, and Volga. These major rivers bring about 75,000 tons of waste per year into the Caspian Sea, 90 percent of which flows from the Volga.
Meanwhile, oil production releases only 111 tons of oil products into the sea.
A third, but no less important source of the sea pollution, is industrial and household waste, especially in large cities.
During a two-day period early this week, the United States reported that coalition aircraft had conducted 23 strikes in Syria, destroying about three dozen Islamic State vehicles, buildings and tactical units.
During the same two days, Russia said its aircraft had hit 472 “terrorist objectives” in Syria, including an Islamic State oil depot, an “oil production plant” and 80 tanker trucks.
Parce que « le capitalisme mondial dominé par les #États-Unis doit être protégé », « l’armée américaine se prépare à une nouvelle ère de guerre du #pétrole » selon deux rapports stratégiques parus cette année.
More broadly, though, the continued centrality of oil to the global economy will underpin the need for an active US military.
LONDON, 29 April, 2015 − Companies and governments responsible for 40% of global gas flaring have made a commitment to stop their climate-damaging activities within the next 15 years.
Announcing the “Zero Routine Flaring by 2030” initiative at a meeting in Washington DC, the UN Secretary-General, Ban Ki-moon, said its supporters are demonstrating real action in the run-up to the all-important UN conference on climate change in Paris later this year.
Vast quantities of gas are wasted each day through flaring at oil production sites – but it will be hard to meet a 2030 target to end the practice.
LONDON, 16 February, 2015 − It’s like burning banknotes. Latest statistics from the World Bank (WB) indicate that the amount of gas flared each year is enough energy to supply electricity to several small countries or many millions of households.
The flaring of 140 billion cubic metres (bcm) a year releases large quantities of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere – and that is not only bad news for the climate, but also for human health.
Je l’avais notifié quelque part, mais je ne sais plus où. Pourquoi faut-il toujours attendre la der des der pour en parler vraiment publiquement?!
Displaced by surging U.S. oil production, millions of barrels of Nigerian crude now head to India, Indonesia and China. But Middle Eastern nations are trying to entice the same buyers. This has set up a battle for market share that could reshape the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries and fundamentally change the global market for oil.
The sudden plunge in global crude oil prices from over $100 a barrel to under $65 has been portrayed as a showdown between Saudi Arabia and the U.S., two of the world’s biggest oil producers. But the reality is more complex, involving Libyan rebels and Indonesian cabdrivers as well as Texas roughnecks and Middle Eastern oil ministers. It reflects both the surging supply of crude and the crumbling demand for oil.
For a long time, it seemed like the world’s growing appetite for oil would soak up all the displaced crude. By 2011 prices began to hover between $90 and $100 a barrel and mostly stayed in that range.
But earlier this year, another trend began to come into focus, catching Wall Street energy analysts and other market watchers by surprise. In March, many analysts predicted global demand for crude oil would grow by 1.4 million barrels a day in 2014, to 92.7 million barrels a day.
That prediction proved wildly optimistic.
Rising supply and falling demand both put downward pressure on prices. Throughout the summer, however, fears of violence in Iraq kept oil prices high. Traders worried Islamic State fighters could cut Iraq’s oil output.
Then two events tipped the market. In late June, The Wall Street Journal reported the U.S. government had given permission for the first exports of U.S. oil in a generation. While the ruling was limited in scope, the market saw it as the first crack in a long-standing ban on crude exports. Not only was the U.S. importing fewer barrels of oil, it could soon begin exporting some also. This news jolted oil markets; prices began to edge down from their summer peaks.
On July 1, Libyan rebels agreed to open Es Sider and Ras Lanuf, two key oil export terminals that had been closed for a year. Libyan oil cargoes sailed across the Mediterranean Sea into Europe. Already displaced from the U.S. Gulf Coast and eastern Canada, Nigerian oil was soon replaced in Europe, too.
