The Oil Drum

15 comments on Problems with our oil from Iraq

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NC on October 27, 2005 - 9:56am

The problem in Iraq is the same as the rest of the world.

A diminishing pool of oil makes for harder and slower extraction. Supply is difficult to maintain, let alone increase.

More importantly in Iraq, a worldwide peak (or at the very least tight supply) means scarcity of resource.

We are entering the period when resource scarcity (oil) makes the remaining oil a strategic target for wars, terrorists and enviromental loonies (of which I have been lumped in with a time or two, to my dismay). When there is a huge lake of oil to draw from, disrupting supply here, there and other places has NO MEASURABLE effect on supply so it is inneffective as a tactic. This dynamic no longer exists.

All the oil in the world is becoming a tactical target now, not just the middle east. And we all know how easy it is to prevent guerilla strikes on soft targets don't we? Look at any strategic structure/place in Iraq and see how quick it gets homed in on.

Imagine the entire oil infrastructure being under that scrutiny by people who want to disrupt supply. How long do think it will take for the supply side of the equation to get much worse by human hands not just natural disasters? Focusing solely on supply in a peak oil world is a fool's choice. It is neither strategically or tactically sound.

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Dan Ur on October 27, 2005 - 2:26pm

Good comment.

Just think, The king is dead!, Long live one of many, ah, um, brothers? No, Sons? Cousins? Gee isn't it hard to tell who is in charge over in Saudi Arabia these days?

And then there are those guys, talking about the Great satan, and cutting off his OIL supply from their own wells.

IRAQ oil is as good as gone by the wayside. Which other nation is next?

By the Way Indonesia is not really a member of OPEC being a net importer of Gasoline, Iran imports some of their own supplies. Shouldn't they be looking for a new name soon??

OP Importing and some Exporting C.

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TI on October 28, 2005 - 2:28am

The political risks concerning oil production are commonly overestimated. Experience shows that oil is usually flowing undisturbed in the middle of political upheavals, even civil wars (Angola, Algeria, Sudan). Nobody wants to destroy the money flow. Terrorism has been a minimal problem. Most production is in an easy to secure environment (deserts, offshore). Emphasizing political risks is usually just a cover up for other problems, depletion and peaking of oil production. It may also serve as a pretext for military action.

Iraq is a special case. There were no security problems before the war and the US created the present situation itself. Middle East is usually considered to be an area of high indigenous political risks for the oil supply. There have been wars and revolutions but the impacts for the oil have usually been short lived. Only in the present Iraq war political factors have caused a severe long time disruption - and here the triggering factor was the US, not any local forces. If the lack of maintenance causes permanent damage to the fields and so permanent loss of supply, it is happening under the US occupation.

We might have resource wars in the future (we are having them right now), but not necessarily. Wars demand huge resources and it seems that even the US don't really have enough of them to wage large scale wars effectively. The Iraq war tells us that oil wars are not a very good idea. Attempts to grab oil fields by force turn easily counterproductive.