Insight and inspiration in turbulent times.
In the past week, oil prices have regained about US$3 a barrel after hitting a low of $45. Apart from the perennial US weather factor, positive sentiment was reinforced by IEA (International Energy Agency) data revising previous forecasts for world oil demand growth in 2005 by 80,000 barrels per day.
Transneft president says, “Beyond 2005 we will probably reach the ceiling in [Russian oil] output. The period of easy oil extraction is over and to boost output further we need serious capital investment and more time.”
Asia’s insatiable appetite for oil coupled with tight supplies has triggered the start of a global bidding war for oil from the Middle East, the head of ChevronTexaco Corp. said on Tuesday.
Such openness is rare; it set me back on my heels. The question came last Monday as I finished a lecture in Pewaukee, Wisconsin–the first of a handful of talks I gave for “Great Decisions 2005.”
OPEC, producer of more than a third of the world’s oil, and the European Union plan to hold twice- yearly meetings to discuss how to maintain a stable oil price acceptable to producing and consuming countries.
But many Caspian estimates proved to be unrealistic, at least in the short term. Experts now say the Caspian should in coming years pump some 4 million to 5 million barrels per day, on par with Iran.
Although the United States has long consumed the lion’s share of the world’s resources, this situation is changing fast as the Chinese economy surges ahead, overtaking the United States in the consumption of one resource after another.
British manufacturers’ raw materials costs rose at their sharpest pace in four and a half years in January as the price of crude oil and imported goods surged.
China will rely on oil for more than half of its energy by 2010, when net imports will rise to between 180 million tons and 200 million tons of oil a year, a Chinese official said.
The skeptics think that it is already too late. Isn’t time to get serious about peak oil and global warming? About navigating The Bottleneck? About imminent global societal collapse?
India is fighting China in the battle for Russian oil by angling for a supply deal and a stake in Yuganskneftegaz, the oil unit that was seized from Yukos and is now owned by Rosneft, the state oil company.
Oil and stocks both finished higher last week. They may not be able to move in tandem for ever. But the long-term oil bulls aren’t backing off.
