Back in the USA they're waiting to see if Hurricane Gustav blasts the refineries in the Gulf of Mexico while Republican presidential candidate John McCain reckons there are votes in his energy policy of "drill, drill, drill", just about everywhere.
In his Scottish lair Gordon Brown is fretting over whether he dare hit oil and gas companies with a windfall tax -- strange, in a way, given that in a recent poll even 57% of Tory voters said they would welcome one as they're worried about their bills too.
Stavanger is an appropriate setting because the Norwegians keep finding more reserves of gas and have thus emerged as a much-needed alternative to the volatile Russians, certainly as far as the gas-starved UK is concerned (no-one seems to want to sell it to us).
The US may not be managing to kick the oil habit but it certainly seems determined to return to the time when it supplied its own energy needs rather than depending on unreliable foreigners who've recently been using their trade surpluses to buy big chunks of US banks.
While Gordon Brown knows that a winter of rising fuel bills may be the last straw as far as his rebellious party is concerned.
But he's worried that the cartel of energy companies who control the UK market will take their ball home, in the sense of reducing much-needed investment in new energy sources such as nuclear and renewables if he hits them with a tax.
Credit crunch or not, the markets are not likely to recover until the "developed" Western economies manage to stem the vast transfer of wealth to oil producers and exporters like China.
Oil and gas rich Russia currently has reserves of about £450bn, exporter China has a staggering $1.44 trillion.
Some estimates have it that so-called sovereign wealth funds, which include operations in Singapore and China as well as the oil producing countries, will have reserves of $12 trillion by 2015, roughly the size of the US economy today.
Which is one reason why the UK and the rest of Europe are in recession and we're all feeling poorer.
GfK can't find an ally to bid for TNS
German market researcher GfK said today that it hasn't been able to find a backer to make a counter-bid to WPP's £1.1bn offer for Taylor Nelson Sofres. Talks with private equity fund Apax broke down last night.
WPP's Sir Martin Sorrell now has the option of extending the deadline for his bid, which will hinge on what happens to the share prices of TNS and WPP over the next week or so.
Last night TNS closed at 268p, almost exactly Sorrell's offer. But Sir Martin has said that TNS' share price will fall back to the 148p it was languishing at before he entered the lists to spike an agreed "nil-premium" merger between TNS and GfK.
TNS also reported its half-year results today, showing strong revenue growth of 17% although operating profits were flat and pre-tax profits down after allowing for the costs of the aborted merger with GfK and trying to fend off WPP.
Sorrell could win the day with a small cash increase in his bid but has so far said that he's offering a full and fair price and won't increase it.
Will TNS shareholders back CEO David Lowden? Lowden said earlier this month that he had a number of hedge funds and other short-term shareholders on his register.
These shareholders will take WPP's cash anyway but they may be tempted to hold out for a higher offer.
Independent defies the odds and boosts profits
Well not the Independent per se but Independent News and Media, the company controlled by former Heinz boss Tony O'Reilly that owns papers in Ireland, South Africa, Australia and New Zealand.
O'Reilly made his early name as a fleet-footed rugby union winger for Ireland and the British Lions with a series of startling performances in the territories in which his newspaper empire now operates.
Dublin-based INM has reported interim profits up 28% at 48.7m euros and says it's on target to hit full year forecasts, not something you hear very often in the newspaper business these days.
The silver-tongued septuagenarian, who now styles himself Dr Anthony O'Reilly, still has rival Irish tycoon, the pesky Denis O'Brien on his register with 27%.
O'Brien wants INM to ditch the Independent and Independent on Sunday in London, which still cost the empire money. O'Reilly reckons a London flagship is good for the empire and he likes it, anyway.
O'Brien and his aides will be poring over the small print to see how much the Indy costs. But O'Reilly's hand will have been strengthened by these results.
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