Behind The Data

This is Behind the Data, where I take you behind the energy market analysis I'm publishing online.I open with the research piece I wrote at Foundations of Energy on why the UAE is leaving OPEC now. Most of the commentary I was reading focused on what happens to oil markets after the decision, e.g. how much more the UAE will produce, how Saudi Arabia responds, what instabilities follow. All reasonable questions. But the angle I felt was missing was the causation running the other direction: oil markets had already been changing in ways that made capital discipline the dominant logic, and the UAE was reading those tea leaves. The decision is a consequence of where the market was heading, not the start of the turbulence.From there I share a clip from the opening session of Oil & Gas Market Mastery's second cohort, where I walk through the first framework I teach: when you see an energy market headline, ask yourself whether it's more about supply or demand. It sounds almost too simple to be useful. But with the volume of headlines we're getting right now (between the Iran war, macro turbulence, and ongoing OPEC+ moves) the two natural responses are to tune out entirely or to try to ingest everything deeply. Neither works. This framework is the 80/20 version: a small amount of rigorous thinking applied consistently builds market fluency without requiring hours of your day.Next I get into Shell's $16 billion agreement to acquire ARC Resources. The Shell-bp parlor game gets all the oxygen, but Shell-ARC actually happened, and the deal sits at the intersection of three threads I've been working: how energy management teams communicate strategic moves, capital being deployed in the direction of energy security, and the geopolitical repositioning happening between the US and Canada under the current administration. Shell's slide deck and press language tell you a lot about how they want investors to read this and what they're betting on.I close with my time in Birmingham at the U. S. Steel customer event, where I joined a panel on market dynamics and tubular goods, and got to tour Fairfield Works. I'd never been inside an integrated steel and pipe mill before, and the post was partly a reaction to the sensory experience (the scale of the buildings, the heat off the furnaces, the constant motion) but also a reminder of the existing US industrial footprint and how aggressively capital and innovation are being steered into it. As wells get longer, deeper, and more demanding, the equipment side has to keep pace. Fairfield is one example of how that's happening.The second cohort of Oil & Gas Market Mastery is underway. You can still jump in and catch up. Learn more at https://krimmelsg.com/ogmm

This is Behind the Data, where I take you behind the energy market analysis I'm publishing online.I open with SLB's Q1 2026 earnings release and a word cloud I built from the text. Two words sat at the center: "digital" and "production." Neither is new for SLB, but both took on different weight this quarter against the backdrop of the Iran war, higher oil prices, and the reality that producers aren't racing to expand drilling programs. The path to incremental barrels right now runs through mature wells, and SLB's ChampionX deal is looking well-timed.From there I get into the talk I gave last week to open the Xait Forum here in Houston. The title was "From Advantage to Imperative," and the argument is that capital discipline, demand uncertainty, and the pressure to do more with less have moved digital tools from a nice-to-have to a necessity for energy companies. The whiz-bang demos are fun, but the market forces underneath them are what should be driving the urgency in the room.I close with GE Vernova's Q1 2026 results, where Q1 power equipment orders alone exceeded all of 2025. That's the kind of number that should temper skepticism about how much of the AI and data center conversation is hype. The more interesting thread inside the GE Vernova story is the tension between utility-scale and decentralized power, including why the big gas turbine OEMs remain so cautious about expanding capacity even with the backlog they're sitting on. It's a story I'm spending a lot more time on, both in the research and in the talks I'm getting invited to give.The second cohort of Oil & Gas Market Mastery kicked off last week. We're one session in, with eleven to go, and you can still jump in and catch up. Learn more at https://krimmelsg.com/ogmm

