[ECM]

There is currently a black market for fuel in many parts of Iraq. It is very profitable for those running it and the only way some people can keep vehicles running.

[Liamj]

Thats what concerns me ECM, given govts habit of cackhanded admin, some off-ration trade will be essential just to keep thibngs working.
Unless trading explicitly sanctioned, via Domestic Tradable Quota's or some such.
http://www.feasta.org/documents/energy/dtqsoct2003.htm

[Sgs-Cruz]

Does anyone know any history of how the world spot market for oil (and, to a lesser extent, natural gas) came into existence, and how hard it would be to "tear it up" so to speak?

I ask this as a Canadian wondering about my country's future energy supply. Right now we're obligated to pay the same for oil as anyone around the world using our oil... how hard would it be for the government to nationalize the industry and sell it to Canadians for less?

Yes, I realize the concept of this may make me unpopular. I'm not advocating the idea, I'm throwing it out there for discussion.

[BAM]

US Oil Suppliers

Canada584Mb/annum
Mexico584
S.Arabia548
Venezuela475
Nigeria402
Iraq256
Angola110
UK110
Algeria73
Kuwait73

I don't think it would go down too well.

[Nano]

It's a question of trading rights. If Canada won't sell it's oil under certain terms, it might become worthwhile for other countries to boycot Canada, or even invade it. You have to know how far you can go. That's what some of the middle eastern countries are worried about. They may say: We can pump no more oil! but if we don't believe them, we might invade them.

[tdrive]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'D')oes anyone know any history of how the world spot market for oil (and, to a lesser extent, natural gas) came into existence, and how hard it would be to "tear it up" so to speak?

[aahala]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Sgs-Cruz', '
')I ask this as a Canadian wondering about my country's future energy supply. Right now we're obligated to pay the same for oil as anyone around the world using our oil... how hard would it be for the government to nationalize the industry and sell it to Canadians for less?

[Dezakin]

If Canada is so concerned about its future energy supply, It can quite easily set export quotas, tariffs, or other restrictions. This will drive down price locally; But not monotonically because supply is a function of price. The tar sands of Alberta would be less economical to process, foreign investment has a lower incentive to pump canadian oil, etcetera.

Russia is currently going through these issues. They not more than several years ago had export quotas.

aahala:$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'L')ower domestic prices mean greater, more rapid resource exhaustion not the other.

[OilsNotWell]

Slight contango still about 7 months out (past "refinery maintenance phase")...

The forward curves continuing to keep pace, and/or seem to be flattening out futher...what does this mean?

Could someone describe or post what the WTI forward curves were like around 1981 and/or 1990?

Boy, look at those prices just a month ago...$10 rise. So volatile, could come down just as fast, maybe?

[tdrive]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'A')gain, is this normal?

[tdrive]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'I')f Canada is so concerned about its future energy supply, It can quite easily set export quotas, tariffs, or other restrictions.

[FatherOfTwo]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('tdrive', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'I')f Canada is so concerned about its future energy supply, It can quite easily set export quotas, tariffs, or other restrictions.

[smiley]

There is a way around it. The government can refund the money they make from the oil companies (taxes, dividends, land leases) in the form of a subsidy for local consumers. Its perfectly legal and it has been proposed (and rejected) here in parliament.

The problem is that by subsidizing internal consumption you're hurting the exports.

[OilsNotWell]

Thanks for the tip!

chart

Although, I'm not sure what that means yet....have to read more I guess!

Was Hotelling Right? Depletion Effects and the Scarcity Rent Path 5/98 (with oil examples)

And this is a paper quite on point:

Optimal World Oil Extraction - Calibrating and Simulating the Hotelling Model

This has many graphs, but I can't figure out how to post from a pdf file, could someone who knows how do so?

It predicted market pricing under certain assumptions of $120/bbl, would be interesting for other to see.

and another link:

Hotelling Revisited (6/2004) - Oil Prices and Endogenous Technological Progress

[Sgs-Cruz]

To tell you the truth, if peak oil happens in a (fairly) big way, I don't see NAFTA lasting long anyway. What do we depend on NAFTA so much for, anyway? Car sales from Ontario to the USA? I think we can live without that if gas costs so much that nobody can drive.

And the resources we would be selling to them, we can still sell to them, but have the option of cutting off exports if Canada's needs are not being met.

For those that would say, Canada is obligated to sell oil to the USA: sell to the country that had the largest production in the world for a long time? Heh.

The only problem is Canada becoming the 51st through 63rd states.

[OilsNotWell]

Contango now 11 mos out, clearly past any "refinery maintenance" issue...

[Pops]

I don’t know much about the math I took…

But I was surprised when I googled “contangoâ€

[nth]

Interesting to hear Brent is out of sync with WTI.
What about the Singaporean market?

[johnmarkos]

Later futures prices now exceed the May, 2005 price out to June, 2007.

They exceed the June, 2005 price as late as November, 2006.

[johnmarkos]

It occurs to me that by contributing data, information, knowledge, and opinion to this site, we are developing a hugely valuable research tool. We create a common awareness of developing data and use "the wisdom of crowds" to refine our understanding of the implications of that data.

Seems like, considering the immense value of this knowledge, we should be able to get a think tank to hire us all so we can quit our day jobs and become full time public intellectuals.