Mozilla Firefox 1.0.7 released

Mozilla Firefox 1.0.7, a security and stability update to the flagship Mozilla browser, is now available for download. Fixes are included for the international domain name (IDN) link buffer overflow vulnerability and the Linux command line URL parsing flaw. There are also other security and stability changes, including a fix for a crash experienced when using certain Proxy Auto-Config scripts.

Firefox 1.0.7 can be downloaded from the Firefox product page or the Firefox 1.0.7 directory on ftp.mozilla.org. The Firefox 1.0.7 Release Notes have more details about this upgrade.

Is OPEC becoming irrelevant?

peakoil.com (thread) -> money.cnn.com :

While OPEC ministers met in Vienna Monday to discuss future production and price targets for oil, oil analysts and traders were instead focused on the waters off the Florida Keys. But even if Rita misses oil faculties, traders and economists say that the once all-powerful oil cartel's official pronouncements have no real impact on the market and the price of oil. "OPEC became powerless the moment it sold its last barrel of excess capacity, and that was maybe a year ago," said energy economist A. F. Alhajji, a professor at Northern Ohio University.

While most oil ministers from OPEC countries are bullish about future production levels, there are growing doubts about what OPEC can and will be able to do to increase production.

Bill Adams, chief energy and capital market strategist, LaSalle Futures, said that OPEC nations are limited in how much they can increase capacity because they could hurt the quality and quantity of oil they can extract from fields long-term if they try to remove too much, too quickly. "Overproduction can lead to a production collapse," he said. That makes promises of future production increases seem somewhat hollow, he said.

- When even the MSM (mainstream media) begins to question OPEC's credibility, it should make people sit up and pay attention. And once again, the peak oil community and the alternative news sources have been ahead of the current news by months. Check out the datestamps on the "see also" entries below for what the community has picked up on earlier.

The Slow Flow of Russian Oil

peakoil.com, nytimes.com :

For five years, the managers of Russia's richest oil fields in western Siberia increased output by 14 percent annually, overcoming decades of Soviet neglect by repairing leaks, replacing pumps and charting better geological maps. But then it stopped. In the year since Yuganskneftegas, the main production unit of the Yukos oil company, was effectively nationalized in December 2004, it will ship the same amount of crude oil, 385 million barrels, that it did in 2004, even as prices shot up in 2005 and the global supply of oil remained extremely tight.

The fields straddle five of western Siberia's best-producing reserves. The state-controlled oil and gas company Rosneft won them in January after the authorities took control of Yuganskneftegas, officially as part payment for a $28 billion tax claim against Yukos, then Russia's largest private oil company.

The stakes are high. By some rankings, Russia is the world's second-largest oil exporter after Saudi Arabia. Energy ministry projections cited by the United States Energy Department show crude oil exports rising possibly to 5.5 million barrels a day this year, from 5.14 million barrels in 2004, and reaching 6.2 million barrels a day by 2015.

See also :

1. Timeline: The rise and fall of Yukos (bbc.co.uk)
2. The Yuganskneftegas fields (yukos.com)

(2005-09-21 09:40:15 SGT) [Energy] Permalink

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