BP's troubles in Russia show Big Oil's clout fading

[Dover]

Source: Houston Chronicle

Last year, soon after Tony Hayward became chief executive of BP, a colleague and I met with him and asked, among other things, about the company's venture in Russia.

He described it as "stunningly successful" and pledged that "we are going to continue to expand and grow our business in Russia."

A year later, TNK-BP is in tatters. Russia essentially kicked the venture's chief executive out of the country. BP remains in an ugly battle for control, while almost a quarter of its annual production hangs in the balance. Russia's invasion of Georgia last week, by the way, forced the shutdown of a BP pipeline originally built to circumvent Russia's control of energy in the region.

TNK-BP was a hallmark of Hayward's predecessor, John Browne. Browne transformed BP into a global player and pushed it into Russia in a bold move that many rivals wouldn't dare attempt. Daring turned to disaster, though, as BP found itself unable to control the outcome.

Gone are the days when BP manhandled reserves out of foreign countries, as it did in Iran the early years of the last century. Once the lion of British enterprise, Russia has brushed it aside like a kitten.

It's not alone. The rise in oil prices has emboldened foreign governments with petro-fed economies, from Russia to Venezuela. Western oil companies have been shut out of major new oil finds around the globe for years. Now, they're finding it increasingly difficult to hold onto assets they already have.

Even when drilling rights are sold at auction, the majors often lose, outbid by state-owned oil companies that can afford to sacrifice profitability for supply.

In other words, Big Oil doesn't seem so big these days.

The exception, of course, is in Washington, where it's still villain of choice for high gasoline prices.
But in the rest of the world, the Seven Sisters that once dominated the global oil market now seem forgotten...cont'd





Read more: http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/business/steffy/5947272.html

---

I think this calls for some bubbley! (and not the crude variety either).

I'd like to teach the world to sing
in perfect harmony....

[Cirque du So-What]

1. One of the lines is laughable

The exception, of course, is in Washington, where it's still villain of choice for high gasoline prices.

In DC, politicians line up like piggies at the feeding trough when Big Oil speaks.

[UpInArms]

6. like this?

Prosecutors: Senator helped oil contractor

By MATT APUZZO – 2 days ago

WASHINGTON (AP) — An Alaska contractor appealed to Sen. Ted Stevens to help win federal contracts, obtain grants and settle immigration issues, federal prosecutors say.

The Justice Department stops short of calling that corruption, but prosecutors want to present that evidence at trial next month.

The Alaska Republican is charged with lying on Senate financial disclosure records about hundreds of thousands of dollars in gifts and services he received from contractor VECO Corp.

In court documents filed late Thursday, prosecutors say Stevens pushed for a natural gas pipeline that would have benefited VECO. While the pipeline project stalled in the Alaska legislature in 2006, prosecutors say Stevens offered to use his Washington connections to try to advance the deal.

"I'm gonna try to see if I can get some bigwigs from back here to go up there and say, 'Look, uh, you just gotta make up your mind, you gotta get this done,'" Stevens told VECO founder Bill Allen, according to court documents.

Days after Stevens prodded state lawmakers to pass a pipeline deal, federal energy regulators issued a report saying delays could cripple the project, prosecutors said.

...more...

[UpInArms]

7. and more: New details surface in Stevens case

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/2008117762_stevens16.html

Sen. Ted Stevens, R-Alaska, quickly turned a $5,000 Florida condo investment into a profit of more than $100,000 in an unconventional transaction that federal prosecutors hope to introduce at his trial on charges that he lied on financial disclosure forms.

<snip>

The new filings go substantially further than a July indictment that charges Stevens with seven counts of failing to disclose gifts from 1999 through 2006. Most of the alleged gifts, including the renovation of the senator's Girdwood, Alaska, home, were from former oil-service company VECO and its politically active chairman, Bill Allen.

<snip>

The documents detailing the Florida condo transaction also allege that Stevens sought jobs from VECO for a son and a grandchild and a new Jeep Grand Cherokee for his daughter Lily in 2005.

<snip>

In March 2006, after the government had begun tapping Allen's phones, Stevens asked a lobbyist to ask Allen for a job in Phoenix for one of his three sons. The lobbyist said Stevens mentioned Allen by name.

...more...

[marmar]

14. It is the Houston paper.....There was probably a gasoline-scented gun pointed at his head.....

.... when he wrote the story.

[Arctic Dave]

2. Wow. This article has more angst and drama then a

teenagers diary. Talk about a feel sorry for poor little us whinefest. As for not being able to do seismic work off shore "to see how much oil were not drilling", is total BS. Off the coast of Alaska they are doing seismic mapping right now. Plus they are, and have, been building island offshore for drilling for about ten years now.

Whoever wrote this is tool.

[Dover]

13. lol....Yeah, they say you really shouldn't corner a wounded oilman.

They're likely to drill their way out.

