DrumBeat: September 25, 2006
Posted by threadbot on September 25, 2006 - 9:15am
Topic: Miscellaneous
Oil supplies from the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (Opec) fell 400,000 barrels a day on the month to 30.2 million bpd in September, according to preliminary figures from tanker tracker Petrologistics.Saudi Arabia and Iran led the fall in output. Petrologistics head Conrad Gerber said the kingdom produced 9.05 million bpd in September compared with 9.27 million bpd in August.
Oil prices drop below $60 a barrel
Oil prices fell below $60 a barrel on Monday amid signs of growing petroleum inventories and after BP PLC said it had permission to restart the eastern half of Alaska's Prudhoe Bay oil field.
Nuclear power pushed for oil sands production: Reliance on natural gas as heating source is industry's Achilles heel.
Chavez drives a hard bargain, but Big Oil's options are limited
With Prices Falling, Gas May Lose Its Electoral Punch
Downtown projects taking steps to be more environmentally friendly
COLUMBUS, OH - A rooftop garden will insulate the former Lazarus department store Downtown and collect rainwater to flush the building’s toilets when it is reborn as government offices in January.Such environmentally friendly building principles were little more than wishful thinking when the Columbus Green Building Forum organized its first seminar in 2004.
Oil peaks, valleys, plateaus and plains
Scotland: Green power station proposal to fire up Highlands economy
PLANS for a wood-burning power station capable of supplying electricity to 40,000 homes in Scotland have been unveiled.
Plant-fuelled cars could be Indonesia's future
Widespread Outage Spurs Coup Rumors In Pakistan
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan - Panicky rumors of a coup swept through Pakistan on Sunday after a power outage interrupted national television broadcasts and later plunged much of the country into darkness.
Showcase pipeline fuels global gas flames
GM developing home hydrogen refueling device
General Motors is building a prototype for a home hydrogen refueling unit in hope of selling fuel-cell cars by 2011.The unit, which would make hydrogen using either electricity or sunlight, would help sidestep one of the most vexing problems surrounding the creation of the pollution-free, alternative-power cars: how to persuade oil companies to invest in expensive new hydrogen stations that would compete with their core product, gasoline.
State red tape trips up green energy efforts
Despite overwhelming public and political support for renewable power, ratepayer contributions of $319 million, and a 2002 law mandating a dramatic increase in the use of sun and wind to create megawatts, California has boosted its use of renewable energy by less than 1 percent of the state's overall electricity use in the past four years.
Cooling Sun brings relief to sweltering Earth
The earth could be rescued from global warming by an unlikely saviour: not fewer cars, nor less pollution, nor even thousands of wind farms spread across Britain's hillsides - but, remarkably, by a cooler Sun. An international group of scientists believes a period of reduced solar activity could soon bring desperately needed cooling to our sweltering world.
What Can Young Professionals and Aging Baby Boomers do to Prepare for America's Collapse?
Any connection(payback) to the Pakistani Pres saying he was blackmailed into support? Us saying we're bomb you to the stone age. Well. Hmm. What timing
If you loose Electrical Power, and The Lights are Out,
If there is no Lights, It is then the "Dark Ages"
Which by definition is the "Rebels blew them back into the Stone Age"
Rebels blow up gas pipeline in southwest Pakistan
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20060924/wl_sthasia_afp/pakistanunrestsouthwest_060924090309;_ylt=As7QUa 474dRkrGrY8lMYVtyAsnsA;_ylu=X3oDMTBiMW04NW9mBHNlYwMlJVRPUCUl
Lots of Special Ops guys running around over there who aren't exactly busy pursuing OBL and are perfectly capable of a mission like this. Taking down a grid, particular one as rickity as Pak's presumably is, isn't much of a challenge.
This is the kind of stuff that our admin--and America historically--has specialized in. Things that are so incredibly blatent that they couldn't possibly be intentional. Shooting down the Iranian civilian airliner about 15 yrs ago after a serious of terror incidents linked to Iran... well, subsequent investigation has shown some spooky intentionality to it. Soo-prize, soo-prize.
And the Venezuelan foreign sec'y was detained and strip searched at JFK yesterday -- but that's just coincidence after Chavez's comments, of course. It was only because he late for his flight... set off some kind of security alert. Coulda happened to any Foreign Sec'y.
Experts believe the future will be like Sci-Fi movies
It's really internet-centered, but it gives you an idea what other "value networks" out there are thinking.
