"Love" high oil prices

A shocking realization that habits need to change. You felt it at the gasoline pumps. Get used to the pain in your pocketbook. Oil prices, which skyrocketed from $18 to nearly $65 a barrel in four years, are not likely to get much lower in the long run. But, in time, you may learn to love the results of the pain, however paradoxical that seems. If there is a glimmer of light in this petroleum gloom, it's the potential for high oil prices to spur individual and collective initiatives to reduce the nation's immense thirst for oil.

Why are prices so high? It's Economics 101. Oil is a freely traded commodity, subject to the law of supply and demand. The global market, not the oil industry, sets the price. Blame the mushrooming industrial growth of China and, to a lesser extent, India. Blame yourself if you bought a big SUV with an 11-miles per gallon thirst and moved into a McMansion with 15 rooms to heat. Or invest in oil stocks.

But what can I do? Quite a lot. Trade in that big SUV for a smaller one. Move closer to your job. Don't buy a bigger house than you need. Use public transport if you can. Individually, all that seems like small potatoes. Collectively, it's huge. It will be hard to reverse course. But we must stop fooling ourselves. High oil prices may well be the shock we need to change course.

(2005-11-07 13:26:42 SGT) [Energy] Permalink

Arab oil money

peakoil.com -> telegraph.co.uk :

The Arabs are back in town. Nearly 30 years after Middle Eastern investors first bought up many of Europe's and America's prize assets, they're back. And, just like in the 1970s, the invasion is being fuelled by record oil prices of more than $60 a barrel.

The size of the oil windfall is staggering. The International Monetary Fund estimates that Middle Eastern and North African oil exporting countries will earn about $530bn from crude sales next year, up from $300bn in 2003. That leaves a surplus of around $200bn in excess cash - footloose money looking for a home. High-end London real estate and wax museums in Paris have all been prime targets. Last week's move by Dubai Ports World on Britain's P&O is the most high-profile attempt yet - if successful, it would end 160 years of corporate history and remove an iconic name from British ownership.

Dubai is very much at the centre of the activity. Large swathes of empty desert are being sold off to private developers, while the economic boom can be seen throughout the state as giant construction cranes dominate the skyline. The result is a world of superlatives: one that boasts the world's tallest building, tallest hotel and the world's largest theme park, Dubailand.

(2005-11-07 13:15:13 SGT) [Energy] Permalink

Canadian oil sands "wildly profitable"

peakoil.com -> redorbit.com :

Think Saudi Arabia has a lock on oil? Turns out Canada has almost as much crude, if not more. For years Canada has pumped oil from traditional wells, shipping it across the border to U.S. consumers. In fact, Canada is the top oil exporter to the United States. (Saudi Arabia ranks third after Mexico.)

With crude prices hanging so high, Canada's unconventional oil sands - or tar sands, as they're often called - have become wildly profitable, adding more than 170 billion barrels of oil to Canada's reserve base. Today, the sands produce as much oil as Texas - about 1 million barrels a day. Output is set to nearly triple during the next 10 years. This will feed Americans' voracious appetite for oil far into the future, but the promise is not without problems.

Extracting valuable crude oil from sand is labor-intensive and expensive. And the process, which involves leveling acres of evergreens and spewing greenhouse gases into the air, has riled environmentalists. Still, energy companies such as Shell, Suncor, Exxon Mobil and ConocoPhillips press on. As Bob Gibson, managing director of independent investment bank Mustang Capital Partners of Calgary, points out: "All the issues get diluted at $60 oil." ...

(2005-11-07 13:06:22 SGT) [Energy] Permalink

"Peak" Dell?

news.yahoo.com -> reuters.com :

The best days of personal computer maker Dell Inc. may be behind it, financial weekly newspaper Barron's Inc. wrote in its November 7 edition. The paper noted that "Dell's revenue growth has now slowed for seven quarters in a row. If Dell's revenue fails to grow faster, and certainly if the company continues to miss earnings targets, it will be time to admit that Dell is past its best."

- "Growth has now slowed". That's the second derivative, folks - d2y/dx2. You see, the economic system we have is not only obsessed with growth, it demands an increasing *rate* of growth. The thing is, Nature has an equivalent for this kind of behaviour. We call it "cancer".

Two weeks

A lot has happened in the past two weeks or so, particularly in the office. One colleague (the team lead) has given birth, the wives of two other colleagues have given birth, two colleagues have gone off on holiday, one colleague has quit, and one colleague has died.

Yes, you read the last part right. His name was Phil. He was an Australian guy, responsible for many of the Java applets in the system, especially parts where a plain web interface wouldn't do. Passed away from cancer last Tuesday. The week before that was the last I saw him alive, when some of the team visited him at the hospital. We called his name then, and he tried to say "Hi" to us. At least, I think he did.

When I joined the company at the end of April, he was one of those who helped me with the bootstrap part. Bootstrap, as in getting started quickly with the system, and getting things done, without having to understand all fifty million lines of code at once. Well, actually, to-date, I don't know the exact line count. The earlier blog entry on the object tag for applets was inspired by his advice.

Three seats down, one seat to my right. The cleaning auntie had gathered up his belongings, books mostly, and put them into two large red plastic bags, ready to be sent back to the family. I pause a little when I pass by. I still have the email sent out earlier, just about three or four months back, telling us that he had been warded for severe stomach pain. I remember going out with him and his friend Ronn for our very last tea-break together, though of course we did not know it at the time. I did not know him very long, but I will always consider him a good friend. Farewell, friend.

"Death and taxes", I blurt out in a YM soon after the funeral, not knowing exactly why. Joe Black's line from the movie, probably - "Death and taxes?" Colleague replies, "some countries don't have taxes". "Yeah, those Middle East oil producers, mostly", I send back. "Brunei as well", he adds helpfully. We chat a little bit more about his (Singapore) oil rig shares and my (Canadian) energy stocks. As they say, "talking cock", mostly.

This kind of thing, it messes with your mind. Life and death. Life and work. He worked hard. He did work very, extremely hard. And then what? The question, such as it is, hangs in the air. Saying "congrats to your newborn" one day, "condolences on your loss" the next. It's extreme. You don't get much more extreme than this. Well. People die, people get born. Time passes. Life goes on. And that's that.

(2005-11-07 00:43:48 SGT) [Musings] Permalink Comments [2]

« Previous day (Nov 6, 2005) | Main | Next day (Nov 8, 2005) »

Most popular blog postings on lowem.log :

1. Singapore SIBOR interest rates fall to 1.5%, lowest since Dec 2004
2. Singapore SIBOR rate falls to 1.31%, lowest since Nov 2004
3. Live spot gold price quotes chart on COMEX
4. Fuel prices seen stoking Malaysia inflation in 2008
5. 2010 Honda Civic Hybrid preliminary specifications released
6. Singapore SIBOR rate fell to 1.25% in Apr 2008, lowest since Aug 2004
7. Malaysia inflation rate jumps to 7.7% in Jun 2008, a 26-year record high
8. Singapore : electricity tariffs to increase April 2008 on rising oil prices

Featured articles on lowem.log :

1. ABC Guide to Beating Inflation in Singapore and Elsewhere
2. Singapore inflation rate hits new 26-year high of 7.5% in Apr 2008
3. Singapore : Bread price inflation continues
4. 2010 Honda Civic Hybrid preliminary specifications released
5. Peakoiler buys 2008 Honda Civic Hybrid FD3
6. How to insert currency exchange rates into Google Spreadsheets
7. Singapore SIBOR rate falls to 0.94% in Nov 2008, lowest since Jul 2004
8. Singapore : Inflation erodes away bank savings