Oil exports down
Could someone notify our clueless congresscritters?
Fresh data from the U.S. Department of Energy show the amount of petroleum products shipped by the world's top oil exporters fell 2.5% last year, despite a 57% increase in prices, a trend that appears to be holding true this year as well.
Maybe if they'd known this before hauling the oil executives up to Capitol Hill last week, they might not have made as many fatuous statements as they did. Then again, who am I kidding?
For all the attention paid to China's increasing energy thirst, rising energy demand in the Middle East may pose the greater challenge. Last year, the region's six largest petroleum exporters — Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Iran, Kuwait, Iraq and Qatar — curbed their output by 544,000 barrels a day. At the same time, their domestic demand increased by 318,000 barrels a day, leading to a loss in net exports of 862,000 barrels a day, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.
Demand in the Middle East is a major factor right now, said Adam Robinson, an oil analyst at Lehman Brothers in New York. Mr. Robinson predicts the region will constitute more than 40% of increased demand next year.
Now that I think about it, maybe we should conceal the rising usage/falling exports within OPEC nations from members of Congress. It'll just make them more inclined to follow through on the notion of suing OPEC.
The unstated assumption would go something like this: The nerve of those countries, using more of the product that lies under their soil, when everyone knows we have the right to buy as much as we want at a price of our choosing so we don't have to drill off our own coasts. (Yes, I know they subsidize, and we all know that's foolish. What do you want to do about it?)
Oh, and there's this cheery sentence buried in the article: "Mexican officials announced Monday that output from the country's once-mighty offshore Cantarell field had plunged by a third in less than a year."
Someone call a priest to administer last rites to Cantarell. Then call a bookie to place bets on the year when Mexico ceases exporting oil, like Indonesia, which acknowledged its status this week by announcing it will pull out of OPEC at year's end.
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[...] Source: Oil Exports Down [...]
Pingback on May 29, 2008 @ 11:51 am
If even the Wall Street Journal has figured out that we’re screwed when it comes to our dependency on foreign oil, then how come Congress hasn’t figured that out yet? And when and if they do figure it out, why don’t they just explain it to the public and use this news to justify sharply expanding oil drilling in the U.S.?
Comment on May 29, 2008 @ 1:40 pm
ural:
You don’t want congress to start telling the truth now, do you? That would expose them (and their past lies) for the frauds they are…with the exception of Ron Paul, of course.
We don’t want our leadership to admit they’ve been lying and have indeed failed us.
That would make us feel bad and all the nice sunny days will go away…
Comment on June 2, 2008 @ 4:12 pm
[...] lord, haven't we already had enough preening and posturing by clueless lawmakers over the alleged "manipulation" of the oil [...]
Pingback on June 3, 2008 @ 9:16 am
[...] lord, haven’t we already had enough preening and posturing by clueless lawmakers over the alleged “manipulation” of the oil [...]
Pingback on June 3, 2008 @ 12:58 pm
I’m sooo sick of Faber & all the rest of you guys making excuses 4 these highway bandits who have the gun at our heads extorting billions by manipulating the oil markets. Faber says if we do a windfall profits tax on the oil company’s “they will stop exploring” for more oil. THEY r not looking 4 oil-WHY would they when it is so easy to play the extortion game? They r NOT taking delivery of the oil, that is the reason that less came in-it sits on the oil tankers off shore, but all I hear from everyone is total, complete BS! And I heard the worst yet on CNN-if we have stock in XOM we should be happy about their huge profits BECause (r u ready?) we will get SOME of those profits back!I truly couldn’t believe I heard such malarky-it should get an award for the most unintelligent statement ever uttered & yes, it did come out of a blonds mouth to make matters worse.I’ll have to change my hair color. Pleease stop with this hogwash before I need a padded cell-call it for what it is-total and complete manipulation to extort massive profits from a public kept captive by the unmasked bandits.
Comment on June 11, 2008 @ 8:47 pm