8/22 Interesting and rather scary article about Saudi oil production in
the Sunday NY Times Magazine:
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/21/magazine/21OIL.html
\. why is it that people like Exxon CEO keep saying that oil prices
are way too high and will come down? is it because they don't
want alternate enery sources to be developed, or have enery
policies aimed at reducing demand implemented, while they
continue to make tons of money?
\_ If I were the oil companies, I'd have big investments in
oil alternatives. Big. There's nothing stopping them from
using their current huge profits to ensure their complete
dominance of the energy market for decades to come, and long
after oil is gone. They just have to update themselves....
\_ What happens when exponentially increasing demand meets
arithmetically increasing supply? We're gonna find out.
And this just shows that planned economies don't work.
China's consuming more and more oil....
\_ most of world's economies are planned, including Japan
\_ We're guzzling more oil too, China's %tage increase is just
more ... Are we consuming more from year to year than China?
Our imports were 2001: 11.8 mb/d, 2002: 11.5 2003: 12.2
2004: 13.1. Since China's oil imports are 2.91 mb/day in
2004, and growing by about 1 mb/d (couldn't find year/year
list for China) it looks like our "unplanned" economy is
responsible for just as much scarcity.
\_ My point is that the unplanned economies are stupidly
using oil, and oil's going to get tight in supply
compared to demand. Why, then, are "intelligently planned"
economies ramping up their use of oil? It's not just
stupid market forces, it's stupid planning. What's
their excuse?
\_ The US uses 100X as much oil per person than China. It seems
like it is the unplanned economies that are the problem.
\_ Apples to oranges. Drop the 1.3b people in China using
near zero oil and compare the non-poverty part of China to
the US and see what the numbers look like. The vast majority
of China is essentially cut off from the rest of the world
and only serves to create bogus statistical per capita
comparisons.
\_ If you just add up the people in the industrialized
provinces, you get 200M or so people. So China is
using 1/10th per capita. Still much less.
\_ Did you include the tons of toxic waste and air
pollution per capita when you did the oil costs
since they're using a lot of coal and wood instead
of oil? How about what they're doing to their rivers
and farm lands? Their production per unit of waste
is way too high. Their inefficiency is stunning.
\_ don't forget to add to that the waste they
ship from the US to dump in china.
\_ no one forgot. it doesn't add up enough to
matter on these scales. ChiCom troll? Is that
you?
\_ oh yea? what are they using the coal
for? making things for walmart, and
motorola, and ge, and ford, ... you
whine there's too much pollution when
they use coal, you whine that they are
destroying the ecosystem when they
built the yangtze dam, you whine that
they are driving prices high, and
threatening the US when they try to
buy gasoline. fucking hypocrite.
\_ yea, like you care about their rivers and
farm lands. all you care is they don't use
too much oil that oil price rises.
\_ China uses a lot of coal too. Can we account for that?
Coal probably produces a magnitude more pollution than gas.
\_ yea, they tried going to gasoline, but we can't let
them buy unocal.
\_ Hi Mr. Nonsequiter troll. No one should have to
explain the insanity of selling off an energy
resource provider to a hostile competitor. That's
a good way to get triple digit price/barrel.
\_ we are talking about oil usage and energy
usage, not pollution, so you are the non-
sequitur troll.
\_ no one should have to explain their oil and
energy usage when US is using 10x as much
per capita.
\. why is it that people like Exxon CEO keep saying that oil prices
are way too high and will come down? is it because they don't
want alternate enery sources to be developed, or have enery
policies aimed at reducing demand implemented, while they
continue to make tons of money?
\_ If I were the oil companies, I'd have big investments in
oil alternatives. Big. There's nothing stopping them from
using their current huge profits to ensure their complete
dominance of the energy market for decades to come, and long
after oil is gone. They just have to update themselves....
\_ but that may hurt their existing investments.
\_ No, it won't. They'll be completely unable to supply
the oil required with all imaginable capacity. They'll
\_ And with that money, they can buy any REAL up and
coming technology. Stop thinking of them as oil
companies. They are energy companies.
get full value on all their existing investments,
guaranteed.
\_ And with that money, they can buy any REAL up and
coming technology. Stop thinking of them as oil
companies. They are energy companies.
\_ They are investing in alternatives, but that doesn't mean
they don't want their tax breaks and subsidies for both
their "regular" oil business and their minor R&D.. If they
keep on saying, high oil prices are just a blip, the less
likely Congress and the country will ask for regulation. |
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