by Dreams End » Wed Aug 16, 2006 2:23 pm
I did a quick search on "saudi oil production". Try it. Almost every article on the first page were dire warnings...and almost ALL OF THEM were actually reports or reviews of a book or presentation by Matthew Simmons. I am completely serious...try it:<br><br><br><!--EZCODE LINK START--><a href="http://www.google.com/search?hs=pCi&hl=en&lr=&client=firefox&rls=org.mozilla%3Aen-US%3Aunofficial&q=%22saudi+oil+production%22&btnG=Search">"saudi oil production"</a><!--EZCODE LINK END--><br><br>Except this one:<br><!--EZCODE QUOTE START--><blockquote><strong><em>Quote:</em></strong><hr><br>How Saudi Arabia can double oil production<br>Saudi oil production capacity could grow from its current 11 million b/d to over 23 million b/d to meet world demand according to Saudi Aramco's President and Chief Executive Officer Abdallah S. Jumah, confounding sceptics who believe that the Kingdom may be approaching, or even past, peak production.<br>Saudi Arabia: Saturday, June 04 - 2005 at 13:00<br><br><br>Petroleum and Mineral Resources Minister Ali Al-Naimi: 'There are great opportunities to increase the Kingdom's producible oil reserve by about 200 billion barrels.'<br>Petroleum and Mineral Resources Minister Ali Al-Naimi: 'There are great opportunities to increase the Kingdom's producible oil reserve by about 200 billion barrels.'<br><br>related stories<br>Dedicated Saudi Arabia Focus RSS feed Saudi Arabia Focus RSS feed<br><br> 1. Saudi gas development is back on track<br> 2. Massive investments in railway infrastructure<br> 3. Saudi minerals: an untapped gold mine for privatization<br> 4. Riyadh optimistic about WTO accession this year<br> 5. Saudi privatisation get into top gear<br> 6. Saudi Arabia plans huge refinery investments<br> 7. Mobile phones transform the Kingdom's telecom market<br> 8. Kingdom's banks look to golden era<br> 9. Industrial diversification lifts off in Saudi Arabia<br> 10. WTO set to boost foreign direct investment into Saudi Arabia<br><br>More Saudi Arabia Focus stories »<br>In a speech delivered at Rice University in Houston Mr Jumah said that the Kingdom is uniquely positioned to step up and deliver, because of its reserves and resources, to consider raising its production by such a margin.<br><br>The company is currently expanding its production, processing and transport infrastructure to allow for a 12 million b/d capacity which includes a commitment to maintain 1.5 million to 2 million b/d of spare production capacity.<br><br>At the end of 2004, Crown Prince Abdullah inaugurated Saudi Aramco's Qatif project, north of Dhahran. This has increased production capacity by 800,000 b/d. Some 500,000 barrels derives from onshore extraction and 300,000 barrels from the offshore Abu Safah field which is part of the Qatif production project.<br><br>Increased production capacity has been helped by completion of other recent projects in the South Riyadh oilfield, Shaybah, as well as Qatif. A project in the Haradh field to produce another 300,000 b/d will be completed in 2006 while 500,000 b/d is expected to come on stream from field developments at Abu Hadriya, Fadhili and Khursaniyah in 2007. New production at the Khurais field north of Saudi Aramco's principal Ghawar field will increase output there to 1.9 million b/d by 2009.<br><br>200 billion barrels more<br>According to Petroleum and Mineral Resources Minister Ali Al-Naimi: 'There are great opportunities to increase the Kingdom's producible oil reserve by about 200 billion barrels either through new discoveries or increasing the percentage of extractable oil from known reserves.'<br><br>Saudi Aramco says it has a conservative approach to reservoir estimates and depletes its reverses at a far slower rate than major oil companies a policy which is designed to provide a healthy cushion between its production and its maximum sustainable capacity.<br><br>Dr. Nansen Saleri, Saudi Aramco's oil reservoir manager has said that Saudi Aramco's production capacity can easily be increased to sustainable rates of 12 million to 15 million barrels-a-day if global markets demand the extra crude.<br><br>With 27.62% of the world's proven oil reserves, Saudi Arabia possesses the lion's share of all the oil producing countries crude according to BP's latest annual statistical survey.