1. The USA is unique (or almost unique) in the world oil scene because:
a. our oil production industry was "developed" much earlier than other major producing countries
b. we import way more oil than any other country
c. we are one of the top three producers in the world but the other two are also the worlds biggest exporters
d. we have way more wells that any other nation
e. we have the refinery capacity that allows us to import more refined petroleum (like gasoline and diesel) than we import
f. our domestic production is dominated by public multinational corporations instead of wholly or partially state controlled oil companies
2. Right now, the world's two big oil exporters are KSA and Russia.
3. The interactive map from Marketplace (a daily news show about the economy on Public Radio International) provides an interesting look at historic production (and production peaks) in major producing countries from around the world.
4. The top importers to the USA over the past 38 years have been Canada, KSA, Venezuela, Mexico, and Nigeria (after which there is a big drop). Overall, the USA has imported oil from 120 different countries since the beginning of 1973. Of the major importing countries, imports from Canada, Mexico, Nigeria, Algeria, Angola, Iraq, Colombia, Kuwait, and Russia are up and imports from Canada, Russia, Brazil, and Kazakhstan are expected increase on into the the near future while imports from the UK, Indonesia, and Norway are down and are expected to decrease further in the near future.
5. Since Canada is our #1 importer and will be for the foreseeable future and their petroleum reserves consist mostly of the Alberta tar sands, it is essential to understand what makes the unconventional tar sands different than other petroleum reserves. Today, we looked at how synthetic crude oil is produced from mined tar sands deposits and on Monday, we will look into the controversy surrounding the exploitation of the tar sands as well as the controversy surrounding new pipeline that has been proposed to move more tar sands oil to US refineries.
Slides from lecture today are on Sakai. For Monday, please read a pair of New York Times Articles on the Keystone XL Pipeline: Rejecting Pipeline Proposal, Obama Blames Congress by John Broder and Dan Frosch published January 18, 2012 and For G.O.P., Pipeline Is Central to Agenda by Jennifer Steinhauer published February 1, 2012. My thanks to T. Meric III for bringing the first article to my attention. In addition to the reading (and homework assignment), please watch the following clip from the November, 14, 2011 episode of the Cobert Report during which Stephen Cobert interviews Middlebury College Scholar in Residence and climate activist, Bill Mckibben about the Canadian tar sands and the proposed pipeline. A note to sensitive viewers- this video contains allegorical references to the "bathing suit" areas of human body. Also, if you are unfamiliar with the work of Stephen Cobert, I strongly urge you to spend a few minutes with his Wikipedia page before watching the video.
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