Big Oil on the defensive?

Alaska oil tax debate reflects global changesback at home

JUNEAU, Alaska — If oil companies want to continue taking Alaska’s oil, state officials say they need to up the ante.

In fact, Gov. Sarah Palin wants 25 percent off the top of all profits the companies make in Alaska, up from 22.5 percent and the second hike in as many years. In a special legislative session, oil giants are warning lawmakers that another increase will make the business climate look unstable.

But after Western oil companies have been effectively kicked out of Venezuela and Russia, these could just be hollow arguments.

“The financial impact pales in comparison to what’s going on overseas,” said Greg Priddy, analyst with New York based Eurasia Group. “In the end, with these oil prices, it will be something the industry is willing to absorb.”

Bad news for oil companies is that more and more governments want a cut of the action.

High oil prices will make it worthwhile for the oil prices.

Not a lot of good news for citizens or consumers.

4 Comments

BooMan on November 4, 2007 at 12:26 pm

If Alaska were not a part of the USA, they’d be invaded.

Gaianne on November 4, 2007 at 4:19 pm

dada on November 4, 2007 at 1:55 pm

can’t blame them for wanting a bigger piece of this pie, now if they would only use it in a constructive manner. promoting alternative sources and conservation maybe?

nah, not with all those $$$$$$$$ dancing in their pointed little heads:

oil at the close of markets friday: $95.93us +$2.44 +2.61%

the oil companies will do as they’ve always done…pass it on to the consumer. in no small way because the competition from other nations is becoming aggressively obvious, even to the oil company’s boyz in the wh, and having a big presence in alaska gives them entry to the N-W passage and all the swag there.

Canada’s Dollar Rises to All-Time High on Crude Oil

…Canada’s dollar rose 1.2 percent to $1.0603 at 5:42 p.m. in Toronto after touching $1.0617, the highest since the currency was floated. One U.S. dollar buys 94.31 Canadian cents. The Canadian currency’s previous high of $1.0614 was reached in 1957. The Bank of Canada let the currency float for the first time in 1950. That era ended in 1962 when the country experienced fixed exchange rates until 1970.

Crude oil rose to a record $95.28 barrel in New York after an Energy Department report showed that U.S. inventories fell to a two-year low. Oil has advanced 17 percent this month.

Canada, the world’s eighth-biggest economy, has benefited from rising demand for copper, gold, wheat and oil from the U.S. and emerging economies such as India and China. The country is the world’s largest producer of uranium, the second-biggest exporter of natural gas, and sits on the largest pool of oil reserves outside the Middle East…

ANWR will be back on the table soon…and all that access that’s opening up in the Northwest Passage due to the thaw is going to cause a massive amount of pressure for exploration and exploitation in what’s considered the last major untapped resource area, and as noted in this article from the Guardian UK… would ignite an “ecological time-bomb” because there is no way to clear up oil spills in icy waters.

that would make the exxon/valdez spill look like a minor accident.

Dr Pete Ewin, an expert in conservation with the Canadian branch of WWF, sees the mounting tension as a product of the scramble to secure energy resources at a time of depleting stocks. “We are pushing into the frontiers of both knowledge and resources. It is easier to go into the extremes than to change your lifestyle.”

rec’d reading jerome a paris’ excellent series of diaries at eurotrib.

yup

lTMF’sA

Knoxville Progressive on November 5, 2007 at 10:14 am

I suspect they’ll leave ANWR alone, at least for a while, but it will be fenced in with oil development around it like Central Park is fenced in with skyscrapers, rendering its value to wildlife reduced.

BooMan on November 4, 2007 at 12:26 pm

If Alaska were not a part of the USA, they’d be invaded.
- Gaianne on November 4, 2007 at 4:19 pm
dada on November 4, 2007 at 1:55 pm

can’t blame them for wanting a bigger piece of this pie, now if they would only use it in a constructive manner. promoting alternative sources and conservation maybe?

nah, not with all those $$$$$$$$ dancing in their pointed little heads:

oil at the close of markets friday: $95.93us +$2.44 +2.61%

the oil companies will do as they’ve always done…pass it on to the consumer. in no small way because the competition from other nations is becoming aggressively obvious, even to the oil company’s boyz in the wh, and having a big presence in alaska gives them entry to the N-W passage and all the swag there.

Canada’s Dollar Rises to All-Time High on Crude Oil

…Canada’s dollar rose 1.2 percent to $1.0603 at 5:42 p.m. in Toronto after touching $1.0617, the highest since the currency was floated. One U.S. dollar buys 94.31 Canadian cents. The Canadian currency’s previous high of $1.0614 was reached in 1957. The Bank of Canada let the currency float for the first time in 1950. That era ended in 1962 when the country experienced fixed exchange rates until 1970.

Crude oil rose to a record $95.28 barrel in New York after an Energy Department report showed that U.S. inventories fell to a two-year low. Oil has advanced 17 percent this month.

Canada, the world’s eighth-biggest economy, has benefited from rising demand for copper, gold, wheat and oil from the U.S. and emerging economies such as India and China. The country is the world’s largest producer of uranium, the second-biggest exporter of natural gas, and sits on the largest pool of oil reserves outside the Middle East…

ANWR will be back on the table soon…and all that access that’s opening up in the Northwest Passage due to the thaw is going to cause a massive amount of pressure for exploration and exploitation in what’s considered the last major untapped resource area, and as noted in this article from the Guardian UK… would ignite an “ecological time-bomb” because there is no way to clear up oil spills in icy waters.

that would make the exxon/valdez spill look like a minor accident.

Dr Pete Ewin, an expert in conservation with the Canadian branch of WWF, sees the mounting tension as a product of the scramble to secure energy resources at a time of depleting stocks. “We are pushing into the frontiers of both knowledge and resources. It is easier to go into the extremes than to change your lifestyle.”

rec’d reading jerome a paris’ excellent series of diaries at eurotrib.

yup

lTMF’sA
- Knoxville Progressive on November 5, 2007 at 10:14 am
  
  I suspect they’ll leave ANWR alone, at least for a while, but it will be fenced in with oil development around it like Central Park is fenced in with skyscrapers, rendering its value to wildlife reduced.

Big Oil on the defensive?

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