Energy & Fuel

"LONDON — BP returned to profitability with a better-than-expected third-quarter profit, prompting the oil giant to raise its dividend."

"LARAMIE, Wyo. -- The idea behind the sculpture that appeared on the University of Wyoming campus about 16 months ago was simple but provocative: a swirl of dead wood and lumps of coal, intended to show the link between global warming and the pine beetle infestation that has ravaged forests across the Rockies."

"THREE RIVERS, Tex. — The refinery business has long been the difficult stepchild of the oil industry, expensive to run, prone to accidents and a low-margin headache for executives who preferred drilling for gushers. But signs of the improving fortunes for the industry can be seen at Valero Energy's Three Rivers refinery here, about 70 miles south of San Antonio at the doorstep of a giant new shale oil field."

"After years of working to obtain permission from the state, Alberta-based U.S. Oil Sands Inc. was given the final go-ahead Wednesday to develop the first commercial oil sands project in the US."

"The hillside vineyards of New York's Finger Lakes region make money producing fine Rieslings and inviting tourists to sip white wine by the water's edge. Now winery owners are worried about the prospect of a grittier kind of economic development: gas drilling."

Fracking has brought economic boom times to some parts of the U.S. As the price of natural gas sinks, the question arises: what will happen when the boom is over?

"High-profile U.S. protesters against the Canadian oil sands are taking their activism north this week, as the battle over a pipeline that would send crude to Asia enters a critical regulatory stage."

"Solyndra, the solar panel maker that failed despite a $528 million federal loan, on Monday won court approval for its plan to repay creditors and end its politically charged bankruptcy, after a judge overruled objections by the U.S. government."

"NEW YORK -- Dozens of wells drilled this year across rural Ohio are quietly pumping out the answer to the U.S. energy industry's most loaded question: Is the Utica shale formation, touted as a potentially $500 billion frontier, a boom or a bust? Yet the answer is likely to remain concealed for some time."

The Texas-based energy company TXU was, under the Bush administration, supposed to be the cutting edge of a coal resurgence. The 2007 leveraged buyout of TXU is widely regarded to be one of the worst deals in private equity history. But the firms that led it -- KKR, TPG, and Goldman Sachs -- made money with big fees even as the company tumbled toward financial ruin.