"By 2020, the people left behind (many by their own choice) by accelerating information and communications technologies will form a new cultural group of technology refuseniks who self-segregate from "modern" society. Some will live mostly "off the grid" simply to seek peace and a cure for information overload while others will commit acts of terror or violence in protest against technology."
Will disenfranchised LoTeks wreak havoc on society? Comparing future anti-technology vigilantes to modern day "eco-terrorists," Internet education expert and poll respondent Ed Lyell pointed out that "Every age has a small percentage that cling to an overrated past of low-technology, low-energy, lifestyle." Respondent Thomas Narten, a member of IBM's Internet Engineering Task Force, believes that "by becoming valuable infrastructure, the Internet itself will become a target," and FirstGov developer Martin Kwapinski feels that "random acts of senseless violence and destruction will continue and expand due to a feeling of 21st century anomie, and an increasing sense of of lack of individual control."
~ I thought it was going to turn out to be 'Expert' Gamers or something. Was I wrong?
The 'Ecoterrorist' label just won't come off, even when most of the violence in our world is created by Political Manipulations, Resource Mismanagement and Denial of Education. But 'The Feminazis' will make a way better Wes Craven film!
"It's 2006, do you know where your StarChild is?"
So, just continue the present trend..... people even more overworked if they want to suck on the tech tit, maybe that drug that allows people (soldiers) to be somewhat effective without sleep will be perfected, hell, it may be required as a condition of taking a tech job..... sure you'll be a dissociated zombie who dies of whatever that sudden overwork-death the Japanese sararimen die of, but .... you'll be a techie!!
Nope I'd much rather be a H.G. and get to spend hours watching ants drag a dead moth up a tree trunk, like I did when I was a kid. We were meant to be barefoot and a bit smelly and have lots of free time.
The Hunter Gatherer has a bit more time spent doing the things that make his life easier, but you do get to spend it with your kids and family most of the time.
And the mortgage company will only be too happy to take a cut of the food profits to keep you in a fine lean to and let you have hammocks for a cut of the dried meat a week.
Mad Max is an Australian apocalyptic science fiction film......
:P
IMO, this article merely demonstrates that television and movies shape people's views, even when such views respresent unrealistic expectations.
This brings up the question of whether popular entertainment may be used deliberately to mold public opinion.
About a year ago, I was surprised to read an article in the NY Times about a new govt program that was looking to hire scientists in order to train them to write scripts for movies. The govt spokesperson said the stated goal was to promote science in movies to stimulate more kids to go into careers in science. That seemed like a ridiculous statement given the govt's ongoing efforts to undercut wages in science-based fields using H1B visas and also high-level govt officials' support of technology outsourcing.
The study cited by the article in odograph's link was perfomed by Pew, a neoliberal think tank that promotes globalization. You have to wonder if "the examiner is leading the witness" so-to-speak when they come up with things like:
"52 percent of respondents agree that the "free flow of information will completely blur current national boundaries as they are replaced by city-states, corporation-based cultural groupings and/or other geographically diverse and reconfigured human organizations tied together by global networks." "
Just the fact that Stephen Hawkings believes AI is likely to overrun humans and we need to start a eugenics program ASAP to save mankind tells us that the lines between entertainment and reality have blurred too much.
That is the funniest line in a long time.
Forms of entertainment such as Survivor, Desperate Housewives, and the antics of Britney Spears are more of the mind-numbing variety.
Elvis Costello
I was tuning in the shine on the light night dial
Doing anything my radio advised
With every one of those late night stations
Playing songs bringing tears to my eyes
I was seriously thinking about hiding the receiver
When the switch broke 'cause it's old
They're saying things that I can hardly believe
They really think we're getting out of control
(CHORUS) Radio is a sound salvation
Radio is cleaning up the nation
They say you better listen to the voice of reason
But they don't give you any choice 'cause they think that it's treason
So you had better do as you are told
You better listen to the radio
I wanna bite the hand that feeds me
I wanna bite that hand so badly
I want to make them wish they'd never seen me
Some of my friends sit around every evening
And they worry about the times ahead
But everybody else is overwhelmed by indifference
And the promise of an early bed
You either shut up or get cut up, they don't wanna hear about it
It's only inches on the reel-to-reel
And the radio is in the hands of such a lot of fools
Tryin' to anaesthetise the way that you feel
(REPEAT CHORUS)
Wonderful radio
Marvelous radio
Wonderful radio
Radio, radio
(FADE)
<--snip--> article goes on...
-C.
How can oilproduction for September be determined before the month is over??
Just part of the natural cycle of life it seems, especially since OPEC is considering production cuts to keep prices high - but strangely, OPEC production seems to have been steadily falling over the last 12 month time frame or so, regardless of price.
