Slow rise: Crude oil inventories across the U.S. posted another build last week, but the pace at which crude tanks are filling remained much slower than in weeks past. As FuelFix.com reports, oil in commercial storage grew by 1.9 million barrels to a total of 490.9 million barrels, according to figures compiled the U.S. Energy Information Administration. The 1.9 million barrel gain is the third consecutive week that oil stores have grown by 5 million barrels or fewer. The smaller recent builds are a departure from the regular, massive builds of 10 million barrels or more that had been common earlier in the year. FuelFix.com has more.
Another new gig: Former Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke is joining Pacific Investment Management Co., or PIMCO, as a senior adviser, his second consulting agreement with a top money manager in as many weeks. As Bloomberg reports, Bernanke will contribute his economic expertise to the firm’s investment process, the Newport Beach, California-based firm said Wednesday. The 61-year-old, who led the U.S. central bank during the deepest economic downturn since the Great Depression, earlier this month joined Citadel, the hedge fund run by Chicago billionaire Kenneth Griffin, to advise on monetary policy, financial markets and the global economy. Read the Bloomberg story for more.
Big rig: Houston-based LoneStar Energy Fabrication has completed work on a $5.1 billion Big Foot drilling platform that is now ready to begin drilling in the Gulf of Mexico, the company announced Wednesday. The extended tension-leg platform, which LSEF says is the industry’s largest, will operate in the Big Foot oil and gas field, 225 miles south of New Orleans. The structure, which took two years to complete, will house 200 workers and has the capacity to produce 75,000 barrels of oil and 25 million cubic feet of gas per day. Standing more than 40 stories above the Gulf of Mexico and weighing in at more than 8,200 tons, it will operate in waters 5,200 feet deep, where pressure exceeds 2,325 pounds per square inch. “Big Foot is now onsite being moored and should begin drilling soon,” LSEF President Brian Shanklin says in a prepared statement.
