Oil Conspiracies and other Political
Oil Conspiracies and other Political Links
From Chip comes a link to a transcript of a CNN piece (Paula Zahn interviewing Richard Butler, the former UN weapons inspector) on a French book that claims that, well, here’s a portion of the interview:
BUTLER: The most explosive charge, Paula, is that the Bush administration — the present one, just shortly after assuming office slowed down FBI investigations of al Qaeda and terrorism in Afghanistan in order to do a deal with the Taliban on oil — an oil pipeline across Afghanistan.
ZAHN: And this book points out that the FBI’s deputy director, John O’Neill, actually resigned because he felt the U.S. administration was obstructing…
BUTLER: A proper…
ZAHN: … the prosecution of terrorism.
BUTLER: Yes, yes, a proper intelligence investigation of terrorism. Now, you said if, and I affirmed that in responding to you. We have to be careful here. These are allegations. They’re worth airing and talking about, because of their gravity. We don’t know if they are correct. But I believe they should be investigated, because Central Asian oil, as we were discussing yesterday, is potentially so important. And all prior attempts to have a pipeline had to be done through Russia. It had to be negotiated with Russia.
Now, if there is to be a pipeline through Afghanistan, obviating the need to deal with Russia, it would also cost less than half of what a pipeline through Russia would cost…
Chip also points us to truthout.com where I found an entertaining column by Michael Kinsley resolving to end his post-9/11 self-censorship. (At least he doesn’t say that if we censor ourselves, we’ve let the terrorists win.)
Hank Blakely hasn’t had a problem with self-censorship. He has a “new home for the disgruntled” where you’ll find his continuing satire of W. He’s added a page of favorite sites where I am honored to find my newsletter in company with the Betty Bowers site who is, as you know, “America’s Best Christian.”
Categories: Uncategorized dw
Sustainable oil?
Posted: May 25, 2004, 1:00 a.m. Eastern
By Chris Bennett © 2004 WorldNetDaily.com
About 80 miles off of the coast of Louisiana lies a mostly submerged mountain, the top of which is known as Eugene Island. The portion underwater is an eerie-looking, sloping tower jutting up from the depths of the Gulf of Mexico, with deep fissures and perpendicular faults which spontaneously spew natural gas. A significant reservoir of crude oil was discovered nearby in the late ’60s, and by 1970, a platform named Eugene 330 was busily producing about 15,000 barrels a day of high-quality crude oil.
By the late ’80s, the platform’s production had slipped to less than 4,000 barrels per day, and was considered pumped out. Done. Suddenly, in 1990, production soared back to 15,000 barrels a day, and the reserves which had been estimated at 60 million barrels in the ’70s, were recalculated at 400 million barrels. Interestingly, the measured geological age of the new oil was quantifiably different than the oil pumped in the ’70s.
Analysis of seismic recordings revealed the presence of a “deep fault” at the base of the Eugene Island reservoir which was gushing up a river of oil from some deeper and previously unknown source.
Similar results were seen at other Gulf of Mexico oil wells. Similar results were found in the Cook Inlet oil fields in Alaska. Similar results were found in oil fields in Uzbekistan. Similarly in the Middle East, where oil exploration and extraction have been underway for at least the last 20 years, known reserves have doubled. Currently there are somewhere in the neighborhood of 680 billion barrels of Middle East reserve oil.
Creating that much oil would take a big pile of dead dinosaurs and fermenting prehistoric plants. Could there be another source for crude oil?
An intriguing theory now permeating oil company research staffs suggests that crude oil may actually be a natural inorganic product, not a stepchild of unfathomable time and organic degradation. The theory suggests there may be huge, yet-to-be-discovered reserves of oil at depths that dwarf current world estimates.
The theory is simple: Crude oil forms as a natural inorganic process which occurs between the mantle and the crust, somewhere between 5 and 20 miles deep. The proposed mechanism is as follows:
• Methane (CH4) is a common molecule found in quantity throughout our solar system – huge concentrations exist at great depth in the Earth.
• At the mantle-crust interface, roughly 20,000 feet beneath the surface, rapidly rising streams of compressed methane-based gasses hit pockets of high temperature causing the condensation of heavier hydrocarbons. The product of this condensation is commonly known as crude oil.
• Some compressed methane-based gasses migrate into pockets and reservoirs we extract as “natural gas.”
• In the geologically “cooler,” more tectonically stable regions around the globe, the crude oil pools into reservoirs.
• In the “hotter,” more volcanic and tectonically active areas, the oil and natural gas continue to condense and eventually to oxidize, producing carbon dioxide and steam, which exits from active volcanoes.
• Periodically, depending on variations of geology and Earth movement, oil seeps to the surface in quantity, creating the vast oil-sand deposits of Canada and Venezuela, or the continual seeps found beneath the Gulf of Mexico and Uzbekistan.
• Periodically, depending on variations of geology, the vast, deep pools of oil break free and replenish existing known reserves of oil.
There are a number of observations across the oil-producing regions of the globe that support this theory, and the list of proponents begins with Mendelev (who created the periodic table of elements) and includes Dr.Thomas Gold (founding director of Cornell University Center for Radiophysics and Space Research) and Dr. J.F. Kenney of Gas Resources Corporations, Houston, Texas.