Obviously, supply, demand, and price are intricately related to production - except when you hit the top of the peak, and the only direction is for supply is down.
Will OPEC be 'cutting' production to keep prices high, or is this just another convenient diversion for what seems to be harder to deny - OPEC is no longer a swing producer in terms of opening the taps to flood the market.
I make no predictions about the price of oil, and obviously supply and demand have their own dynamic, but it looks like the race is on - declining oil production compared to a crashlanding American economy. (And no, I don't think declining gasoline prices are going to help the American economy crash more softly in any significant way.)
Should be interesting to see if this gives the Saudis enough time to get those ordered rigs up and running - a Saudi plateau is looking like a better bet these days, if anyone wants to bet. But their ramping up to 12 or 15 million barrels a day is looking ever more like a pipedream, in the light of their announcing production cuts to keep the price of oil 200% over OPEC's targeted price from ca. 18 months ago.
Though the idea that the Saudis might be still producing to fill storage is intriguing - didn't the Saudis already have a problem with too full storage and no buyers just a few short months ago?
I think a lot is going on which is not really visible on the surface at this point in terms of the Saudis perhaps having learned one thing from Texas oilmen - that bluffing is a valid way to take home all the chips if you play your cards right. Maybe the Saudis have a new plan - to become the world's swing tank farm. Certainly the Texans never thought of that one - they were too wedded to the idea that technology would save them. But the Saudis, who seem to believe they will become camel drivers again in the not too distant future, may just be attempting to wring every penny out of their oil through truly long term bargaining, knowing that the oil is running out while they do it, while not disturbing their strangely gullible buyers own inscrutable Western delusions.
Can anyone easily sum up when the SPR was brought to its current low point? I'll go back through the thread later. Thanks.
It would be really interesting if the gov just decided not to refill the SPR at high prices, and waited for the bubble to blow over.
... of course, ideas like that are very much ourside our TOD value network.
In this case, the Saudis may just be carefully focussing on their 'over' supply of sour crude, while keeping their mouths shut about not being able to pump enough sweet light crude.
Keep in mind the first apparent Saudi purchase of fuel oil - that doesn't sound like a country swimming in easily refined crude which can't find buyers.
If more and more of the SPR is filled with heavy crude, who would ever know? It's useless in an emergency, because there is no refining capacity for large quantities, but as long as you keep it in the tanks, who will be the wiser.
The advantage is of course that it's much cheaper, and that you get to state that there's no problems with reserves: look at the numbers. If those Saudi idly floating tankers, for which there were no buyers, want to unload it, you'd get a real bargain. It's not fit for direct use, see refining, and that would keep buyers away. But it's ideal for strategic reserves, just not the strategy you thought was meant.
Never quwstion the motives of Dear Leader.
We are Guided by an Invisible and Beneficent Hand.
On something like this, I can look at both sides without being very certain at all about what is going on. Many short term oil trends are possible.
Is there ever a time when you are suspicious of someone's motives? Do you ever seek an explanation that does not put the best light on everyone>
The moderate reality is that we already have a state-market hybird of regulated commerce. Nut jobs on the left and right form their poitical views based on a fantasy far from that reality.
The point that appears to elude you is that markets existed long before capitalism and will exist long after capitalism, which is a system for which growth is the sina qua non and which is peculiar to the age of fossil fuels.
Markets are a social mechanism. It is a mechanism which may be as old, or nearly as old, as self-reflective consciousness; there is no way to know.
Capturing the state and reforming markets to serve the greed of tiny minorities, no matter the consequences, is the raison d'etre of the modern Republican party and their fellow travellers around the globe. Is this evil? It is certainly nothing less than terrible, for those who value human potential and natural beauty.
Your presumption of a 'moderate reality' is no more than an attempt to disguise an uncritical defense of the status quo.
The rest is bullshit, sorry.
The thing all the numb-nuts have in common is that they can't even SEE the center.
"All the rest is bullshit" is pretty feeble reasoning, so hopefully you can rise above this level in providing the lines surrounding and shaping your hallowed perch.
Take a couple of weeks, or years, as needed.
That is bullshit.
Half this country is Republican, and while many of them do not have their dots connected on cause and effect, they are not out there for that.
But then, to think about that you'd have to give up your bullshit bogeymen.
Yeah! Nascar dads and Soccer moms dont "connect" that much, they just binge on whatever is in the trough.
they are not out there for that.
To connect?
But YOU do connect, don't you?
How much "lapsed" are you for a Republican?