Word: oiling
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...troops prepare to withdraw from the country next year, some of the world's biggest energy companies, among them ExxonMobil and Royal Dutch Shell, are racing to lock up multibillion-dollar deals with officials in Baghdad that will allow them to exploit the country's giant oil fields. The deals will not only allow Big Oil to return to Iraq for the first time since Saddam nationalized the industry in 1972. By modernizing a production system wrecked by conflict and embargoes, Iraq's exports could also get a huge boost, putting the country's parlous economy on firmer footing...
...just the fortunes of one war-torn country are at stake. Researchers believe that Iraq's untapped oil reserves total at least 115 billion barrels - the third largest in the world. When fully developed, Iraq's oil industry could significantly boost global crude supplies and even bring down oil prices. Tapping Iraq's oil is an industry event of historic proportions, says Alex Munton, a Middle East analyst at global energy consultancy Wood Mackenzie. "There are very few examples in history you can point to and say, 'A similar thing happened there,' because there really have not been...
...Until recently, that change looked like it might never happen. Last summer, Iraq's government hosted an auction for eight large oil and gas fields at Baghdad's high-end Al-Rashid Hotel. There, oil executives from the U.S., Europe, Russia, China and South Korea paraded on stage and dropped their bids into a sealed box, in a ceremony broadcast live on Iraqi television. It was meant to be grand theater, but proved a p.r. failure for Baghdad. Just one bid succeeded: it was submitted by a partnership between Britain's BP and China National Petroleum Corp. (CNPC) for production...
...auction's failure was due in part to the government's inflexibility. Baghdad is under pressure by Iraq's feisty oil unions and politicians, who have accused leaders of aiming to sell the country's riches on the cheap to gain a little short-term relief for the economy. Oil executives argued they should be paid as much as $3.99 a barrel - nearly double the government offer - because of the risks involved. Operating in Iraq means investing billions in an unstable country where foreign oil workers are routinely kidnapped and insurgents have blown hundreds of holes in pipelines. Rochdi Younsi...
...government may have been right all along. After months of sticking to their demands, oil companies now are agreeing to Iraq's $2-a-barrel offer. In mid-November, Italian oil executives from ENI flew to Baghdad to sign a deal on Zubair, a southern Iraq field with about 4.1 billion barrels of reserves. ENI plans to pump about 1.1 million barrels a day from Zubair in partnership with California-based Occidental Petroleum and South Korea's Kogas. ENI was quickly followed by ExxonMobil and Royal Dutch Shell, which agreed to produce about 2.3 million barrels a day in another...