Rising oil
** Oil prices climbed to their highest levels in nearly two weeks on Monday morning as fresh attacks on Saudi Arabia and oil tankers near the Strait of Hormuz put Middle East supply risks back at the center of the market, outweighing President Donald Trump’s announcements of additional Russian diesel supplies and a Russia-Ukraine energy ceasefire.
Costly
** The cost of shipping crude oil soared to record highs last month as the Iran war reshuffled trade routes and patterns and tied up more tankers in inefficient and lengthy voyages. Supertanker rates soared in September to above $1 million per day on the Persian Gulf to China route—a record high.
Enforcement
** The U.S. military said on Saturday it had disabled a commercial cargo vessel in the Gulf of Oman after the ship’s crew ignored warnings and attempted to run a naval blockade against Iran.
Houthis
** One person was killed and nearly a dozen hurt in a new attack Riyadh’s international airport on Sunday, Saudi authorities reported, a day after a strike claimed by Yemen’s Iran-aligned Houthis that killed 13 people and wounded more than 300.
Austria
** Austria’s final solar subsidy round of the year attracted 43,300 applications in its first 10 minutes, far exceeding demand in the previous round. The government is now preparing to overhaul the scheme in 2027, shifting its focus from PV installations to battery storage and smart energy management systems.
US energy developments
** More than 200K customers in FL and AL were still without power on Sunday night, after Hurricane Isais barreled through this weekend.
** A bipartisan group of senators is calling on President Donald Trump to “immediately reverse course” on his decision to allow Russian diesel imports, accusing the administration of violating federal law and handing Moscow a financial lifeline as it wages war against Ukraine.
** Contract truckload rates have climbed to a 52-week high of $2.72 per mile plus fuel, up 18% year over year, as carriers and shippers reset agreements at elevated levels, according to FreightWaves SONAR data presented in an Oct. 9 market update.
** The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has opened $180 million in funding to replace and upgrade existing diesel fleet infrastructure in an effort to reduce fleet emissions. Eligible alternative fuels under the 2026 Diesel Emissions Reduction Act include propane autogas.
** Across the Permian Basin, hundreds of oil and gas well pads are awaiting reclamation, creating a growing need for restoration practices that work in the region’s challenging environment. A multi-year research partnership between the Borderlands Research Institute (BRI) at Sul Ross State University and Apache Corporation (Apache) is providing new information to help identify practical, effective approaches for restoring well pads as they reach the end of their operational life.
** AES Indiana is working with Google to serve the tech giant’s planned data center near Indianapolis. Google will foot 100% of the bill for the needed infrastructure and generation to serve it, with “no cost shifting to existing customers.”
** Oracle has been delivering gas by truck to keep its data center near Salt Lake City running, while it waits for a gas pipeline to get built, Bloomberg reported. It’s using the same strategy for a new OpenAI campus in Texas—and now it might also truck in gas to Project Jupiter in New Mexico, where a gas pipeline is delayed.
