Australia’s the most promising destination for the drillers hoping to apply US shale techniques overseas. Read More
It's hard to imagine anyone better suited to covering the energy-investment waterfront than Robert Rapier.
Robert is no armchair analyst—he has two decades of in-the-trenches experience in a wide range of fossil fuel and biofuel technologies, including refining, natural gas production, gas-to-liquids, ethanol production and butanol production.
During a six-year stretch at ConocoPhillips, Robert ran a team of engineers in Scotland working on oil and gas projects in the North Sea.
For two years, Robert was an efficiency expert in a Texas petrochemical plant. The process changes he implemented saved the facility $9 million a year. He later worked as the Engineering Director for a Dutch environmental-technology company and provided engineering support for a Chinese facility the company was constructing.
Robert was also a butanol engineer in Germany for the Celanese Corporation, where he designed a novel butanol unit that cut production costs by $5 million per year.
In all, Robert has spent more than a dozen years working on liquid fuels technologies. Along the way he's picked up five patents, including one for a breakthrough way to convert ethane into ethylene (U.S. Patent 7,074,977).
Now, in addition to guiding readers to timely investments in Utility Forecaster and Rapier's Income Accelerator, Robert travels the world evaluating startup energy companies for deep-pocketed investors. After grilling management and assessing the technology on-site, he makes a go/no-go investment decision. His wealthy private investors and hedge fund backers trust him to make the right choice for the same reason we do: his vast real-world experience in just about every facet of the energy industry. If Robert votes thumbs-up, millions of dollars flow into these cutting-edge outfits.
Robert earned his master of science in chemical engineering and a bachelor of science in chemistry and mathematics (double major) at Texas A&M University. He tells us he was "this close" to finishing his Ph.D. before he decided he was having a lot more fun making money in energy stocks.
A prolific writer, Robert's articles have appeared in Forbes, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post and the Christian Science Monitor -- and he has been a featured expert on 60 Minutes and The History Channel. His new book, Power Plays: Energy Options in the Age of Peak Oil (Apress, 2012), helps investors sort through doom and gloom, hype and misinformation to understand the true costs, benefits and trade-offs for each of our major energy options.
In what little spare time he has left, Robert consults for a number of energy projects, including biodiesel, ethanol, butanol and biomass gasification facilities.
Analyst Articles
Fast-growing incentives tend to trump the lower yield. Plus: chat follow-ups on AmeriGas and Legacy and a Kinder Morgan earnings update for subscribers. Read More
The pipeline stock has been on a roll of late, and could keep going. Plus: Robert’s quick takes on Pembina, Halcon, Swift and GasLog and a Schlumberger earnings update for subscribers. Read More
Crude should get cheaper this year and natural gas more costly. Meanwhile, one ailing former darling of the cleantech craze could end up worthless. Read More
Crude should get cheaper this year and natural gas more costly. Meanwhile, one ailing former darling of the cleantech craze could end up worthless. Read More
If interest rates continue to rise, some of the biggest recent winners among MLPs could struggle. Read More
US drillers are pushing for a reversal of the ban on crude exports, but some refiners like their inputs cheap too much to let that slide. Read More
Most MLPs are well-hedged against downside commodity moves, but nitrogen and natural gas producers have plenty of upside. Read More
Most MLPs are well-hedged against downside commodity moves, but nitrogen and natural gas producers have plenty of upside. Read More
I got the natural gas price and crude differentials right, but didn’t reckon on endless delay for the Keystone XL. Read More