Weekend Rant
I was just reading this article that I came across on the Japan Times. No, I don't go there often, it actually linked from Google News. The article is here and it goes on about Big Oil companies and President Bush and Iraq and Global Warming etc etc. This one is good as well. The usual mumbo jumbo. But I found it interesting due to the crazy amounts of money Oil companies make despite trying to justify that the cost of petrol going up and how this isn't their fault and it's all down to global supply and the cost of a barrel of crude.
In the words of the Tui campaign, "Yeah, right!" (Those of you not from NZ, or not currently living in NZ, might not get the Tui reference. If not, go here (refresh the screen for a new one)and here for some excellent videos)
In complaining about the price of oil, it is important to put it into perspective. I read a great article in the NZ edition of Top Gear magazine that did just that. The author talked about a mate of his, who, over a pint or two of the gold stuff, updated him on just how tricky and expensive it was to get the black stuff out of the ground and into a pump near you. Apparently Exxon Mobil have dedicated US$15 billion to exploration and investigation of new oil deposits. I will try and summarize what the article said: So they spend years looking around the world studying geological deposits and likely sites of interest to investigate further. They'll then head off to these sites in person and have a look at the land, get some soil deposits, take a few pics, get a satellite to take a pic, maybe some special fancy pics that x-ray the ground to see what's under, before deciding if it's worth spending a couple of $100 million drilling some holes in the ground to see what's under it all. They might find something, they might not. If they do, they'll then take the astronomical gamble of investing a several more $100 million dollars, maybe a billion, I'm not sure, in developing the site and gearing up for full scale drilling.
Invaribly these sites are not right next door to your local, so they have to pipe it somewhere. And this another horribly expensive task, not to mention risky and sometimes life threatening. Typically passing across inhospitable terrain and usually having to pass through some country or other who wants a bit of moolah in the back pocket to "protect" you from getting your head chopped off or pipeline blown up. Or both.
So you managed to navigate through the local warlords territory to a port somewhere and realise that you then need to get it shipped halfway round the world to a refinery. Either build or boat or hire someone to ship it. The choice is yours. One's expensive and risky, and the other is too.
Moving right along........you get it to your refinery, off load it, process it, throw in a bucket full of dangerous chemicals that could take the hair off a rat at 30 paces, pump it onto a truck to get carried off to the local petrol station.
And then some wanker has the audacity to ask how you can possibly charge $1.69 a litre for it!
This is probably the same tosser who just brought his 750ml bottle of water out of the stations fridge for about $3. Water that came out of a tap in the middle of the Waikato.
No wonder oil companies don't really fuss to much when they make a bucket load of cash.
On the subject of water being the new oil, read this.
Iran is a problem. See here. I will elaborate further next time. This post has taken me four days to get finished, so I thought I better just get it up there and be done with it.
More to come on Iran. And some crazy stuff on Auckland's traffic "solutions". Yes, I do see how pathetic I am with my worries, compared to the bigger picture stuff. But I truly believe it's all relative. For example, the person who live's in a small village in the back of China who probably is living on less than a dollar a day and has never been to a city or seen a car/tv/computer, has problems that are relative to their way of life, much like the traffic is a problem to my way of life. It's all relative to the situation and life you are in. And you don't know what you don't know, if you get my meaning.
In the words of the Tui campaign, "Yeah, right!" (Those of you not from NZ, or not currently living in NZ, might not get the Tui reference. If not, go here (refresh the screen for a new one)and here for some excellent videos)
In complaining about the price of oil, it is important to put it into perspective. I read a great article in the NZ edition of Top Gear magazine that did just that. The author talked about a mate of his, who, over a pint or two of the gold stuff, updated him on just how tricky and expensive it was to get the black stuff out of the ground and into a pump near you. Apparently Exxon Mobil have dedicated US$15 billion to exploration and investigation of new oil deposits. I will try and summarize what the article said: So they spend years looking around the world studying geological deposits and likely sites of interest to investigate further. They'll then head off to these sites in person and have a look at the land, get some soil deposits, take a few pics, get a satellite to take a pic, maybe some special fancy pics that x-ray the ground to see what's under, before deciding if it's worth spending a couple of $100 million drilling some holes in the ground to see what's under it all. They might find something, they might not. If they do, they'll then take the astronomical gamble of investing a several more $100 million dollars, maybe a billion, I'm not sure, in developing the site and gearing up for full scale drilling.
Invaribly these sites are not right next door to your local, so they have to pipe it somewhere. And this another horribly expensive task, not to mention risky and sometimes life threatening. Typically passing across inhospitable terrain and usually having to pass through some country or other who wants a bit of moolah in the back pocket to "protect" you from getting your head chopped off or pipeline blown up. Or both.
So you managed to navigate through the local warlords territory to a port somewhere and realise that you then need to get it shipped halfway round the world to a refinery. Either build or boat or hire someone to ship it. The choice is yours. One's expensive and risky, and the other is too.
Moving right along........you get it to your refinery, off load it, process it, throw in a bucket full of dangerous chemicals that could take the hair off a rat at 30 paces, pump it onto a truck to get carried off to the local petrol station.
And then some wanker has the audacity to ask how you can possibly charge $1.69 a litre for it!
This is probably the same tosser who just brought his 750ml bottle of water out of the stations fridge for about $3. Water that came out of a tap in the middle of the Waikato.
No wonder oil companies don't really fuss to much when they make a bucket load of cash.
On the subject of water being the new oil, read this.
Iran is a problem. See here. I will elaborate further next time. This post has taken me four days to get finished, so I thought I better just get it up there and be done with it.
More to come on Iran. And some crazy stuff on Auckland's traffic "solutions". Yes, I do see how pathetic I am with my worries, compared to the bigger picture stuff. But I truly believe it's all relative. For example, the person who live's in a small village in the back of China who probably is living on less than a dollar a day and has never been to a city or seen a car/tv/computer, has problems that are relative to their way of life, much like the traffic is a problem to my way of life. It's all relative to the situation and life you are in. And you don't know what you don't know, if you get my meaning.
posted by DaveNZ at 2:11 pm
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home