Oil markets have entered a "super-spike"' period that could see 1970's-style price surges as high as $105 a barrel, investment bank Goldman Sachs said in a research report. Goldman's Global Investment Research note also raised the bank's 2005 and 2006 New York Mercantile Exchange crude price forecasts to $50 and $55 respectively, from $41 and $40.

These forecasts sit at the top of a table of predictions from 25 analysts, consultants and government bodies surveyed by Reuters.

"We believe oil markets may have entered the early stages of what we have referred to as a 'super spike' period a multi-year trading band of oil prices high enough to meaningfully reduce energy consumption and recreate a spare

capacity cushion only after which will lower energy prices return,'' Goldman's analysts wrote

. (Dikutip dari agensi berita Reuter 30 Mac 2005)

The United States must act now to deal with peaking world oil production or face disruptions far greater that the 1973 oil embargo or the 1979 Iranian oil cutoff, according to an article in the spring issue of Issues in Science and Technology. Evidence that world oil production will peak in the near future is becoming more compelling all the time, according to the article by Robert L. Hirsch, Roger H. Bezdek, and Robert M. Wendling, who produced a recent report on the subject that was published by the Department of Energy's National Energy Technology Laboratory . (Di kutip dari journal Issues In Science and Technology terbit pada 29 Mac 2005 keluaran National Academies dan University of Texas Dallas.)

Nippon Oil Corp announced its largest wholesale price hike in 14 years Tuesday for gasoline and other petroleum products for April due to sharp crude oil price increases. Japan's biggest oil refiner said it will raise the wholesale price for April by 5.1 yen per liter from March, the largest hike since an 8 yen increase in October 1990 amid the Persian Gulf crisis. The latest hike follows a 3.3 yen increase for March . (Dikutip dari agensi berita Kyodo News 30 Mac 2005)

Oil giant Shell revealed the extent of its declining reserves today after replacing only 19% of the oil that was pumped out of the ground in 2004. Shell said its recoverable reserves stood at 11.9 billion barrels at the end of December, down from a restated figure of 12.95 billion barrels a year earlier . (Dari Berita Shell 31 Mac 2005)

Planet Earth stands on the cusp of disaster and people should no longer take it for granted that their children and grandchildren will survive in the environmentally degraded world of the 21st century. This is not the doom-laden talk of green activists but the considered opinion of 1,300 leading scientists from 95 countries who will today publish a detailed assessment of the state of the world at the start of the new millennium . (Dikutip dari rencana Feeding The World under Climate akhbar Independent 30/03/2005)