<br><br>About 130 billion barrels of this is developed and mostly in production. Saudi Aramco's plans call for the replacement of 15 billion barrels of reserves from 2005 to 2009 at a rate of about 3 billion barrels a year.<br><br>'We believe very confidently that we are looking very conservatively upwards of 150 billion barrels over and above the 260 billion barrels that we carry as proven reserves right now. That is 60% more and that's the underlying message we want to convey,' Dr Saleri told the Centre for Strategic and International Studies last year.<br><br>Saudi Aramco considers that the huge acreage in Saudi Arabia's Rub al-Khali Empty Quarter desert region in the south-east offers big potential for new oil finds as well as the northern basin towards the northern border as well as the offshore Red Sea basin.<br><!--EZCODE LINK START--><a href="http://www.ameinfo.com/61640.html">link</a><!--EZCODE LINK END--><br><hr></blockquote><!--EZCODE QUOTE END--><br><br>Can you see why some of us intelligent anti-peakers might be "deluded". Not only do we have to believe the peakers, we have to ignore other experts. We are somehow, magically, supposed to know which ones are shills and which ones are speaking truth. Since Simmons makes $$$ when prices go up, I'm wondering if maybe he's not the one to listen to about this, since justifying price gouging by saying it's simply supply issues is a great tactic.<br><br>Can I go ahead and anticipate the response? Saudi Arabia/Aramco is lying!!!!<br><br>Fine, so how do you guys have independent sources of information to sort out the truth or falsity of various claims in oil. You doing your own surveys?<br><br>And why does it amaze you that people could see a report like the one above and give it as much credence as a book by an oil speculator. Who provides the data, anyway? Do oil companies benefit from HONESTY in their reporting one way or the other?<br><br>Go read palast's article again about the falling price of oil and Hubbert's helpful analysis for Shell that showed that it was going to peak sooner than anyone thought. Translation: prices are too low.<br><br><br>Now Sullymandias, how did YOU become such an expert on the Ghawar oil field? What's your data source? What does "down millions of barrels a day mean?" Where did you get that info and how do you know that it's a matter of peak and not profit. <br><br>A quick review:<br><br>Decrease supply = increase price = fat wallet for fat oilmen.<br><br>Here, evidently without irony, is the description of Simmons given on one site that reported his dire findings (which turned out to be "skepticism of Saudi claims".<br><br><!--EZCODE QUOTE START--><blockquote><strong><em>Quote:</em></strong><hr>Another analyst who made the post-9/11 pilgrimage to Saudi Arabia was Matthew Simmons, an <!--EZCODE BOLD START--><strong>advisor to Dick Cheney's energy task force </strong><!--EZCODE BOLD END-->and a one time contributor to George Bush's energy plan during the 2000 campaign. An investment banker who has specialized in the energy industry for 30 years, Simmons visited Saudi Arabia for six days in 2003 as part of a U.S. energy delegation and, like Roberts, came away skeptical. Could Saudi Arabia really double its production rate over the next decade? For that matter, could it increase its production rate at all? Or had Saudi production already peaked?<br><!--EZCODE LINK START--><a href="http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/2005/0506.drum.html">link obtained on first page of above google search</a><!--EZCODE LINK END--><br><hr></blockquote><!--EZCODE QUOTE END--><br><br>Are you folks seriously going to sit here and say I should believe someone who was an advisor to Cheney's energy task force...can you honestly not see what's going on here? <br><br>Oh, by the way, one of Simmons' main projects is pushing for more transparency in reporting in the oil industry. See, it's really hard to get good info. from the above article:<br><br><!