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(1) Brian Bremner, So Much for Russia. Rising energy production in the US is testing Russia' economic model. Will Vlamidir Putin survive the challenge?
http://www.businessweek.com/arti ... mericas-energy-boom
Quote:
"Russia is still the world’s biggest overall energy exporter: It’s the No. 1 oil producer and No. 2 in gas after the U.S. However, the country’s known oil reserves—primarily between the Ural Mountains and the Central Siberian Plateau—are enough to sustain current production levels for just 20 years, according to a study in December by the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) * * * Untapped oil and gas reserves in eastern Siberia and the Arctic will take massive investments to explore.
"he [Putin] took over at the start of the last decade (he served as president from 2000 to 2008 and premier for four years after that) * * * Through 2008, Putin oversaw an average of 7 percent growth in gross domestic product and a huge expansion in Russia’s middle class. * * * Russia’s phenomenal run of prosperity would have been an ideal time to diversify the economy beyond energy, a goal that harks back to the days of Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev. Instead, energy’s share of the economy actually increased; as of late 2012, oil and gas accounted for about 70 percent of exports, compared with less than 50 percent in the mid-1990s, providing half of the government’s revenue and roughly 17 percent of GDP, according to the EBRD. Gazprom alone represents 14 percent of the Russian stock market’s total capitalization. Russia’s energy dependency problem became impossible to ignore in 2009 as the global recession crushed oil prices, which fell to $34 a barrel from a precrisis high of $147. Russia’s economy contracted almost 8 percent, the steepest drop among the G-20 industrialized nations that year. Since 2010, the economy hasn’t come close to hitting the 5 percent to 6 percent mark that Putin has said it needs to close the gap with leading developed nations.
"What he [Putin] didn’t anticipate was that US oil production—thanks to horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing technology, in which pressurized water and chemicals are blasted into rocks to release energy—would increase 46 percent. That equals the entire output of Nigeria, estimates Daniel Yergin, vice chairman of consulting firm IHS.
"Russia’s worry is twofold: An expanding supply of affordable LNG, which is transported by ship, is forcing Gazprom[, which ships by pipeline to European customers] to either cut prices or lose share. (Weird and surprising fact: As American utilities shift to gas, displaced US coal is flooding into European markets. The US may supplant Russia as the world’s No. 3 coal exporter by yearend, according to Goldman Sachs.) Second, the Russian gas giant is under pressure to adopt spot-market pricing instead of tying its prices to oil.
Note:
(a) This is the cover story.
(b) the title: So Much for Russia
so much (pronoun): "all that can be or is to be said or done <so much for the history of the case>"
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/so+much
(c) stick it to: "to treat harshly or unfairly"
www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/stick
(d) Russia's contract to sell oil and gas to China is state secret. It is likely that the pricing is not based on spot market. Then China loses. |
发表于 9-5-2013 15:56:00
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