In his 1999 book, “The Deep Hot Biosphere,” Dr. Gold presents compelling evidence for inorganic oil formation. He notes that geologic structures where oil is found all correspond to “deep earth” formations, not the haphazard depositions we find with sedimentary rock, associated fossils or even current surface life.
He also notes that oil extracted from varying depths from the same oil field have the same chemistry – oil chemistry does not vary as fossils vary with increasing depth. Also interesting is the fact that oil is found in huge quantities among geographic formations where assays of prehistoric life are not sufficient to produce the existing reservoirs of oil. Where then did it come from?
Another interesting fact is that every oil field throughout the world has outgassing helium. Helium is so often present in oil fields that helium detectors are used as oil-prospecting tools. Helium is an inert gas known to be a fundamental product of the radiological decay or uranium and thorium, identified in quantity at great depths below the surface of the earth, 200 and more miles below. It is not found in meaningful quantities in areas that are not producing methane, oil or natural gas. It is not a member of the dozen or so common elements associated with life. It is found throughout the solar system as a thoroughly inorganic product.
Even more intriguing is evidence that several oil reservoirs around the globe are refilling themselves, such as the Eugene Island reservoir – not from the sides, as would be expected from cocurrent organic reservoirs, but from the bottom up.
Dr. Gold strongly believes that oil is a “renewable, primordial soup continually manufactured by the Earth under ultrahot conditions and tremendous pressures. As this substance migrates toward the surface, it is attached by bacteria, making it appear to have an organic origin dating back to the dinosaurs.”
Smaller oil companies and innovative teams are using this theory to justify deep oil drilling in Alaska and the Gulf of Mexico, among other locations, with some success. Dr. Kenney is on record predicting that parts of Siberia contain a deep reservoir of oil equal to or exceeding that already discovered in the Middle East.
Could this be true?
In August 2002, in the “Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (US),” Dr. Kenney published a paper, which had a partial title of “The genesis of hydrocarbons and the origin of petroleum.” Dr. Kenney and three Russian coauthors conclude:
The Hydrogen-Carbon system does not spontaneously evolve hydrocarbons at pressures less than 30 Kbar, even in the most favorable environment. The H-C system evolves hydrocarbons under pressures found in the mantle of the Earth and at temperatures consistent with that environment.
He was quoted as stating that “competent physicists, chemists, chemical engineers and men knowledgeable of thermodynamics have known that natural petroleum does not evolve from biological materials since the last quarter of the 19th century.”
Deeply entrenched in our culture is the belief that at some point in the relatively near future we will see the last working pump on the last functioning oil well screech and rattle, and that will be that. The end of the Age of Oil. And unless we find another source of cheap energy, the world will rapidly become a much darker and dangerous place.
If Dr. Gold and Dr. Kenney are correct, this “the end of the world as we know it” scenario simply won’t happen. Think about it … while not inexhaustible, deep Earth reserves of inorganic crude oil and commercially feasible extraction would provide the world with generations of low-cost fuel. Dr. Gold has been quoted saying that current worldwide reserves of crude oil could be off by a factor of over 100.
A Hedberg Conference, sponsored by the American Association of Petroleum Geologists, was scheduled to discuss and publicly debate this issue. Papers were solicited from interested academics and professionals. The conference was scheduled to begin June 9, 2003, but was canceled at the last minute. A new date has yet to be set.
Related links:
Gas Origin Theories To Be Studied
The Mystery Of Eugene Island 330
Odd Reservoir Off Louisiana Prods Oil Experts To Seek A Deeper Meaning
Fuel’s Paradise
Chris Bennett manages an environmental engineering division for a West Coast technology firm. He and his wife of 26 years make their home on the San Francisco Bay.
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APRIL 2003 WAR IN IRAQ OPEC’s President: “No Shortage of Oil”
If anything, says Abdullah bin Hamad Al Attiyah, the producing nations’ biggest fear is a post-war price collapse.
In the run-up to the war in Iraq, crude oil prices shot to levels not seen since the last Persian Gulf crisis. Since the war began, however, prices have dropped back to earth. Crude oil at the New York Mercantile Exchange is hovering close to $30 a barrel, a far cry from the nearly $40-a-barrel levels seen a few weeks ago. Indeed, according to Geneva-based energy consultancy Petrologistics, the cartel boosted production by 1.3 million barrels a day in March.
Still, with the war’s course so uncertain, oil prices are likely to see volatile times in the days and weeks to come. What lies ahead? On Mar. 27, Abdullah bin Hamad Al Attiyah, the president of OPEC and Qatar’s Energy Minister, spoke to BusinessWeek’s Laura Cohn in Doha, Qatar, about the adequacy of energy supplies, the mood at OPEC, and what will happen to oil prices after the war. Following are edited excerpts of their conversation:
Q: What are you doing to ensure that there will be adequate energy supplies?
A: More oil has been produced and brought to the market. That’s why the price has dropped dramatically. If you ask yourself, why has the price dropped very dramatically — almost more than $7 in 10 days? There’s more oil in the market, and the world can absorb it. Also, don’t forget Venezuela is coming back [into the market as a producer].