--EZCODE QUOTE START--><blockquote><strong><em>Quote:</em></strong><hr>For Simmons, this is no idle question. His main fight these days is to push for increased transparency in the oil industry so that independent analysts can rely on more than guesswork to figure out how much oil we have left. It's a good cause as far as it goes, since the almost complete lack of solid information in the oil patch leads different analysts to wildly diverse conclusions. Peak oil doubters, for example, project a world production peak sometime around mid-century, if ever. They note that production has continued to increase for decades despite warnings of decline ever since the first oil embargo. They point out that estimates of world oil reserves have increased since 1980 despite the fact that we've gulped down more than 500 billion barrels of the stuff during that time. And they argue that higher prices will promote additional exploration and more extensive use of costly technology, while making it profitable to develop otherwise remote deepwater and Arctic oil fields.<hr></blockquote><!--EZCODE QUOTE END--><br><br>Searching on Ghawar I get this:<br><!--EZCODE QUOTE START--><blockquote><strong><em>Quote:</em></strong><hr><br>Among the many prolific oil fields in the Middle East, the giant Ghawar field in Saudi Arabia stands out as the crown jewel.<br><br>Discovered in 1948, Ghawar is the world's biggest oil field, stretching 174 miles in length and 16 miles across to encompass 1.3 million acres.<br><br>Current estimates, according to the numerous published articles and reports on Ghawar, tag cumulative oil production from this geological giant at 55 billion barrels, and the field just keeps going gangbusters. Average production for the last 10 years has held essentially steady at five million barrels per day.<br><br>In fact, this one field accounts for more than one-half of all oil production in Saudi Arabia, according to a number of sources.<br><br>The anatomy of Ghawar was the topic of a presentation given by Abdulkader Afifi, senior geological consultant at Saudi Aramco, during his recent U.S. tour as an AAPG Distinguished Lecturer.<br><br>Ghawar is a north-trending anticlinal structure, which is expressed on the surface by outcrops of Tertiary rocks. In the field's northern part the structure actually comprises two parallel anticlines with a small low in between.<br><br>Oil was first discovered in 1948 in the northern part using structural drilling, where geologists would map structures by drilling a grid of shallow wells to the top of the Cretaceous, according to Afifi. This technique was developed by Max Steineke, chief geologist at the Arabian American Oil Co. (parent company to Saudi Aramco), who received the AAPG Sidney Powers medal in 1951.<br><br>The initial discovery in Ghawar's southern part was in 1949 at the Haradh Field, where American geologist Ernie Berg mapped the surface of the Haradh anticline using the ordinary, tried-and-true plane table method.<br><br>The northern and southern discoveries appear as separate fields on early maps prior to being connected as a single field in 1955.<br><br><br><!--EZCODE LINK START--><a href="http://www.aapg.org/explorer/2005/01jan/ghawar.cfm">link</a><!--EZCODE LINK END--><br><br><hr></blockquote><!--EZCODE QUOTE END--><br><br>This is from the radical American Association of Petroleum Geologists. So how is an intelligent anti-peaker supposed to figure out that they are lying? where is the pro-peak data coming from and how are we non experts supposed to know which is correct? Which of you are geologists?<br><br>Aramco's chief petroleum writer:<br><br><!--EZCODE QUOTE START--><blockquote><strong><em>Quote:</em></strong><hr>The planning, construction and operation of oil-production and pressure-maintenance facilities in such fields as Ghawar represents a deliberate, coordinated effort to produce crude oil in Saudi Arabia at optimum conditions. It is common knowledge in informed circles that the volume of crude produced daily by Aramco's fields, including Ghawar, is very substantial. While the company's storage tank capacity is large, and growing, it would take very little time to overflow its tanks with current production. This is a problem that company oil planners do not expect to face. Large quantities of oil are being produced in and exported from Saudi Arabia these days because there is a demand for it. Ghawar field is pulling its weight to help meet the world's urgent—and increasing—requirements for energy.<br><br><!