Why America Is Hopessly Dependent On SA For Oil - NYT

[hatrack]

EDIT

That is quite a change from four years ago. After the attacks on New York and Washington of Sept. 11, 2001, Saudi Arabia's position as the supplier of choice was threatened. Fifteen of the 19 hijackers were Saudi nationals, and the man who inspired the attacks, Osama bin Laden, was born in Saudi Arabia; and Saudi funds had financed Taliban schools in Afghanistan. To make matters worse, Saudi intelligence agencies dragged their feet in sharing information with their American counterparts. Then came the Iraq war. Among the fringe benefits of removing Saddam Hussein from power, went the thinking in the United States at the time, would be a rapid recovery of that country's oil production. In some hawkish circles in Washington, it was thought that a free Iraq would eventually undercut OPEC's power and marginalize Saudi Arabia.

The day American troops entered Baghdad, Mr. Cheney told the American Society of Newspaper Editors that Iraq would be able to produce as much as three million barrels a day, "hopefully, by the end of the year." Still more optimistic forecasts predicted that Iraqi production would climb to six million barrels a day within five years, and provided more fodder to the theory that American troops went into Iraq to break OPEC's back, weaken the Saud dynasty and reduce the kingdom's oil-based influence.

Of course, these predictions turned out to be wrong. Iraq's production is struggling at two million barrels a day because of the relentless targeting of pipelines and infrastructure by the insurgency. Exports lag prewar levels and today few, even among Washington's most radical neoconservatives, expect that a restoration of Iraq's oil sector will quickly chip away at Saudi Arabia's clout. The kingdom remains unrivaled. Iran's production comes in a distant second, but that country, which just elected a conservative president, is at odds with the international community over its decision to develop a civilian nuclear program. That leaves Libya, a country at the center of attention from American diplomats and oil executives last year, but its reserves are less than a sixth those of Saudi Arabia. "All the countries we thought we could diversify our production away from Saudi Arabia haven't lived up to our expectations," said Amy Myers Jaffe, the associate director of Rice University's energy program in Houston. "We are definitely more dependent on the Saudis, absolutely, than we were before 9/11."

EDIT

According to United States government estimates, the world will need Saudi Arabia to produce some 18 million barrels a day by 2020 and 22.5 million by 2025. But Saudi officials - and many Western analysts - consider these forecasts unrealistic. Questions still surround Saudi Arabia, fanning doubt over the country's ability to meet the world's growing demand for oil. These revolve around the true extent of its huge oil reserves, the rate at which its fields are depleting, and the output at Ghawar, the world's largest oil field, which accounts for half the nation's output. Matthew Simmons, a Houston-based investment banker, has recently made popular the notion - held by a tiny minority - that Saudi Arabia is fudging the rate at which its fields are depleted and, in speeches and in a recently published book, contends the country has reached a peak in production. While few oil analysts agree with Mr. Simmons, some remain skeptical of Saudi Aramco's ability to increase capacity as planned.

EDIT

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/06/business/worldbusiness/06saudi.html?ei=5070&en=3255ae548af4243b&ex=1123992000&emc=eta1&pagewanted=print

[Maat]

1. Thanks for the post!

More enlightenment.

[candy]

2. This goes all the way back to FDR .

[bemildred]

6. Yes. Jimmy Carter tried to do something about our oil addiction.

Around 1977-78 I think it was.
And the DEMOCRATIC RUN Congress refused to do squat about it because they didn't want to give Jimmy a win.

[Coastie for Truth]

3. Henry (Ford) Should've Listened to Tom (Edison)

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Dr. Lee Raymond and Dr. Dave O'Reilly and Sir John Browne and Rick Wagoner and Bob Lutz have spoken

[IrateCitizen]

4. This article ignores the most basic questions surrounding its premise...

Such as, what aspects of our national transportation network make us increasingly dependent upon petroleum imports, and what could we do to change those parameters to decrease our oil usage and dependence.

The word "consumer" with regards to oil was only uttered once in this entire article. While global petroleum demand seems to be bumping up against supply right now, not one iota of analysis was given in this article to look at HOW petroleum demand is broken down in the US. If it had been analyzed, even rudimentarily, it would reveal that we consume about 1/2 of our annual petroleum usage through transportation.

Which, of course, would lead to another obvious question -- what can we do to reduce consumption in the transportation sector? Matthew Simmons has repeatedly advocated a step that I completely agree with -- reinstitute our national rail network as a primary means of transporting goods around the country. Such a switch would result in about 1/10 of the energy required to move goods as the current trucking system. Furthermore, it would help re-establish a more town-and-city-centered model of development, as industry and commerce would likely begin to spring up around rail hubs, as it did when the railroads first came on the scene.

The problem is that asking these questions would result in questioning the very underpinnings of our modern society -- namely, the twisting of the term "freedom" into a freedom to shop and a freedom to be wasteful. It would present a direct challenge to our growth models that have developed over the past 50 years, which is strictly verboten in the mainstream press, because it would undermine the status quo.

[hunter]

5. Another benefit -- railroads can easily run on electricity...

... or synthetic fuels. No technological breakthroughs are required.

A transportation corridor consisting of four tracks -- a freight track each way, and a high speed passenger track each way -- uses far fewer resources than a "superhighway" of equivalent capacity, and it needs not use any imported petroleum at all.

[NNadir]

10. The putative environmental benefits of using electricity depends wholly

on how that electricity is generated.

My personal theory is that the generation of electricity in the US has resulted in a generation as mad as hatters.

[IrateCitizen]

11. And on that, I'd have to agree with you...

My personal theory is that the generation of electricity in the US has resulted in a generation as mad as hatters.

Of course, it was that generation of massive amounts of electricity that resulted in the ascendancy of advanced post-industrial capitalism and all of the ill effects that accompany it. But that is another discussion for another time....

[Strelnikov_]

7. Actually 67% Is Used In Transportation

With 67% of that (45%) used for personal transport at an average of 20.8 mpg.

Therefore, if we simply improve personal transport to 100 mpg, we reduce petroleum use by 36%. With efficiency improvements in mass transit, freight transit, development of alternate chemical feed stocks, and building less 'junk', a reduction in petroleum consumption of 50% or more, with todays technology, appears possible.

So yes, why is no one addressing consumption.

(Pluggable Prius with 20 mi. electric only range would yield ~100 mpg under typical driving patterns. At 100 mpg, the quantity of personal transport fuels would be in the realistic range of what could be supplied by biomass).

http://www.eia.doe.gov/pub/oil_gas/petroleum/analysis_publications/oil_market_basics/petflow.htm

[IrateCitizen]

8. Thanks for the correction.

I was going off the top of my head, and I now realize that the 50% figure I cited was really just a rough one for PERSONAL transportation, not even total transportation.

That reality makes it even MORE urgent and necessary that we restructure our physical infrastructure.

[BeFree]

9. Not addressing consumption?

Why that would kill the greatest economy on earth. Can't do that. Consumption means jobs.

Besides that, has anyone ever considered the amount of tax dollars taken in by the money grubbing politicians? No? Well, sons, the government would collapse, collapse I tell ya, if the taxes from gasoline were cut back.

That's why there is no incentive to reduce consumption, either at the pump, or the wally worlds. Growth is good, and anything that gets in the way of growth is bad. Except for cancer.