Energy Comments
The Oxford Energy Comment is written by members of the research team and may take the form of a market commentary and reflections, or concern aspects of research in progress.
In all cases, the views expressed are those of the authors, and should not be taken to represent the position of the Oxford Institute for Energy Studies.
Oil Pricing Systems
Published: 1st May 2000| By: Paul Horsnell
The broad details of how oil is priced in the world market have remained the same for more than thirteen years. Indeed, the current system has now survived for as long as direct setting of an administered price by OPEC did. The system itself may have been stable, but the past thirteen years have seen [...]
Categories / Energy Comments, Energy Economics, Energy Policy, Oil
Gas Power Stations in Norway: Environmental Policy or Political Power Game?
Published: 1st April 2000| By: U. Bartsch
In many respects, Norway is not like other countries. It is large, sparsely populated, very rich, mountainous like Switzerland, oil-exporting like Kuwait, and has a citizenry which, in many instances, wants to see rather more than less state involvement in its affairs. And for the last two years the country had a government, under Kjell [...]
Categories / Energy Comments, Energy Policy, Gas
OPEC: Hard Choices
Published: 1st March 2000| By: Robert Mabro
This article appeared in Middle East Economic Survey Vol XLIII, No 11, 13 March 2000. The oil-exporting countries spent fifteen months (January 1998-March 1999) to agree upon and implement production cuts of the magnitude required by a sceptical and intemperate market for correcting the declining trend in prices. They all knew that a small percentage [...]
Categories / Energy Comments, Energy Economics, Energy Policy, Oil
The Kyoto Protocol: Does US Ratification Really Matter?
Published: 1st February 2000| By: Benito Müller
A growing number of mainly US analysts and academics have voiced their opinion that the UN Protocol concerning the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions adopted in Kyoto on 11 December 1997 is doomed to failure because of US Congress hostility. Indeed, it does not seem very likely that Congress will ratify the Kyoto Protocol at [...]
Categories / Energy Comments, Energy Policy
A Little Bit of Opening Up: The Middle East Invites Bids by Foreign Oil Companies
Published: 1st December 1999| By: K. Bindemann
In mid-November Kuwait held a conference on ‘The Role of International Oil Companies in the Development of Oilfields in Kuwait’. More than 200 executives from foreign oil companies (FOCs) shared what was, according to observers, a lively and open debate with the Kuwait Petroleum Corporation (KPC), Kuwaiti parliamentarians and government representatives. One of the aims [...]
Categories / Country and Regional Studies, Energy Comments, Oil
Suspending Sanctions on Iraq: Make Haste, Slowly
Published: 1st November 1999| By: Robert Mabro
Iraq’s decision on 22 November to suspend oil exports, helping to send oil prices to highs not seen since the Gulf war, underscores the continuing turmoil surrounding international policy on Iraq. By all accounts the UN economic sanctions imposed on the country nine years ago after the invasion of Kuwait have reduced it to hardship. [...]
Categories / Country and Regional Studies, Energy Comments, Energy Policy, Energy Security
A Line in the Sand
Published: 1st October 1999| By: Juan Carlos Boué
Without a doubt, 1999 has been an eventful year for the international oil industry, even when judged against the standards of the recent past. However, even in this year of extraordinary goings-on (OPEC shaking off its decade-long torpor, Saudi-Iranian rapprochement, the about face in Venezuelan oil policy brought about by the accession of Hugo Chávez [...]
Categories / Energy Comments, Energy Policy, Oil
Managing Oil Prices within a Band
Published: 1st September 1999| By: Robert Mabro
Oil prices fell to very low levels during the January 1998 – March 1999 crisis. The oil-exporting countries sought to redress the situation by repeated attempts to impress the market with production cuts. The first attempt, made in March 1998, did not produce the desired price effect. The second attempt, in June 1998, was equally [...]
Categories / Energy Comments, Energy Policy, Oil
Should OPEC Now Raise its Output Quotas?
Published: 1st August 1999| By: Robert Mabro
A. The Oil Price Saga How far is Tipperary? Well, the answer to this question depends first and foremost on where you happen to be when you enquire. In the same vein we can ask: `How high are oil prices today?’ And we would then answer the question by a further question: `What is your [...]
Categories / Energy Comments, Energy Economics, Oil
US Oil Security and the Oil Import Tariff Question
Published: 1st June 1999| By: Paul Horsnell
Oil protectionism is back as an issue in the USA, specifically in the form of lobbying by smaller producers for an oil import tariff to help bolster the prices they receive. The true hallmark of a bad idea is that it never really goes away. When the idea is one that can serve as a [...]
Categories / Energy Comments, Energy Security, Oil