[lovuian]

3. Yes all the US Oil Groups have hit a blocked wall

the US Military can't protect them anymore

they are really going down

I don't feel sorry for them at all

[Dover]

5. Well, we'll go down with them economically speaking, but it's a fair price to pay.

Now if we can just keep them from dragging us into more wars to save them and
prevent them from grabbing other resources (like water) and calling it 'oil',
we might finally get this country moving toward sustainability in a big way.

[Dover]

4. Oil Executives March On D.C.

'We Just Want Our Voices Heard'





WASHINGTON, DC—More than 1,000 majority shareholders and executive officers from the nation's largest oil companies gathered in the National Mall and marched to Capitol Hill Monday in a mass demonstration for petrochemical corporations' rights and, according to several of those who attended, "to let our voices be heard at last."


"We're American citizens, and we demand to be part of the national dialogue," said John S. Watson, vice president of international exploration and production for Chevron Corporation, the world's second-largest oil company. "Many people in our industry think nobody in Washington cares about us, and that our opinions don't matter. We're here today to change that."

Guest speakers, including folk-singing lobbyist Anne Novotny, international drilling-rights activist Bill Marshall, and several Saudi princes, focused on the need to extend subsidies to offshore drilling efforts, grant tax breaks for the construction of new refineries, and stop oppressive environmental regulation.

But the real message of the protest was more personal: To demonstrators, the oil industry is unappreciated and even persecuted by large segments of the public who only want them for the gasoline they sell. Protesters hoisted signs reflecting this sentiment, bearing such slogans as "Enough Is Enough," "Power To The Petroleum-Producing People," "Texaco-American Pride," and "I'm Pro-Oil And I Vote."

"Politicians are supposed to work for everyone," said Red Cavaney, president of the American Petroleum Institute. "For years, they've pretended like we didn't even exist. But today, with this many people from the oil industry right here in our nation's capital, we're sending an undeniably strong message." ..cont'd

http://www.theonion.com/content/node/48458

[dkf]

8. This is why arguing about big oil is stupid. Exxon is not the big boy anymore.

Other countries control oil. We are at the mercy of Russia and Saudi Arabia and Venezuela, Canada, Mexico, etc.

So please stop with the windfall profits tax. Most of the profits are going overseas.

[Strelnikov_]

10. ..

One reason that regime change in Iraq was seen as offering significant benefits for Big Oil was that it promised to open up a treasure chest which had long been sealed — private ownership of Middle Eastern oil. A small group of major international oil companies once privately owned the oil industries of the Middle East. But that changed in the 1970s when most Middle Eastern countries (and some elsewhere) nationalized their oil industries. Today, state-owned companies control the vast majority of the world's oil resources. The major international oil companies control a mere 4 per cent.

The majors have clearly prospered in the new era, as developers rather than owners, but there's little doubt that they'd prefer to regain ownership of the oil world's Garden of Eden. "(O)ne of the goals of the oil companies and the Western powers is to weaken and/or privatize the world's state oil companies," observes New York-based economist Michael Tanzer, who advises Third World governments on energy issues.

[Strelnikov_]

9. The Kurds bombing of a pump station, two days before Georgia attacked

is the reason the BTC pipeline was shut down.

Any fact-checking nowadays?

Operator British Petroleum (BP) was forced to shut down the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan (BTC) pipeline after a terrorist attack in Turkey that occurred 2 days before the Russian military incursion into Abkhazia, South Ossetia and Georgia

[Dover]

11. Well.... the MSM has to be in lockstep or propaganda doesn't work.

U.S. MSM -

Talking point number one: Georgia was the victim of an unprovoked attack by Russia
Talking point number two: The attack caused BP to shut down its BTC pipeline
And so on...

[Dover]

12. 29 Years Ago

That's how long it's been since Carter presented a choice to our nation, to which we did not
respond or rally:

From J. Carter's speech in 1979, A Crisis of Confidence:


Energy will be the immediate test of our ability to unite this nation, and it can also be the standard around which we rally. On the battlefield of energy we can win for our nation a new confidence, and we can seize control again of our common destiny. In little more than two decades we've gone from a position of energy independence to one in which almost half the oil we use comes from foreign countries, at prices that are going through the roof. Our excessive dependence on OPEC has already taken a tremendous toll on our economy and our people. This is the direct cause of the long lines which have made millions of you spend aggravating hours waiting for gasoline. It's a cause of the increased inflation and unemployment that we now face. This intolerable dependence on foreign oil threatens our economic independence and the very security of our nation. The energy crisis is real. It is worldwide. It is a clear and present danger to our nation. These are facts and we simply must face them....I do not promise you that this struggle for freedom will be easy. I do not promise a quick way out of our nation's problems, when the truth is that the only way out is an all-out effort. What I do promise you is that I will lead our fight, and I will enforce fairness in our struggle, and I will ensure honesty. And above all, I will act. We can manage the short-term shortages more effectively and we will, but there are no short-term solutions to our long-range problems. There is simply no way to avoid sacrifice....I will continue to travel this country, to hear the people of America. You can help me to develop a national agenda for the 1980s. I will listen and I will act. We will act together. These were the promises I made three years ago, and I intend to keep them.