"Chilly Reception: Fears of Terrorism Crush Plans For Liquified-Gas Terminals: Activists Claim an Explosion Could Create Deadly Fires; Dr. Fay Spreads Message (Industry Says Fuel Is Safe)," by John J. Fialka and Russell Gold, Wall Street Journal, 14 May, p. A1.

"Chinese Oil Demand Puzzles Market: Sudden Shifts in Usage By Second-Largest Market Make Forecasting Difficult," by Bhushan Bahree, WSJ, 14 May, p. A6.

"As Prices Rise, Russia Alters Oil Politics Toward U.S.," by Erin E. Arvedlund, NYT, 14 May, p. W1.

Three big players and uncertainty abounds about future energy requirements and the ability to meet them.

U.S. is very tight on natural gas, but doesn't seem to have the political will to deal with that capacity crunch. Don't worry, it will when the prices get high enough, but expect serious price fluctuations and spurious explanations for failure (terrorism threat!) until then.

With China, it's all about how much energy they will need over the coming years and decades that has the global market uncertain. Depending on the trajectory of its growth, the numbers on energy project out to a widely varying degree. And since you can't make energy infrastructure appear out of thin air, the global markets are taking these long-term projections very seriously. Having done a lot of research on this, I will tell you that every year, when the Department of Energy revises its China projections just a bit here and there, it ends up changing the 2025 numbers a whole damn lot, so basically every number on China's future energy requirementsóno matter how far you look outócarries a high degree of swag, or uncertainty.

Finally, again with Russia, what looked like this rapidly growing relationship between a stable source (Russia) and a buyer looking (like everyone else it seems) to reduce its "dependency" (an overblown concept if you check the numbers) on Middle Eastern oil is now looking a whole lot more iffy. What drives this most? The arrest and ongoing investigation of Mikhail Khodorkovsky, billionaire founder of Yukos. As I noted in the book, the government's prosecution of Khodorkovsky calls into question the preservation of private ownership rights in Russia, which makes investors shy away (no surprise) and sours potential deals involving energy multinationals.