads (topics) people have posted.

3) Scroll to the bottom and click the box labeled “Email me when this forum has a new thread.”

That’s it!...

My kids poke fun at me whenever we go on vacation because I usually pack a large bag of unread Wall Street Journal newspapers. Some go back for  months, but more on that in a moment. On Sunday, I picked up the Saturday edition for Nov 12 (I’m already a day behind), and spotted an article about Henry Thorne. I learned that Mr. Thorne is an engineer, inventor and entrepreneur. He and a money guy founded Thorley Industries and created the 4Moms brand of high tech gear for babies and toddlers. Well, I guess it’s more for the moms if it makes the babies stop crying, hence the name.

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Here’s a link to a June 27, 2011 article Posted by Ken Cohen

“You really have to wonder why the New York Times is campaigning against cleaner-burning, domestically produced natural gas.” source link

Following in the footsteps of Marathon Oil, Conoco Phillips will spin off its refinery business to focus on exploration.

Reuters

The Street

An IBM worldwide survey of information-technology professionals concludes that within 5 years more developers will be working on mobile applications than on traditional computing platforms for enterprise. Wall Street Journal Link

Image originally posted on The Zendesk Blog

Excerpted from The Hill

Exxon Mobil said Wednesday it has discovered an estimated 700 million barrels of oil equivalent at a deepwater well off the Louisiana coast, a major find that a top House Republican argued should push the administration to speed up offshore permitting.

"This is one of the largest discoveries in the Gulf of Mexico in the last decade,” Exxon Mobil Exploration Company President Steve Greenlee said in a statement.

Exxon Mobil made the discovery after the Interior Department’s Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, Regulation and Enforcement (BOEMRE) approved an application in March allowing the company to resume exploratory drilling. Drilling at the well was halted in the aftermath of last year’s Gulf of Mexico oil spill.

The well is located about 250 miles south of New Orleans in about 7,000 feet of water, Exxon Mobil said.

 

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We just got the inside scoop from FLIR.  “PetroTherm Returns!”  In case you missed it, FLIR used to host a conference dedicated to Optical Gas Imaging that often featured LDAR applications and case studies.  It’s coming back, but under a different name.  THEY ARE LOOKING FOR ADDITIONAL PRESENTERS!  Do you have a topic pertaining to leak detection using the Camera? 

Here’s what we’ve heard on the street from FLIR…

We [FLIR] are continuing the old "PetroTherm" optical gas imaging conference...

At the ISA Fugitive Emissions LDAR Symposium in New Orleans this year we had the benefit of learning from the experience of others.  It’s no small feat to be a presenter at an ISA Symposium.  You have to select, develop, write, edit, re-write, refine, finalize, rehearse, edit, rehearse, and finally present a meaningful topic in front of an audience that happens to include the best and brightest in our industry. 

The audience doesn’t see how much time it took to prepare for that 30 minute appearance.  Nor do they see how much time it took for the corporate legal department, management team,...