If you go back to December [with strikes and unrest in Venezuela], we saw 3 million barrels suddenly disappear…[but it’s] coming back. Now, people are concerned about Nigeria, but this is only temporary.
Q: Iraq has asked other Arab nations not to increase their production. What’s your reaction to that?
A: They had the right to ask. Iraq is a member of OPEC, and anyone as a member of OPEC has the right to discuss [anything] with other members. But OPEC and major oil producers are working together to stabilize the oil markets.
We are not aiming to produce just to produce. We aim to stabilize the oil market. We aim to seek a balance between demand and supply. OPEC is an international organization. It is not a political organization.
Q: How often are you in consultation with your OPEC colleagues?
A: Not daily, but we are in consultation all the time. I do a lot of consultation with my OPEC colleagues, with non-OPEC colleagues. We try to see how to manage it. In reality, oil prices are always underestimated.
From 1985-2000, the average price of a barrel of oil was only $18. Sometimes it’s exaggerated. When oil prices go to $30, consumers start crying. But when you take the average of the last 15 years, [you see] you shouldn’t blame oil producers.
Q: Do you have any plans for an emergency OPEC meeting?
A: Why should we meet? There is no shortage of oil. The price has dropped. So it’s not [like] we have an agenda that would attract us to meet. If we have something to push us, yes. If there’s a big shortage of oil, prices skyrocket, then we [will] have something to say.
My main concern is that after the war, we will see the oil price collapse. Demand and economic growth now are not good. The world is in recession, and this is reflected in consumption. This is a story we have to be very careful about.
Q: If the war drags on, won’t oil prices rise again?
A: I cannot predict what will happen. Some analysts said once the war starts, oil will reach $100. Do not believe analysts. When I went to America for school in 1970, there was a very famous song [by The Undisputed Truth] that said “Smiling faces sometimes they don’t tell the truth.” Analysts never give the truth. All scenarios are open. This is my concern.
Q: In your view, why did the price of oil go up so much before the war started?
A: It was because of the speculators. They hijacked the oil market. We always said there’s a high war premium. It was more than $7. Now the market has become more pragmatic.
Edited by Douglas
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Energy shortage ….. an oil company myth ….. ??
By paul yogi nipperess Wednesday, February 11, 2004
Oil and gas, around the globe …..! Hi folks,
There’s some evidence to suggest, that the current “oil shortage” is a myth generated by oil companies to keep crude prices high.
Over the past couple of years, we have seen crude prices high, but still relatively stable, transiting a range, roughly from $25 to $35/bbl.
With less dependence on Middle East oil, it is in the interest of US-based oil companies to keep their production, from other countries, flowing at international prices.
With crude oil prices high, gas-to-liquids plants have also become an important income stream for the oil companies.
So instead of the focus being on crude oil, the oil companies have been able to utilize their huge reserves of gas around the globe, that were previously idle …..a sure cash flow, without the exploration risks.
Evidence of this can be seen in global rig utlization figures over the same period. Using offshore rigs, in 12 monitored categories, we can see that 2 years ago, oil companies were still exploring vigorously and the “modern” rig fleet was fully employed worldwide.
Today, NONE of the 12 rig categories are 100% employed, rig rates are down and 6 of the 12
monitored rig categories rate between 33 to 72% utilization.
Only shallow-water jackups 200-300 feet and the high-tech 5th generation, deep-water semisubs are currently around 90% employed.
So, it is evident that oil companies have shelved their oil exploration efforts, in preference for a switch to processing their gas reserves and adding to oil reserves, by acquisition.
We can also see, that despite high crude prices, drilling contractors and oil service companies are still at the mercy of the oil companies.
Skeptics will say this is just part of the “normal cycle of price-tug-of-war”, between the drilling contractors and the oil companies ….. that may be correct to a small degree, but this time the slide may be extended for a much longer period.
Of course, as the spoils in Iraq are eventually allocated, by way of Iraqi-awarded contracts, then the pressure to do more expensive and risky exploration, is lessened considerably.
Other known fields, like West Africa, South America and the Russian states will likely be developed to lessen our dependence on Middle-east crude, even further.
In summary, we will probably have to get used to a high crude oil price, for whatever reason the oil companies can justify.
Meanwhile, the oil services sector may get much tougher for all players, in the foreseeable future.
…..and that equation never changes, it’s the oil companies’ money and they will always keep the costs down, even if it means shelving exploration for extended periods.
Twenty years ago, there was a similar wave of disinterest in exploration … it lasted about 5 years from 1983-to-1988 ….. tough times for the oil services companies.
At one point in 1986, there was 29 offshore rigs idle and stacked in ONE of Singapore’s anchorages.
An energy shortage?? ….. not for the want of an energy source.
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Wow..What should I believe ? The theory on ” Peak Oil ” may just be a pipe dream.
There’s a fascinating artice, ‘Is ‘Peak Oil’ A Scam? Oil Fields Are Re-Filling Naturally And Rapidly’, on the ‘Current News You Need To Know’ page at SurvivalistSkills.Com.
Makes for interesting reading!