Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Oil War

the problem is the current government has done alot to shut down as much growth as possible.....oil prices world wide have been high enough that the current oil boom in the US has been largely immune to Obama's effects.....hell just Obamacare has done a hell of alot to stifle possible growth let alone everything else....hard to grow when most businesses are going to be required to give health care(expensive health care at that) to employees working more than 35 hours a week and where is the new growth going to come from even with low fuel prices? any improvements are going to be offset by the high cost of health insurance...

The Saudi's have enough money set aside so they can sell cheap oil for a little while, but not for years and years. So, whatever their strategy, it'll have to play out relatively quickly.

For the US industry, I don't think a short shake out period is a bad thing. Let housing construction etc catch up a little, and get the wage structure in the oil fields under control a little.

For players like Russia, Iran and Venezuela, $69 a barrel oil is a budget revenue disaster, and more than a year or so could start toppling governments. It stands to reason that this is the ultimate goal of the Saudi's: put enormous pressures on the Shia's.

None of all that seems like an entirely bad thing to me.

I think this is the root of the Saudi plan. The Iranian economy is already on the rocks with the economic sanctions over their nuke program and the Saudi's are trying to kick the last support out from under them. The triple pressure of the cost of supporting Iraq and fighting their war for them , the economic sanctions , and low oil prices the Iranians are in a tight spot. It also doubles down the pressure on Russia with economic sanctions and capital flight being bolstered by low oil prices. Low oil prices may slow domestic drilling in the short run but it's killing two of our enemies.

Oil shale is not monolithic (so to speak). While there is an average cost per barrel of production, it varies in the Bakken.
Production costs further north are already above market, but the costs south of Williston are less than $30/barrel. I expect, for a while that the result of this market will be a reallocation of production resources geographically, but not a shut down. The Saudis are playing a short term game for a short term gain and I really do not think they believe this is the death knell for shale oil production in the US. just sayin.

This is one of the few times I would stand for a price guaranty. How bout buying oil for 74 bucks barrel, right here in the USA. It is enough to keep our own oil pumping, keeping workers busy and say to hell with OPEC. We would stay at about $3.00-$3.50 per gal.

HFS! - crude took a 9% hit today. I'd been looking at DUG. Coulda made 13% today.

The good news is that once the holes are drilled they can still produce with minimal cost.

What costs the most is drilling.

I've read a couple opinions on oil shale remaining viable in some areas down to $65 a bbl

No jobs no money to buy gas no matter how cheap....

the main stream culture, worldwide depends upon oil to fuel the global economy.

but, thanks to gov't, more or less, we're on the cusp of a sea-change in transportation based energy usage. look at the nissan leaf, chey volt, the Tesla, and other such vehicles. it's the advance guard moving forward, it's innovative technology asserting itself.

toyota promises us a hydrogen fueled vehicle as early as next year.,

it's long been said that we're at the beginning of the end of the age of oil. it's time to move forward. advancements in technology and gov't regulation is going to ensure the change.

menawhile, i'll keep the wood heater, and the kerosene heater in reserve just in case the propane gas truck fails to make a timely delivery during cold weather,

oil derived energy continues to dominate, but it's impact has peaked, even though an oil shortage would hurt most everyone,.

Russia and Venezuela are about $90 break even.

Bakken is around 60.

Saudi is around 50.

What we really need to do if we want to control world markets is to increase refining capacity. Oil production itself is not and has never been the bottleneck in the last few decades. It's all about refining capacity. This is why liberals refuse to let refineries be built.

agreed. but the liberals who walk amongst us do not want additional gasoline usage. they want the markets to crunch so that we have no other option than to move on to mass-transit with the jobs it will provide, and the emergent solar economy.

it is a shift in consciousness. sun power, given a sufficient basis of r&d that helps to move the technology into the main-stream is their overall goal.

meanwhile, why split atoms when one can split wood?

Large fuel reserves aren't a bad thing.


Diesel keeps forever.

Start buying 10 year old pre-emissions pickups.

Save 'local' oil for when the chit really hits the fan.

we're busier than chit, i haven't been home in almost 6 weeks. can't complain though making 16-18,000 a month now.

What?!

That is insane on both counts but I am not surprised....grin

Boys its not only the crude but the huge amount of natural gas that comes along with extracting crude oil. While the crude is substantial, the gas is phenomenal!
Not yours, the stuff in the ground.

A few years back, Glenn Beck was telling the story that back in the 70s, there was a push to convert coal to oil the way the Germans did during the war. According to Beck, the Saudis reacted by cutting the price of crude below the level at which the conversion process made sense, thereby killing the competeition.

Sounds like the same crap they're pulling now.

Beck's friend and fellow Mormon, the President of jet Blue, wanted to do the coal to oil bit, but wanted the gummint to guarantee a minimum price to be offset when prices were high. Never heard any more about it.

A side benefit for the Saudis is that low prices limit the cash the Iranians have for their peaceful nuclear program.

Pappy,

Glad to see somebody else is paying attention.

This is a standard response from OPEC, or any other corporate entity, for that matter, that has readily available in-country supplies of energy stock.

How many times has this happened in the past? Same old story.

Said producer A (Arab) wants to put producer B (Balkans, SA, whoever/whatever) out of business.

Try to kill the competition by temporarily lowering prices and crying wolf the whole time while doing so. Voila.

Its a phuggin businesss model, for God sake.

Yep, it's just business. They want to slow oil production in the U.S. and Canada by selling it cheaper than we can produce it. It'll also likely stop the keystone pipeline if the price remains around $70, at that price the Alberta oil is too expensive to extract so there'll be no need for the pipeline.

It also has the effect of royally putting the screws to Iran and Russia, which is another big win for the Saudis. To tell the truth, I'm not sure what's really their target, the domestic U.S. oil industry or Iran. Maybe it's both.

They take the long view, which they can afford to do since they don't have to worry about elections and all that other stuff that " hampers" the West.

Of course, when ISIS starts to roll across their borders, they'll squeal for help like a bunch of little piggies. And we'll pull their sandy little chesnuts out of the fire again, of course. Again.

I hope when that happens, this country has a leader that makes sure they pay the price for their salvation. Where that leader will come from, I have no idea.

That same leader would see to it that we develop and use all available sources of energy, so we can never be held hostage by foreign devils again. We have all we need right here, and if we used it we could have full employment, balance the budget and get this country rolling again.

That will never happen, of course, because most of us are too focused on Kim Kardashian's ass to get anything done.