--EZCODE LINK START--><a href="http://www.saudiaramcoworld.com/issue/197306/oscar.for.an.oilfield.htm">link</a><!--EZCODE LINK END--><hr></blockquote><!--EZCODE QUOTE END--><br><br>I am well aware that there are reports that contradict the above. Even some Saudi officials have said Ghawar is in decline, but say they can make up for it and more in other ways. They could be lying about the former, the latter, both or neither. <br><br>My point is that the idea that peak is somehow self-evident...you look out your window and go, "Holy S&*t, we are running out of oil" is silly. People disagree because the data that exists is not complete and even when it is, how to speculate about future tech and discoveries is not agreed on. That's why they call it the "future" and not the "past."<br><br>I think this quote from Simmon's & co international probably sums up why I'm a little skeptical of him:<br><!--EZCODE QUOTE START--><blockquote><strong><em>Quote:</em></strong><hr><br>Ownership of publicly traded oil service equity is concentrated in a small percentage of institutions. This concentration of ownership, combined with its focused industry research, has enabled Simmons to develop close relationships with these key owners of oil service equities. This gives the Simmons Institutional Sales force, with its “single product,” excellent placement power in offerings, and its Research effort excellent access to those institutions.<br><br><!--EZCODE LINK START--><a href="http://www.simmonsco-intl.com/services_inst_sales.asp">link</a><!--EZCODE LINK END--><hr></blockquote><!--EZCODE QUOTE END--><br><br>Simmons is a pro of course and has a business to run so he has to be a bit more blunt in his reports. You can find them <!--EZCODE LINK START--><a href="http://www.simmonsco-intl.com/research.aspx?Type=researchreports">here.</a><!--EZCODE LINK END--><br><br>I found this little paragraph in the January '06 report:<br><!--EZCODE QUOTE START--><blockquote><strong><em>Quote:</em></strong><hr><br>Crude fundamentals are characterized by structural positives, including stubbornly resilient energy demand, OPEC discipline and increasingly unyielding challenges which support a higher range of oil prices than historical precedent (in our view between $50 and $80/bbl) with risks of spikes if geopolitical tensions escalate. As was the case last year, there is uncertainty regarding winter demand due primarily to mild weather in North America. The Secretary-General of OPEC, however, has recently expressed, on more than one occasion, that at $45 to $55/bbl crude, oil prices do not have a deleterious effect on the worldwide economy, which leads us to believe that the cartel will defend this pricing threshhold, should this prove necessary. Further, there is some anecdotal evidence that OPEC has trimmed production over the past month - the recent compressing tanker rates and effective price increases for Arab Medium and Heavy grades corroborates this view as well. Whether OPEC ultimately offically cuts production in Vienna on January 31 remains to be seen, but the fact remains that OPEC is proactively managing for the possibility of excess supply by controlling output in advance of the seasonally weak second quarter demand.<hr></blockquote><!--EZCODE QUOTE END--><br><br>I had to hand type that so you have to get the pdf yourself. Can you see what this is saying? Nothing radical, of course, but it's saying OPEC manipulates production to keep prices up and that they were anticipating an excess of supply.<br><br>I went to around page 11 or so looking for his country by country analysis. No dire end of the world predictions to be found, but he did say this about Saudi production in reference to the disagreement over oil field decline rates:<br><br><!--EZCODE QUOTE START--><blockquote><strong><em>Quote:</em></strong><hr>Based on the limited amount of publicly available information, we believe there is reason to doubt whether or not Saudi Arabia can meet its target of 12.5 mb/d.<hr></blockquote><!--EZCODE QUOTE END--><br><br><br><br>He's not contradicting himself in these reports...but just a tad less...alarmist. <p></p><i>Edited by: <A HREF=http://p216.ezboard.com/brigorousintuition.showUserPublicProfile?gid=dreamsend@rigorousintuition>Dreams End</A> at: 8/16/06 12:26 pm<br></i>