Tuesday, March 19, 2013

Oil and war and economic growth.

Maybe the EU doesn't have to steal money from the savings of private citizens in Cyprus:
 Russia's Gazprom will pay their debts if they let them take over and explore/exploit their natural gas reserves.

 Belmont club discusses.

 Fracking is saving the US economy: NYTimes article on Fracking in Albany.
American steel industry recently received the economic equivalent of a gift from the heavens: natural gas extracted by means of hydraulic fracturing, or fracking. Fracking involves a whole lot of long steel pipes being sunk into rock formations thousands of feet beneath the ground in search of hydrocarbons. U.S. Steel, which is based in Pittsburgh, also happens to be right on top of the Marcellus Shale, the oil-rich formation that stretches from New York to Ohio. 
Similar deposits in the Mediterranean could also make Israel a source of clean energy in the near future.

and is the Sabah invasion (and the same nincompoop trying to say Sulu is independent) about who controls the  oodles of money from natural gas in that area?
This website mentions wikileaks cables and hates America, but does note:
Let’s not forget, the strategically located state of Sabah is abundant in natural gas reserves, and its oil reserves are the third highest in the Asia-Pacific region after China and India. Sabah’s fifteen oil wells produce as many as 192,000 barrels a day, while the country has holds over 4 billion barrels of proven oil reserves.
the reason I say the site "hates America" is that they correctly notice the US's possible involvement, they don't even hint that China might have a stake in the area, even though it is an open secret that Chinese businessmen run SEAsia and often are a point man for China's influence in the region. China is now busy grabbing the seas off of Palawan and Luzon, and how better to distract the Philippines than to have the Moros start a little trouble?

LINK does note China's interest in the area:
Oil majors such as ConocoPhillips and Shell have poured in billions of dollars to develop oil and gas fields in Sabah. Chinese companies have been investing in hydro-power and coal mining.

The Philippine foreign secretary flew to Malaysia on Monday to urge "maximum tolerance" against the group. Aquino urged Malaysia not to harm the interests of an estimated 800,000 Filipinos in Sabah, where many work in palm oil PLANTATION []s.

eighty percent of Sabah's land is now Palm oil plantations...
PBS article on Palm oil plantations/
STEVE SAPIENZA: In Malaysia's Sabah province, migrant workers hustle to keep up with the rising global demand for palm oil. Made from the fruit of oil palm tree, it is now found in more than half of all the products sold in U.S. supermarkets, from cookies to cosmetics.
This labor-intensive work has changed little since the 1960s, when the government first pushed the expansion of palm oil production. Today, palm oil is Malaysia's top crop, netting $25 billion dollars a year, and driving the spread of palm oil plantations into the wilderness.

but the future of palm oil is for biodiesel...
apparantly the demand and price of the oil has fallen, so they figure the only way to make money is to make biodiesel.

No, I am not an expert at all of this, but it does show the interconnected world.



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