Energy Newstand: Going Green in Motor City

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Oil prices are torn between Middle East tension and U.S. economic worries and inched higher Monday, reports AP. DonÂ’t look to OPEC for supply-side relief, notes Bloomberg: No sign of a production increase ahead of next monthÂ’s Vienna meeting.

Maybe Motown will help. Big automakers unveiled a new slate of alternative-fuel vehicles at the Detroit Auto Show: A Toyota plug-in hybrid (NYT), a diesel-hybrid land rover (Green Car Congress), and a green Hummer. The WSJ auto mavens discuss how car insides are trumping outsides this year. Venture capital is throwing cash at electric cars, reports the WSJ: The latest is a luxury plug-in partly backed by Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers.

Old technologies are making a comeback, the WSJ says. Cleaner diesel could be the easiest way to meet new CAFÃ‰ standards, led by European automakers. GM, for its part, is looking closer to home, taking a stake in biowaste ethanol producer Coskata, part-financed by Vinod Khosla. The move has some auto analysts puzzed, notes the NYT, but the energy billÂ’s biofuel mandates are driving a new round of investment, says the Free Press.

Western oil majors face more investment in Kazakhstan: Eni, Exxon, Total, and Royal Dutch Shell reached an agreement with the Kazakh national oil company to end the impasse hamstringing work on the massive Kashagan field. Western majors will sell part of their stakes at below-market prices, notes the WSJ, and will cough up $2.5 to $4.5 billion to compensate project delays, reports the FT.

Shell, Total, and Eni are hedging their bets elsewhere, reports the Guardian, boosting Nigerian natural gas production by 20% with the completion of a new LNG terminal. Total is spreading its wings the widest, Marketwatch says, through a joint venture with utility Suez and nuclear giant Areva to build a pair of nuclear reactors in Abu Dhabi, the latest entrant in the Middle East nuclear power race.