Iran Warns: ‘Get Ready for Oil to be $200 a Barrel’

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THE TOP FIVE

1. Iran warns: ‘Get ready for oil to be $200 a barrel’

Oil prices surged 8% as Iran refused to start ceasefire talks with the United States and vowed to drive oil prices up by more than 100%. In a statement, Ebrahim Zolfaqari, a spokesperson for Iran’s Khatam al-Anbiya military command headquarters, said the world should “get ready for oil to be $200 a barrel” as “we will never allow even a liter of oil to pass through the Strait of Hormuz for the benefit of the United States, the Zionist regime, or their partners.” Living up to its threat, Iranian missiles struck three ships Wednesday attempting to cross the narrow channel in the Persian Gulf through which about one-fifth of the world’s hydrocarbons typically flow. The U.S. military, after vowing to safely shepherd ships via the waterway, turned down requests yesterday for an escort, The Wall Street Journal reported. During a televised appearance Wednesday with Fox News’ Laura Ingraham, Secretary of Energy Chris Wright said the Strait would reopen “hopefully in the next few weeks.” Later that evening, during an interview that aired on CNN, President Donald Trump said the strait was in “great shape,” promising, “We’re going to look very strongly at the strait.”

Mind the gap between 2024 and 2025. EIA

In the meantime, the International Energy Agency agreed to release more than 400 million barrels of oil from the world’s strategic reserve, by far the largest disbursement in history. Wright’s Department of Energy, too, will release 172 million barrels onto the market to keep prices down. The U.S. just refilled the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, which the Biden administration tapped to battle surging inflation a few years ago. In fact, U.S. crude exports fell last year for the first time since 2021, in large part due to efforts to redirect flows to the national stockpile, according to analysis the Energy Information Administration just released. All that stored oil will only cover about a month of global demand, Heatmap’s Matthew Zeitlin wrote yesterday, succinctly summarizing the stakes like this: “This oil supply shock is very, very bad.”

2. An AI industry super PAC is pouring money into the race to replace Marjorie Taylor Greene

Big money is pouring into the U.S. congressional race to replace former Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene in her conservative district in northwest Georgia. The first big spend came from Leading the Future, a super PAC backed by artificial intelligence companies that raised more than $125 million last year. According to Atlanta Journal-Constitution reporter Greg Bluestein, the group is spending $500,000 to back Republican Clay Fuller, Trump’s favored candidate, ahead of next month’s special runoff election. Taylor Greene, a right-wing populist who resigned from office following a public fallout with the president, emerged as a fierce critic of the AI industry’s data center buildout. Georgia led the nationwide push to ban data centers, with a state lawmaker introducing what The Guardian called one of the country’s first bills to put a moratorium on the buildout.

3. Chile’s new right-wing president heralds a shift on copper, lithium, and hydrogen

With copper prices at a record high, shifting political winds in major mining countries matter more than ever. All eyes, as I told you last month, are now on one of South America’s richest countries. On Wednesday, Chile inaugurated José Antonio Kast as its new president, replacing the copper- and lithium-rich nation’s most left-wing leader in half a century with its farthest-right head of state since the fall of former dictator Augusto Pinochet. The sea change comes just a month after Chile became the latest country to sign onto an 11-nation minerals accord with Washington, according to Buenos Aires Times. One of the first moves Kast is expected to make is placing mining under the country’s economic development ministry, and appointing Daniel Mas — an agribusiness executive with no background in mining — to be in charge. “Supporters of the model argue that tighter alignment between mining and economic policy could improve coordination on investment and competitiveness,” reporter Agustín de Vicente wrote in the Valparaíso-based mining trade publication Reporte Minero. “Critics, however, warn that mining’s technical complexity, long project cycles and strategic importance require dedicated expertise and institutional focus.” The next big priority will be permitting reform for the mining industry. The prospects for the green hydrogen industry are less clear. Under leftist President Gabriel Boric, the government last year approved a $423 million green hydrogen project, part of a burgeoning industry in the country. The Boric administration unveiled a finalized national strategy for green hydrogen just a week before the inauguration. Whether Kast holds to that plan remains to be seen, but it’s more likely he’ll overhaul the policy.

On the opposite side of the global copper supply chain, Mongolia is demanding earlier payments and a larger share of the sweeping Oyu Tolgoi copper mine the country co-owns with Rio Tinto. The government of President Ukhnaagiin Khürelsükh, which owns a 34% stake through the state-owned Erdenes Mongol LLC, said it considers the current agreement unfair and wants dividend payments on a faster schedule in addition to a 60% share of returns. “These discussions reflect our continued commitment to working together to achieve Oyu Tolgoi’s full potential for the benefit of all partners,” Rio Tinto told Mining.com.

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4. A Chinese offshore wind company is going public

Dajin Heavy Industry, a Chinese manufacturer of offshore wind foundations, has begun promoting its plans to go public on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange, offshoreWIND.biz reported. The privately-owned Beijing-based company has so far self-funded its expansion, including a new assembly plant in Tangshan, the development of a fleet of deck carriers for transporting turbine components, and direct investments into wind and solar projects across China. It’s a sign of how much China’s wind industry is growing. As I reported in Monday’s newsletter, global wind installations hit a record high last year as Chinese companies surged into dominance, seizing eight of the top 10 manufacturer slots. Last October, Matthew wrote that a Chinese company’s new factory in Scotland augured the eventual takeover of one of Europe’s few strong domestic energy industries.

5. Myriad Uranium doubles the size of its Wyoming project

The Canadian mining startup Myriad Uranium has announced plans to double the size of its Copper Mountain Uranium Project in Wyoming, increasing the total holdings from about 9,439 acres to 18,351 acres. The expansion, the company said, came after a recent “high-resolution radiometric and magnetic survey” revealed that the deposit likely stretches east of where the existing project has already explored. “Confidence is increasing that we now have one of the largest uranium projects in the United States,” Myriad CEO Thomas Lamb said in a statement. “As uranium prices rise, a progressively larger share of our endowment will transition into economic viability, offering strong leverage to the steadily increasing price of uranium.”

THE KICKER

If I were a cornier writer, I would earnestly try to come up with a Sonic pun. University of Oxford researchers found that ultrasound-repellers could save hedgehogs from cars. A study published Wednesday in Biology Letters demonstrates for the first time that hedgehogs can hear high-frequency ultrasound, highlighting the possibility that repellers could deter the mammals from scurrying into roads where they’re frequently killed by cars. “Having discovered that hedgehogs can hear in ultrasound, the next stage will be to find collaborators within the car industry to fund and design sound repellents for cars,” Sophie Lund Rasmussen, the assistant professor who served as lead researcher on the paper, said in a press release. “If our future research shows that it proves possible to design an effective device to keep hedgehogs away from cars, this could have a significant impact in reducing the threat of road traffic to the declining European hedgehog.”