The headlines from BP’s Strategy presentation yesterday are all about how chief executive Tony Hayward promised to boost annual profits by $3bn over the next two or three years. In a frank admission, Hayward said that BP’s financial importance over the last few years had not been acceptable and had “some catching up to do.”
Iraq
Oil “Dominating” Iraqi Election Campaign
So seven years later it will come down to this weekend. Whether President Obama can withdraw all American combat troops from Iraq by August will be decided by the Iraqi elections this weekend. If the election passes off peacefully, American soldiers will probably go home on schedule. But if there is a repeat of the … Read More
Is Iraq a “Game-Changer” for Peak Oil?
The Oil Drum is one of those great blogs that discusses energy and peak oil. It has consistently and coherently been ahead of the curve, shall we say, when it comes to exploring the issue of peak oil and what we, as a society, should be doing about it. But the New Year has brought … Read More
Iraq: New “Colonial” Era of Oil Exploitation Begins
The British military may be gone, but the British oilmen are back. Today is the day that the oil men from BP take control of Iraq’s biggest oilfield: Rumaila. It is the first important oil deal since the 2003 invasion, and a long time since 1961 when Iraq passed Law 80 that wrestled back 99.5 … Read More
Police Use Anti-Terror Laws Against Climate Activists
Tomorrow is the “Great Climate Swoop” where hundreds of climate activists will demonstrate against E.ON’s Ratcliffe-on-Soar in Nottingham. It is a protest aimed at raising the issue of climate change in the run up to the Copenhagen Summit in December. But the planned protest has caused a strong backlash from the Police. Already there are … Read More
Rich should “rise to the challenge rather than race to the bottom”
For all the people who dared to dream that some kind of deal could be realised at Copenhagen comes the cold reality that time is basically running out. Fast. And there is less than sixty days to go. The Bangkok talks have ended in failure. The gap between what is needed and what the current … Read More
Iraq: “We have the right to ask for our rights”
When the final chapter of the dying days of the hydrocarbon age is written, the petro-politics of one nation will probably have more bearing on the outcome than any other. Whether you are reading about Africa, Canada or the Middle East –Â the country of concern will be China. (Also see Friday’s blog about the … Read More
Iraq Offers 2nd Round of Oil Bids
So the great Iraqi oil sell-off continues. The embattled Iraqi Oil Minister Hussain al-Shahristani will today unveil the next round of oil contracts at a conference in Istanbul. Al-Shahristani is under pressure to pull in investment after the Iraqi government’s first round only secured one deal for the vast Rumaila field: BP and China National … Read More
Iraq Trade Union Threatens BP Deal
After its offer was accepted last month to develop Iraq’s vast Rumaila oil field, BP may have thought it had won the biggest prize in the country’s oil race. But it may not be over yet and BP now faces industrial action. The trade union representing workers of Iraq’s state-owned Southern Oil Company (SOC) yesterday … Read More
Kurds Stake Claim to their Oil Reserves
This was not meant to happen. In the post-invasion planning of Iraq it was meant to be the American and British oil companies that enjoyed the spoils of war and access to the country’s lucrative oil reserves. But the Kurds keep putting a proverbial spanner in the works. Iraq’s Kurdish leaders adopted a new constitution … Read More