Oil prices & supplies – Mar 11

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Gas prices near records, following oil
John Wilen, Associated Press
Gasoline prices were poised Monday to set a new record at the pump, having surged to within half a cent of their record high of $3.227 a gallon. Oil prices, meanwhile, surged above $108 to a new inflation-adjusted record and their fifth new high in the last six sessions on an upbeat report on wholesale inventories.
(10 March 2008)

New ‘super-spike’ might mean $200 a barrel oil
Steve Gelsi, MarketWatch
With $100-a-barrel here for now, Goldman Sachs says $200 a barrel could be a reality in the not-too-distant future in the case of a “major disruption.”

… Goldman analysts Arjun Murti, Kevin Koh and Michele della Vigna said prices have advanced more quickly than Goldman had forecast back in 2005, when it predicted a range of $50 to $105 a barrel as part of its “super-spike” oil theory.

“We characterized the upper end of the band as more likely to be driven by geopolitical turmoil and that recession was a key risk to our view,” the analysts said. “In fact, oil prices have reached $100 a barrel without extraordinary turmoil, and the U.S. currently appears to be in recession.”
(7 March 2008)

Energy crunch hinges on Bolivia
Dan Keane, Associated Press
Facing blackouts and a looming South American winter, energy-gobbling Brazil and Argentina have an urgent message for their longtime natural gas supplier Bolivia: Step up production, and quick.

The two countries depend on their poorer neighbor for gas to power homes, businesses and cars. But Bolivia’s gas industry, stagnating after a decade of falling foreign investment, can no longer keep up with demand from the continent’s two largest economies.
(10 March 2008)

Unchanged Syncrude oil sands “increased” due to new category
Platts
COST says Syncrude end-2007 reserves at 4.9 billion barrels
—
The Syncrude oil sands project in western Canada had 4.9 billion barrels
of proved and probable reserves at the end of 2007, “virtually unchanged” from
the 5 billion barrels recorded a year earlier, part-owner Canadian Oil Sands
Trust said Monday.

… The increase is due to the reporting of a new category, known as
prospective resources, and a change in mine pit design criteria that expanded
the size of oil sands pits in some areas, said COST.
(10 March 2008)
See Gail Tverberg’s The disconnect between oil reserves and production.