This is Behind the Data, where I take you behind the energy market analysis I'm publishing online. In this episode, I start with the webinar I hosted on reading the market after six weeks of war, and why I think this conflict is such a rare teaching opportunity for anyone trying to build real mental model fluency, the kind that avoids both false certainty and head-in-the-sand paralysis.Then I get into why US E&Ps have stayed disciplined on production even with oil prices elevated, and the piece of the story that I think gets underplayed: the Gulf states have their own vote in whatever resolution the US and Iran land on, and the longer the war drags on, the messier that becomes.From there I turn to bp's move to collapse its reporting segments down to Upstream and Downstream, eliminating the low-carbon segment entirely. I walk through what reporting structure decisions actually signal, about where management believes earnings will come from, and about the tradeoff between optimizing multiples and optimizing earnings dollars.I close with Norway's record crude exports, and why they're a useful antidote to the tribal dunking that often dominates conversations about European and California energy policy. The reality of both is more pragmatic and more complex than either side tends to admit.The next Oil & Gas Market Mastery cohort launches Thursday. If you want to develop executive-level market fluency alongside a cohort of peers taking it as seriously as you are, you can learn more at krimmelsg.com/ogmm.

In this episode, I go behind some of the energy analysis I've been publishing recently.I start with why oil markets may not normalize until late 2026, and the conversation I've been having with a New York Post reporter about the lingering disruptions from the Iran war. I walk through why repairs that could in principle be done in days or weeks will take months in practice, from reconfigured maritime insurance to the paralyzing new reality of shippers negotiating with both the Iranians and the Americans to move vessels through the Strait of Hormuz.Then I reflect on my recent appearance on Maciel Diaz's podcast, where I told my personal story in greater depth than I have before, and what it taught me about embracing non-traditional elements in a career as labor markets shift under the weight of consolidation, AI, and political turbulence.I close with the importance of building market fluency: why it's a scarce skill, why the returns to it are growing, and why I built Oil & Gas Market Mastery to help executives develop it.To learn more, join my upcoming webinar on Wednesday, April 15th at 12:00 PM US Central Time, where I'll talk about how to read the market six weeks into war: krimmelsg.com/ogmm-info. The next OGMM cohort kicks off Thursday, April 23rd.This is Behind the Data, where I take you behind the energy market analysis I'm publishing online.

In this episode, I go behind some of the energy analysis I've been publishing recently.I start with the recent surge in WTI prices past Brent, and what these price movements reveal about how stakeholders and well-capitalized entities are processing the ongoing Iran war. Then I explore the persistent reality of capital discipline among US oil producers, and whether a prolonged closure of the Strait of Hormuz could be the catalyst that encourages US drillers to accelerate their production. From there I connect the dots between the first cargoes loading at Golden Pass LNG and disrupted Qatari production, highlighting why the US Gulf Coast is becoming an increasingly secure and attractive destination for energy infrastructure capital compared to the vulnerable Strait of Hormuz. I close with some reflections on the completion of the founding cohort of my Oil and Gas Market Mastery (OGMM) program, and why equipping the next generation of energy leaders is more critical than ever as the industry consolidates and asks fewer people to do more work.To learn more about the next OGMM cohort launching on Thursday, April 23rd, visit krimmelsg.com/ogmm.This is Behind the Data, where I take you behind the energy market analysis I'm publishing online.

In this episode, I go behind some of the energy analysis I've been working on recently. I start with a CNBC inquiry that pulled me into the petrochemicals value chain, and what I found about the split between upstream feedstocks and downstream products. From there I step back and look at how the energy conversation is shifting: from sustainability to affordability to security, and why it's important to find a productive path through this conversation. I close with the Valero Port Arthur refinery outage, and why a major refinery going down right now is particularly painful for the market.This is Behind the Data, where I take you behind the energy market analysis I'm publishing online. 

 In this episode, I go behind some of the energy analysis I've been publishing recently. I start with a question that's been on my mind: why are energy executives still uneasy even as oil prices sit near $100 and profits are strong? Then I get into the Brent-WTI spread surge and what's driving the widening gap between international and domestic oil prices. From there I connect some dots between the Alaska LNG project and the Iran conflict that are important for the LNG sector as a whole. And I close with some reflections on a guest lecture I gave to the Texas A&M Professional MBA program. I discussed what I shared, what surprised me, and what their questions revealed about how the next generation of business leaders thinks about energy. This is Behind the Data, where I take you behind the energy market analysis I'm publishing online.