The new Seven Sisters: oil and gas giants dwarf western rivals
The “new seven sisters”, or the most influential energy companies from countries outside the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, have been identified by the Financial Times in consultation with numerous industry executives. They are Saudi Aramco, Russia’s Gazprom, CNPC of China, NIOC of Iran, Venezuela’s PDVSA, Brazil’s Petrobras and Petronas of Malaysia.
Overwhelmingly state-owned, they control almost one-third of the world’s oil and gas production and more than one-third of its total oil and gas reserves. In contrast, the old seven sisters – which shrank to four in the industry consolidation of the 1990s – produce about 10 per cent of the world’s oil and gas and hold just 3 per cent of reserves. Even so, their integrated status – which means they sell not only oil and gas, but also gasoline, diesel and petrochemicals – push their revenues notably higher than those of the newcomers.
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Governments’ unwillingness to allow their national oil companies to reinvest their recent windfall profits back into the industry lies at the root of many of the worries about future supplies. Instead, those governments use the money for social ventures or it is wasted.
President Hugo Chávez, of Venezuela, spends two-thirds of PDVSA’s budget on his populist social programmes, with almost $7bn being funnelled in that direction by 2005, compared with the $77m spent in 1997 by the previous government, the Rice Univeristy report found. Meanwhile, in Russia too little of Gazprom’s earnings goes towards upgrading Russia’s antiquated, leaking pipeline system, 30 per cent of which needs replacing, the IEA warns. In Iran, NIOC is still a gas importer despite controlling South Pars, the world’s biggest gas field. It is hindered from boosting its oil production or fixing its refineries because of the burden of financing subsidies that keep petrol prices at just 10 US cents a litre.
But the poster child of what happens when a government restricts foreign investment while using its national oil company as a bottomless piggybank is Mexico. Pemex’s decline has excluded it from the FT list of the developing world’s most influential energy companies.
The most pessimistic forecasters say the rapid ageing of Mexico’s giant Cantarell field will turn America’s third largest oil supplier into a net importer within a decade.
Pedro Sette-Câmara
André Azevedo Alves
Carlos Guimarães Pinto
Helder Ferreira
Bruno Garschagen
João Luís Pinto
LA
Bruno Alves
Miguel Botelho Moniz
ruicarmo
Miguel Noronha
Elizabete Dias
António Costa Amaral (AA)
LT
Rui Oliveira
BZ
dos ∫antos
André Abrantes Amaral
planca12
rui a.
Rodrigo Adão da Fonseca
Adolfo Mesquita Nunes
Michael Seufert
Luciano
Carlos M. Fernandes
Maria João Marques
jtcb
Nuno Branco
elisabetejoaquim
filipeabrantes
Tomás Belchior
Bruno Gonçalves
Ricardo G. Francisco
Tiago Loureiro
Ricardo Campelo de Magalhães
Filipe Faria
Ricardo Arroja
O que é interessante é que há quem defenda que alguns países poderão usar o facto de serem produtores de petróleo para chantagear o ocidente. A verdade é que esses países precisam de vender petróleo para manter os seus estados ineficientes. A queda de produção a ocorrer, será involuntária e dever-se-á à má gestão das receitas e ao sub-investimento.
Comentário por JoaoMiranda — Outubro 12, 2007 @ 22:33
“A queda de produção a ocorrer, será involuntária e dever-se-á à má gestão das receitas e ao sub-investimento.”
Mas quanto à queda, tenho poucas dúvidas…
Comentário por André Azevedo Alves — Outubro 12, 2007 @ 23:04