How to share that oil?
(Oil price in 2004 prices. $ a barril. 1946-2006. Source: BP)
The Baltimore Sun writes today: "President Bush is reportedly annoyed that the Chinese are using so much petroleum. With the world's fastest-growing economy, China's oil consumption has soared to at least 6.5 million barrels a day, and its market for automobiles is growing. If the boom continues, the Chinese may eventually be somewhere in the neighborhood of the United States, which burns up about 20 million barrels a day.
Who do those Chinese think they are - Americans?"
The Bush adminstration wouldn't give the Chinese the honour of a formal state visit, when Hu visited America. He could start the Journey on the West Coast visiting a private businessman. That does not bode well for the coming relationship between these two - in future - perhaps equally dominating superpowers.
How are these two going to share the oil in the world? - If there's any oil to share? Anywhere, there's not going to be enough of it - and who will be most favoured in the coming distribution of it. This is probably what the coming global conflicts will be about.
The world production and consumption of oil is about a little under 100 million barrils (169 litres) a day. America consumes some 20 million. It imports more than half of this amount. The Chines consume a third of that. If the Chinese and the Indians end up consuming as much oil as the Americans, the world will need to produce and consume 300 million barrils a day. When the "little" extra Chinese consumption we've seen so far has been able to drive prices up, as can be seen on the curve of prices above, what effect will 300 million barrils a day have? - What effect will it have on the environment? What level will the water in the oceans rise to, when global warming heats up the Earth? How will the geostrategic situation evolve?
We are getting an "innocent" impression of it, when we see the push for regime shift and "Freedom and democracy" (designer democracy imposed from without) these days in Iraq and Afghanistan, - and soon also Iran. The West seems to be prepared for any line of action when it comes to protecting its geostrategic interests in the battle for resources.
posted by Cosmic Duck at 10:28 AM
2 Comments:
This is a great post. The chart and the map are very useful. may be you will be interested to read this article from Counterpunch published on April 20th about Cheney and China and how the middle east adventure of the neo-cons may somehow be driven by what they perceive as the Chinese problem in its increasing energy need. We should never forget that this guy worked for an energy multinational company.
http://www.counterpunch.org/leupp04202006.html
Sophia.
You're right. A very interesting article. A noted the following remark: “The true measure of how powerful the vice president’s office remains today is whether the United States chooses to confront Iran and Syria or to seek diplomatic solutions. For the moment, at least, the war party led by Dick Cheney remains in ascendancy.”
I feel sorry to say that probably "Cheney remains in ascendency". It's actually not so much "being in ascendency" as calling the shots. He is body and content of Bush' father syndrome. Therefore his words will continue carrying weight.
Post a Comment
<< Home