A portenteous decline in Mexican oil exports

[GliderGuider]

The headline of the article in the International Herald Tribune is, "Mexico's oil production falls 6.4 percent in first two months of year", but the most ominous fact in the story is that Mexico's oil exports fell by 14.6 percent in the same period. Why is this ominous? Check out the "Export Land Model" of peak oil: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Export_Land_Model

Mexico's oil production falls 6.4 percent in first two months of year

MEXICO CITY: Mexico's oil production fell 6.4 percent in the first two months of the year compared to the same period in 2007, while exports fell by more than twice that much, the state-owned oil company reported Monday.

Daily crude output fell to an average of 2.94 million barrels per day in January and February, Petroleos Mexicanos, or Pemex, said. Exports were down 14.6 percent.

Unlike global oil production, which may never decline all the way to zero, it's conceivable that the international oil export market could run dry. Given that Mexico is one of the largest suppliers of oil exports to the USA this development, though not unexpected, is deeply worrying.

[hatrack]

1. Yowza - 6.4% in two months? Maintenance & rework issues?

No mention of such in the article, I noticed . . .

[GliderGuider]

2. That's 6.4% YOY, not 3.2% per month.

An annual decline of 6.4% is on the high side of the average decline expectations of most PO pundits. There seems to be a consensus that 4% pa will be an "average" rate of decline for a post-peak oil province. 2% would be good, 6% would be bad, 8% would be catastrophic. So far, Mexico is merely "bad"...

[hatrack]

3. Thanks for the correction - as you say, "bad" as opposed to "pants-crapping cataclysmic"

:evilgrin:

[Dead_Parrot]

4. Demi Moore is into leeches

not good.

:crazy: