RENEWED ENERGY: Big Oil Looks To Renewables For Future Profit

[OKIsItJustMe]

http://www.cattlenetwork.com/content.asp?contentid=204517

RENEWED ENERGY: Big Oil Looks To Renewables For Future Profit

WASHINGTON (Dow Jones)--As crude oil prices soar to new highs, big oil companies are looking beyond the windfall to place bets in the growing alternative energy market.

In addition to the allure of a new market, there are worries that record-high oil prices could lead to a backlash plunge in demand. But there are other reasons the petroleum industry wants to plan for a more alternative-energy future. Dwindling access to new oil reserves, which is seen constraining supplies and forcing prices ever skyward, and a global political push to both cut greenhouse gases and shift to cleaner-energy technologies, are driving oil firms to the alternative energy industry.

"We want to be one of the leaders in the trade and operations of biofuels worldwide," Jose Sergio Gabrielli de Azevedo, chief executive of Petroleo Brasileiro S.A., or Petrobras, told Dow Jones Newswires last week at an international renewable energy conference here.

As governments around the world enact new climate change laws and renewable energy directives, companies like Brazil's state-owned petroleum champion Petrobras are leveraging their finances, infrastructure and expertise to capitalize on the new energy reality.

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