Word: crude
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Leaders in Beijing want to avoid the fate of other oil-poor countries like South Korea, which buys all its crude on the open market and is therefore exposed to sharp price rises. The way to do that is to invest in exploration and development in countries that have oil fields but lack the capital or technology to exploit them. When Chinese companies have a stake in oil coming out of the ground, even if it originates abroad, they will have secured long-term supplies independent of the world's fickle prices. The process of overseas exploration began...
...China's import requirements will continue to rise--putting upward pressure on world crude prices. If China's oil demand keeps growing an average 7% a year, as it has since 1990, in less than 20 years the country will consume 21 million bbl. of oil a day, matching current U.S. consumption. "The world has the oil," says Chen Huai of China's Development Research Center, a think tank in Beijing run by China's Cabinet, "and China has the money." The question is, how much is China--and the world--willing to pay for it? --With reporting by Susan...
...answer: the opportunities seem to far outweigh the risks. The major oil firms are under intense pressure from investors to find new reserves--now. With near record crude prices and Iraq in turmoil, Russia's vast untapped wealth of oil and gas has never looked more attractive. To be sure, there are production challenges: many of the reserves are located in remote locations deep in Siberia or above the Arctic Circle, and transport depends on clunky Soviet-era railways and pipelines whose leaks are frequently decried by Greenpeace and other environmental activists. Nonetheless, the Western oil companies are eager...
...companies regard Libya's oil as some of the best on the planet. Relatively thin, its crude is among the easiest to refine. It also takes far less time for tankers from Libya to reach U.S. ports than those leaving the Persian Gulf. Given the turmoil in Iraq, and the fact that Washington is on chilly terms with Iran, many U.S. oil companies see Libya as a dream prospect. "There's a huge amount of oil that hasn't been discovered," says Michael Thomas, director of the London-based Middle East Association, a trade-promotion group that organized the business...
...goes on, "we don't lack cash. We don't need capital." But Libya does need modern technological know-how and experienced manpower--the kinds of resources that big outside oil firms can provide. "We are strong enough to bargain," says Seif, who knows how valuable his country's crude is to the West. Who will command the upper hand in the negotiations remains to be seen. But with both sides motivated to get the oil pumping, Libya's importance to the world economy, and to America, will only grow...