I still don't see how this is relevant? Oil refinaries are NOT pumping at 100% capacity. Close to it, yes... but not 100%. If they built a new oil refinary where would the oil come from? US stock inventories? They have been falling for most of the year without any sign of replenishing. There is simply not enough oil to go round. And if there were, it is very very tight.
Infact gasoline stockpiles have INCREASED recently. There is plenty of refined product at the moment. Do you have forecourts closing because they ran out of gas? The problem is not products, its crude oil.
So, there is a surplus of gasoline, but the price hasn't gone down? They are putting out 2 million less barrels of gasoline per day than they were in 1981...But there is now an increase in stockpiles, according to you...I guess we're using less? You cited that article as proof that Exxon's profits were going down...The article said they went down for the quarter due to a decrease in "gasoline output". Read your links...
The whole oil infrastructure is majorly outdated. Refineries and drilling rigs are well beyond their use-by date. There is massive maintanence just to keep them going. The oil workforce is in rapid decline also. The average age of oil exectives/managers is well over 50. Its literally crumbling away.
So, they made huge profits and gave themselves huge bonuses but didn't bother to maintain their equipment? I guess they didn't realize that things become dated due to advance in technology.
I don't see how this is relavent. What each CEO gets paid doesn't dipict how much oil is in the ground. For example, shell makes around $3million an hour. Of course the CEO's are gonna get HUGE pay packets. The companies are rolling in it, even if their profits are down. This is just speculation on your half. It sounds like jelousy?
Well, they(and you) claim that the infrastructure has gone to shit because of low profits and not enough regulation(Nobody told us to update our infrastructure). By your own admission "There is massive maintanence just to keep them going". Well, maybe they shouldn't have given themselves a raise bigger than the CEO's of other industries(who practice equipment maintenance and turnover).
On the day we first drew crude from the ground, there was less in the ground than the week before. Will it run out? Not likely, unless we are stupid enough to not find an alternative. You want me to believe this peak oil theory but yet the price of oil wasn't going up significantly for twenty years. It has skyrocketed since 2001...Not because experts came out and said "There is less oil! There will always be less oil!" No, it went up because of 9/11. No oil fields have burnt, no tankers have sank, and no refineries have been disabled by terrorists. The price went up because everyone expected it. The media came out and said "We'll pay for this at the pump..." And we have. Now they are priming us for another boost..."Oooh, look out folks it's running out, less supply means higher prices"...Duhh, okay, as long as I can keep driving.
http://www.ibtimes.com/articles/20070906/oil-commodities-opec_2.htmIn this article OPEC says that they may increase pumping by "up to 1 million barrels per day (bpd) later in 2007, perhaps in December, should demand prove robust and inventories fall." (So, we haven't reached the peak output, and they don't sound worried that the resource is dwindling.)
OPEC president says no shortage of oil
By Emma Graham-harrison
Posted 06 September 2007 @ 08:50 am EST
DALIAN, China - The oil market is well balanced and there is no shortage of crude, OPEC's president said on Thursday, ahead of a meeting of the producer group next week that is expected to maintain supply curbs.
"I think the market is very well balanced... There is no shortage whatsoever of oil supplies," Mohammed bin Dhaen al-Hamli, who is also oil minister of the United Arab Emirates, told Reuters.
In the run up to the September 11 gathering, several members of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) have said they see no need to boost supply, despite calls by consumer nations for an increase that could help bring down high prices.
Hamli emphasized a shortage of skilled labor and bottlenecks in the refinery sector as key factors in high oil prices that were beyond producer nations' control. (Is that true considering they were refining more barrels per day a quarter century ago?)
http://business.maktoob.com/News-20070423131528-OPEC_chief_says_no_need_for_oil_output_hike.aspxOPEC chief says no need for oil output hike
AFP Wed, 14 Nov 2007 11:54 PM - Dubai Time
OPEC chief Abdallah al-Badri on Wednesday rejected US calls for increased oil output to cool record prices, saying the market is already well supplied...US Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman on Tuesday called on OPEC, which supplies 40 percent of the world's oil, to help cool record prices by raising output.
"I do believe there is a
lack of willingness to supply the market... It is contributing to the price environment," he told reporters on the sidelines of an energy conference in Rome.
The OPEC chief said the cartel will not allow any shortage of supply to occur and called on the United States to help in resolving its refinery bottlenecks which are contributing to the price hike.
"We don't want to see any shortage in supply... If there is a shortage, we will watch it and we want to see if we can satisfy this shortage," said Badri, adding that OPEC does not favour a high price for oil.
He said OPEC members are
investing 150 billion dollars on 120 projects to raise their capacity by five million barrels a day in 2015.(Because it is running out soon
)
The 12-member cartel plans to increase its capacity
by 19 million barrels in 2030, he said.
Oil prices rose sharply to close to 100 dollars a barrel last week over concerns of
tight supplies, geopolitical tensions and a decline in US oil inventories.
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