Results tagged “OPEC” from Green Mesh

OPEC agreed to maintain current production quotas, concerned that a fourth cut since September risked increasing energy costs during the worst global economy in six decades. bloomburg.com

It's interesting because these countries rely on a certain value of oil to fuel economies heavily tied to oil revenue. Common sense says to take a hit now because a global depression will slow your own recovery.

Meanwhile, back in the U.S., AIG is serving up a round of fresh taxpayer bonuses for executives who helped create the toxic investments that helped cause the financial mess because their contracts must! be honored. washingtonpost.com

OPEC is scrambling to tighten up supply as the price crude has dropped 56 percent decline in 16 weeks. Even when they moved to close the flow today, the price continued to fall.

Some effects beyond making U.S. drivers happy and adding a stimulus to the U.S. economy.

• With fewer petrodollars now flowing to the Gulf, Russia and other regions, a major source of global liquidity and investment in places like the United States and Europe is beginning to shrink.
• Iran's representative said that prices below $90 a barrel would hurt.
• A continued drop in oil prices, and a tough domestic economy, could jeopardize the position of Iran's president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who was elected on a populist platform and who faces re-election next year.
• Some analysts believe Hugo Chávez needs $100 a barrel to finance his expensive social programs and continue his international activism.

nytimes.com

It appears that low oil prices hurt the people who don't like us very much, foreign oil producers don't have the money to buy up our stuff in the U.S. and we don't really have any control over the supply of oil when OPEC's members control 40 percent of the world's oil exports.

Look for more OPEC drops in supply if the price of oil doesn't increase.

I think I will "help" out those suffering from low oil prices by not driving my car tomorrow.

The House voted today 236-189 to allow oil drilling off the nation's Atlantic and Pacific coasts if states agree -- but only 50 or more miles out.

The bill rolls back $18 billion in oil industry tax breaks and imposes new oil and gas royalties, while giving tax incentives for wind and solar industries and for conservation. (AP)

President Bush vetoed the bill saying "its a waste of time" and opponents argue that 50 miles is beyond where most of the estimated 18 billion barrels of oil is located.

Republicans who recently shouted "Drill Baby Drill" at their national convention hate the bill and the Democrats say drilling needs to be part of a comprehensive alternative plan.

The Republican's believe that the bill is an election year gimmick against the will of the people which is to lower gas prices.

Fifteen Republicans crossed the aisle to support the bill Tuesday. Thirteen Democrats voted against it.

Since we really don't control the the world oil market, of which the rest of the world has the majority of the oil and the oil we drill in the future will just flow on the world market.
Domestic drilling + OPEC = no impact (greenmesh 9/08)

As the United States feeds a global economy with outsourcing and imports the demand for global oil will just increase far greater than anything we can drill.

Even if we drill tomorrow it will take years before oil hits the world market.

The drilling initiative is almost pointless in the long or short-term, though it squeaks out a tiny addition to the world oil supply beyond the next decade.

The alternative is to...find an alternative? I don't get the problem with the bill.

OPEC oil ministers agreed today to trim overall output by more than 500,000 barrels a day in a compromise meant to avoid new turmoil in crude markets while seeking to bolster falling prices.

The news sent oil prices rising. Light, sweet crude for October delivery rose 97 cents to $104.23 a barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. (AP)

Oil had a short-lived dip below $100 due to sluggish demand and weakening global economies.

During the Republican National Convention, more than once, the people in the crowd responded to speakers with the chant, "Dril. Dril. Drill." It's an exciting knee-jerk reaction akin to the gas tax holiday (greenmesh 5/08).

We import over 50 percent of our oil from foreign entities that control the global price based on their own internal manipulation of the supply.

Of the 1,143.355 billion barrels of world proved reserves of oil, the United States has 20,972. (U.S. Energy Information Administration 8/27/08)

It really doesn't matter how much you drill here when someone who owns the majority of the resource can manipulate the price. It isn't like we get to keep what is drilled for ourselves.

Oil companies are global companies. When they are given the green light to start drilling that company sells the oil on the global market. Then those who have a majority of the resource (OPEC) manipulate their output to regulate price.

So drilling domestically really won't change the equation other than bolstering profits for global oil companies constantly thirsty for new sources of oil to prove to stockholders that there is a future supply of oil.

And it makes a great chant for conventions by people who are longing to take the situation unsolved for decades, because it is too profitable for those who control it, into their own hands and start boring it with a drill.

We are just feeding the machine by drilling with no short or long-term solution for consumers. If anything, if we don't let global oil companies drill our oil sometime decades from now, OPEC will suck themselves dry and we will still have dwindling reserves. This isn't likely though because we are always tapping our own reserves.

We Should be chanting, hydrogen hydrogen hydrogen... or solar, solar, solar or maybe, Think, Think Think !! and come up with some plausible alternative energy sources and implement them.

I can recall presidents since the 1970's, Republican and Democrat, all saying we need to free ourselves from the dependence of foreign oil. Some were mildly successful.

Here we sit in 2008 with the same dependence on foreign oil we enjoyed thirty years ago chanting "drill, drill, drill".