Click on the headline (link) for the full text.
Many more articles are available through the Energy Bulletin homepage
Interview: Top Iraq oilman Thamir Ghadhban
Ben Lando, UPI Energy Editor
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates, Sept. 19 (UPI) — Thamir Ghadhban has served in several political and technical capacities in Iraq’s oil sector. He’s been oil minister twice since 2003, has sat as a politician crafting Iraq’s constitution and is now Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki’s top energy adviser.
He sat down with United Press International on the sidelines of the Iraq Oil, Gas, Petrochemical and Electricity Summit organized by the Iraq Development Program in Dubai earlier this month to talk about issues facing his country’s energy sector.
(19 September 2007)
Venezuela’s National Oil Company’s Vision for Social Development
Bernardo Alvarez, Energy Tribune
National oil companies (NOCs) are in the ascendancy throughout the world, and the traditional oil and natural gas model relating to international energy development and markets must be revised accordingly.
Until recently, international oil companies (IOCs) managed the world’s oil and natural gas markets, essentially solely for the profitability of their shareholders. Invariably, this model worked to the detriment of the countries whose natural resources were being exploited. This approach could never be justified; new realities no longer make it tenable.
NOCs have become sophisticated, extremely capable, and quite profitable business entities in their own right. Compared to IOCs, NOCs enjoy comparative advantages, and are also gaining competitive advantages throughout the value chain. As such, a major shift from the IOCs to the NOCs has occurred in control of reserves and production of both crude oil and natural gas.
In the 1970s, IOCs controlled more than 80 percent of the world’s oil reserves. Today they control less than 10 percent. As noted by the James A. Baker Institute at Rice University, state-owned enterprises now represent the top ten reserve holders internationally. By comparison, the big IOCs – Exxon Mobil, BP, Chevron, and Royal Dutch Shell – now rank 14th, 17th, 19th, and 25th, respectively, in crude oil reserve holdings.
What must be understood and accepted, moreover, is that NOCs appropriately have another mandate as well. As state-owned enterprises, they also serve as social contributors to their countries’ overall sustainable development, and are an economic engine to be harnessed for the benefit of their populations. In this respect, it is difficult for some in the United States to recognize the legitimate aspirations of those in the developing world to control their own destiny. A country has the sovereign right to develop and manage its non-renewable energy resources as it sees fit.
Bernardo Alvarez is the Venezuelan ambassador to the U.S.
(19 September 2007)
U.S. business columns are dominated by the viewpoints of international oil companies (IOCs). It’s hard to make good policy if you only hear one side of the story. -BA
Energy CEOs call for Canadian national policy
Doug Saunders, Globe and Mail
In Alberta’s oil patch, the words “national energy program” are usually uttered as a curse, a reference to the ill-fated 1980s program of oil nationalization and price controls.
But in a possible sign of changing times, several senior Canadian energy executives have used a gathering in London this week to make an unprecedented call for an increased federal role in their industry – some even daring to call for Ottawa to develop a comprehensive national energy policy.
“I firmly believe that developing and implementing a national energy strategy would help resolve many of the issues” facing the oil and gas industries, said Patrick Daniel, chief executive officer of the petroleum pipeline and distribution firm Enbridge Inc. “A national strategy would help in mapping our energy development agenda and serve to prioritize our initiatives, including R&D and training.”
Leaders in the oil, gas, pipeline, energy retail and electricity industries – and especially those involved in the high-stakes oil sands sector – came together at an annual meeting of Canadian and European CEOs to call on Ottawa to deliver regulations, infrastructure investments and immigration and education policies.
While such federal roles have been actively opposed in the recent past, the CEOs now believe that only a strong federal role will ease the cost burdens faced by the companies and the uncertainties faced by their shareholders, and also overcome the patchwork of provincial and federal laws with a unified national program.
(19 September 2007)
Coal industry asks for still more handouts, and Washington lends an ear
The Coal Nine Yards
Brian Beutler, Grist
We’re gradually learning how the U.S. government will approach our country’s energy needs in the carbon-constrained future — and if you were envisioning a future free of mining the earth for dirty energy, you should probably check the optimism.
Two important hearings on Capitol Hill earlier this month strongly indicated that we’re stuck with coal — and a coal industry generously supported by the American taxpayer — for the foreseeable future.
Coal industry representatives were invited to explain to key members of the U.S. House of Representatives why the federal government should ply it with hundreds of millions of dollars on top of the fat subsidies it already receives. Said Michael Morris, CEO of American Electric Power, “This is a willing industry, a willing company, a willing people who simply want to have a timeline to allow [carbon capture] technology to develop so that in fact we don’t just get a political sound bite, but we get something that works.” Well, OK, they want a little more than a timeline — namely, some sizable handouts.
(19 September 2007)
The fuel merchants of Zimbabwe
Andrew Molefe, The Sowetan
… She was waiting for a “business associate” whom she had to pay for a job he did for her.
It turned out the business associate was a transport man with a tanker who, twice a week, runs errands for Mavis by slipping into Botswana to purchase fuel.
“Is business good?” I enquired.
“Better than good,” she said without modesty.
Mavis is one of those people who believe that there’s no better time to make loads of money than during times of crisis.
As the economy of her country crumbles and price controls bite and the pumps run dry, this is where Mavis and her fellow flotsam and jetsam come in.
“I buy a tanker-full of fuel in Botswana and sit tight on it until Harare runs dry and the prices go up,” said the fuel merchant of Harare, kicking one expensively shod leg over the other.
Sam is a mystery. Badly paid hotel staff fight over themselves to be at his beck and call and Harare’s beautiful young things made a beeline to our table.
But he never spoke about himself. He leaves the talking to his conspicuous wealth. And the language is vulgar. On our first encounter, he drove me to my hotel in the most luxurious German sedan I have had the fortune of driving in.
(20 September 2007)