Increasingly, shipments of Nigerian crude headed toward China.
Saudi Arabia didn’t want Nigeria to develop long-term relationships with refinery buyers in Asia. In late September, the kingdom decided to shore up its hold on them by, effectively, holding a sale. The Saudis cut their official crude price in Asia by $1 a barrel; within a week, Iran and Kuwait did the same.
Two weeks later, the IEA again lowered its full-year projection of demand growth by 200,000 barrels a day to a meager annual increase of 700,000 barrels, nearly half of what it expected at the beginning of the year. Oil prices fell nearly $4 a barrel on the news.
At this point, the oil market appeared to be in free fall. Of the 23 trading days in October, the price of crude fell by more than $1 on eight days. It rose by $1 on one day.
Traders’ attention turned to OPEC, which has traditionally played the role of market stabilizer by cutting production when prices fall and raising production was prices rise. Many OPEC members, reliant on the cash oil brings in to pay for generous social programs, didn’t want to cut.
Saudi Arabia’s powerful oil minister, Ali al-Naimi, was silent for weeks. The country had been burned in the past when it cut its oil output, only to see other countries continue to pump—and steal its customers.
And it was already feeling competition, says Abudi Zein, chief operating officer of ClipperData, a New York firm that tracks global crude movement. Colombia, which historically has sent most of its oil to the U.S., is finding its biggest buyer this year is China, a critical market for OPEC, he said.
At its regular meeting in Vienna in late November, the cartel kept production unchanged. U.S. and European oil prices fell another $7 per barrel.
The agreement that Iran, the United States and Europe have been pushing for months was finally signed last week when Erbil and Baghdad agreed to regulate their oil production and revenue sharing.
It wasn’t for nothing that Iran, the United States and Europe worked so hard for this accord that has important ramifications for future of Iraq. The same accord will have important consequences for Turkey.
A mon avis, de la plus grande importance pour la suite... On notera que l’Iran, les USA (et l’Europe) négocient de concert pour donner un peu d’air au Kurdistan irakien vis-à-vis de son dialogue avec la Turquie, et pour donner un peu de crédibilité à l’Etat irakien.
London, Asharq Al-Awsat—The Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) is preparing to seize one of the few remaining major oil production centers in Syria not under its control, according to Syrian opposition officials.
“ISIS is already in control of more than 60 percent of Syria’s oil, with a total production rate of 180, 0000 barrel per day” and now plans to seize facilities in the northern province of Hassakah, an official from the Ministry of Energy in the interim Syrian opposition government, Yamin Al-Shami, told Asharq Al-Awsat.
Shami warned that oil production constitutes a significant source of revenue for ISIS, adding that the Islamist militant group is able to sell a barrel of crude oil for around 18 US dollars. Brent crude, a global benchmark, currently sells at around 107 US dollars.
Oil is transported from ISIS-held areas with the help of local and foreign brokers, Shami said.
Despite its recent advances in Iraq, ISIS has been unable to take control of oil resources comparable to those it holds in Syria, and its recent attempt to capture the key Baiji refinery was successfully deterred by Iraqi forces. But Iraq’s oil infrastructure is far from secure, and there are frequent reports that huge amounts of crude oil are being smuggled out of the country by militants.
“Militant groups, along with ISIS, are stealing crude oil from fields near the Hamrin mountains” in northeastern Iraq, a local administrative official, Shallal Abdool, told Asharq Al-Awsat.
“Kurdish Peshmerga forces that control the area have seized more than 50 tankers loaded with stolen crude oil,” he added.
But, pointing to the fact that oil smuggling has been a problem for decades, others played down worries about ISIS’s oil activities.
“Oil smuggling operations from these sites exist and have been taking place for a long time before ISIS took over Nineveh province,” the governor of Salah Al-Din province, Ahmed Abdullah Al-Jubouri, told Asharq Al-Awsat.
The American Government, pursuant to its Executive Order (E