Schlumberger cuts 9,000 jobs due to low oil prices

The oil company Schlumberger recently laid off 9,000 workers due to the rapid decrease in oil prices. The cost of oil has dropped by more than 50 percent since June. The 9,000 workers that were laid off by the company makes up about 7.5 percent of the company's global workforce. Earnings were down as well for the company, 82 percent lower than they were one year ago. The company has had to make several costly charges due the drop in oil prices, as well as almost completely restructure and resize. Among these charges were a $296 million charge for the 9,000 jobs, $590 million of seismic assets due to the restructuring of the company, $472 million for devaluation in Venezuela, and $199 million for oilfield assets due to the drop in value as a result of the decrease in oil prices.  

While it's beneficial for most of the population to have lower oil prices, these low prices are causing quite a noticeable impact on the oil field and its workers. With the size of the oil industry, a lot of damage might be caused as a result of lost jobs due to the budget cuts from the sharp decline in oil prices.

The fall in the price of oil and gas provides a once-in-a-generation opportunity to fix bad energy policies

The price of energy has been on a steep decline for the past several months. Oil is the most noticeable form, due to its enormous presence in the world's energy supply, but other forms of energy have been dropping, as well. Natural gas prices are the lowest they've been in 10 years, and cleaner, renewable forms of energy have been dropping in price as well due to the increase in understanding and production of the technology. This all-around drop in energy prices poses an excellent opportunity for the country's government to make some much needed changes. 

Rarely is such major change possibly in such a short amount of time, but because of how rapid the fall in prices have been a major change is achievable. Taking advantage of the current low prices in energy the country can reform its energy policy to include more efficient, renewable, and clean alternatives to the old methods that have been used for years. 

I think this is a very good opportunity for the United States as well as other country's to move away from non-renewable resources. Moving away from non-renewable resources and redoing the infrastructure of how the country gets its energy will greatly benefit future generations.

Exelon must shoulder financial burden of its nuclear plants

Exelon established six nuclear power plants over the course of several years. In the past decade, they have done fairly well bringing in more than $21 billion in profits. The high profits can largely be attributed to high electricity prices. But as the price of natural gas and oil have been steadily decreasing recently, many consumers are turning to those means of energy. Because of this recent loss in interest in what the nuclear plants have to offer, profits for the plants have been quite low and Exelon is seriously considering closing up to half of its power plants. 

Exelon has been pushing for legislature to get consumers to pay more, which would all-around be bad for consumers, but all-around good for the company. This may seem like a ridiculous request that would never be met by the local government, but Exelon has ties in government and the plants provide many jobs. There would need to be a few necessary guidelines for this piece of legislature to work: the first would be to share the risks and rewards of the increased investment in the plants equally between the company and the consumers. The second requirement would be that the state would need to prioritize clean and efficient energy resources, so that the plant would gain more profits. The final guideline is that any support is to be given only after an analysis of Exelon's financial situation.

I don't like the fact that a private energy company can make billions of dollars, but once they start to lose money they have the power to influence government into helping them out. In a mostly free-market economy, there shouldn't be this level of influence over the government to receive financial help.

India’s economic growth is driving its energy consumption

India’s economic growth is driving its energy consumption

As the world's fourth largest energy consumer, India has far from a low energy consumption. Their economy is also quite large, the tenth largest in terms of US dollars. When looking at real GDP and purchasing power India is has the third largest economy. Despite the current large size of their economy, it continues to grow, and has grown substantially over the past couple decades. Over the past 15 years their real GDP has grown at a rate of 7% annually, and continues to grow. 

While a growing economy is generally a good thing, it means an increase in consumption of goods, resources, and especially energy. India has struggled in the past to provide adequate energy resources, relying heavily on foreign imports. Despite having the World's fifth-largest coal reserves, of which this resource is their primary source of energy, their is still a shortage of energy. The energy consumption per capita in India is substantially lower than that of developed countries, but because of the very large population in India the lower per capita energy consumption helps the problem of energy minimally. As the county's economy grows, and their energy consumption with it, it will be a challenge for the country to provide and afford an adequate supply of energy.

It is good to see that developing country's economies are growing. India is one of the developing countries whose presence has become quite noticeable in the world economy in the past several years. It will be interesting to see how the country solves the issue of energy consumption.