Today's news that Envitec Biogas -  a producer, planner, constructor and commissioner of turnkey biogas plants - has just closed a deal worth EUR 60 million tells us a few things;

i) The continuing effectiveness of generous subsidies in Germany in attracting investment - recently revised to further promote Biogas
ii) Recent rises in natural gas prices across the world, with probably more to come are pricing Biogas into the mainstream
iii) On energy security issues, for the import of gas, Germany has no real choice other than Russia - talks of creating LNG terminals to tap into other suppliers have remained just that - that means the only real option is the exploitation of domestic gas supplies from biosources

The company is way off its highs since a year ago and in the face of this news, you wonder how long that will last.

Meanwhile, the other day I was interviewed on Al-Jazeera TV again and argued that OPEC was increasingly irrelevant and its importance long-overrated to the oil price. It was never as if they all sat down at a table and planned for $140 a barrel. As if they could ever all agree and flawlessly coordinate and trust each other !

The leading player in this game was the emerging market consumer, led by the Chinese middle class. China, I added, still plans to have 100 million more vehicles on its roads by 2020.