Sun 8 Aug 2010
BP’s Next Deal: Deepwater Drilling in the Mediterranean
Posted by USA / Allison under Balkers
[5] Comments
If you reached this Balkingpoints.com article by direct external link, stop by the front page for an incredible satellite view of the earth in rotation!
By Allison Addicott
SAN FRANCISCO–
Bold and precocious, and when the gulf remained aflame, BP announced its latest deal.
Few media outlets carried this story. The press release appeared for about two hours on BP’s homepage on July 19th. Then, it was moved about three levels back into its site – rendering the news almost invisible to the average reader.
Two weeks ago, with close to 7,000 vessels and 2 million people working daily in the Gulf of Mexico — simply to gain some handle on the oil disaster, British Petroleum boldly and unapologetically announced in a press release that it signed an agreement with the Egyptian Ministry of Petroleum and the Egyptian General Petroleum Corporation to alter its holdings and move forward with business as usual in the Mediterranean Sea.
- Healthy dolphins in Mediterranean near oil refinery…
Even as the loss of marine life and human livelihood in the warm waters of the gulf remained underestimated at best, then- BP Chief Executive Tony Hayward announced, “This agreement unlocks a new phase in realizing the huge potential of the Nile Delta basin, which will play an important role in meeting regional energy security needs in the coming decades.”
According to the plan, phase one will garner close to 5 trillion cubic feet of gas in undersea drilling in five offshore fields. They also plan to build a new onshore gas refinery on Egypt’s Mediterranean coast, with oil gushing again as soon as 2014.
“BP and EGPC have a long-standing and successful partnership, and the agreement we signed today takes that to a new level in developing these deepwater resources, as well as creating an important source of future growth for BP.”
Endangered Sea Turtle dead on Gulf beach
Saying they seek to “develop” hydrocarbon resources in the North Alexandria and “West Mediterranean” areas – in this infamous West Nile Delta area – they project to yield close to “1 billion cubic feet per day of oil”. Purportedly, this would be a significant addition to the gas available for domestic use in Egypt.
The contract amends the commercial terms and the governance structure for the two concessions located in the West Nile Delta, enabling BP and its German partner RWE AG to proceed with development.
Hesham Mekawi, President of BP Egypt, commented “This is a very important project that is set to unlock a strategic gas resource in the West Nile Delta area, which is significant for Egypt’s energy supply today and the future. The investment in this project, estimated to be $9 billion gross, will reinforce Egypt’s importance as a major source of future oil and gas production.”
A primary presence in Mediterranean and Suez oil business for 50 years, BP claims to provide about 40% of Egypt’s domestic oil. The scale of investment and activities of the West Nile Delta Project is expected to create thousands of job opportunities during the different project phases and will significantly contribute to the growth of petroleum-related industries in Egypt.
Allison Addicott writes “The Flip Side” at The Washington Times Communities, she also serves as a Managing Editor and Social Media Coordinator for the Communities. An award-winning speaker, Allison authors “The Future: Politics, Religion, and Culture”. Balkingpoints.com and The Daily Kos are two other sites to which she contributes her work. To find out more about her, see her bio. You can follow her @allisonaddicott on Twitter, or friend her on Facebook.
What Say You?
Green Light BP for more deep water?
Site Log In
(or use Google Friends Connect button below)
Very well done Allison. Quite telling of BP’s objectives, and no surprises in that. As you’ve mentioned, corporations do what they do: earn.
I like the Hayward representation “energy security needs”. Just in case you had discounted the firm’s value to the world. Tony has since been assigned a new role furthering these imperatives, in Siberia… ;^)
You do need the oil and gas – for a temporary period of hopefully a decade or two – and you’re not looking for oil firms to fold up operations. You just have big new questions to address as to proper regulation vis-a-vis the environment, particularly regarding deep-water drilling.
One hopes Egypt has that factored in. We know the United States, failed to.
As long as governments can share the profits or tax profits they’re going to allow more drilling.
And if more deep water drilling goes on, and there’s no improvement in how it’s done, more big oil disasters will happen sooner or later. They don’t seem to have all the questions answered about the pressures from the earth that these kinds of wells tap into. I suppose this story may have run in bigger Egypt or around the Mediterranean, but they sure did get it buried with our press.
Am I pessimistic in feeling that there will be no serious attempts to find alternative energy sources while fossil fuels remain profitable? But alternative sources must be found: there may be a lot of fossil fuels left, but they cannot last forever.
And if nukes turn out to be the future … Well, I’m old; but I have children and grandchildren. In the final analysis, nukes aren’t a sustainable source either. Do they cost less than renewable energy even now? In South Africa, PB technology had to be abandoned on grounds of cost.
The first step, imo, is energy efficiency.
Madeleine; that certainly has been our problem in USA since our first wake-up call on oil – the 1973 OPEC oil embargo.
Which caused gasoline to double in price, set off a wicked wave of inflation (nearly all goods here move by truck, increasing their retail price), and made our dependency on foreign oil clear to all.
Solar, wind, hydro, geothermal technologies have been here all that time, and now we can add biodiesel. Every president since has talked about energy independence and a conversion to renewables, but all have tinkered the margins of it only, while they let the energy free market decide what we use.
Which puts you where you are, in 2010. Problem, not solved. Gasoline spikes which damage the economy. Dependence on oil supplies from nations that may cut it off. Military presence and involvements to protect that supply. Air pollution. Oil spills. Ridiculous windfall profits for a handful of traders and Big Oil, out of the pockets of everyone else.
I contend that the global free-market economy is not only here to stay, but also a system that can spread prosperity – if properly regulated. Instead of being allowed to run amok, as it has been. So you need smart coordination & some nudging by governments, to tilt the energy marketplace in the direction which you have to take it in. Status quo on energy is not only a proven failure, it’s simply ignorant.
Those who favor a carbon tax are basically advocating such a tilt. Careful however, not to load costs directly onto consumers and a fledgling global economic recovery, after decades of that aforementioned amok which wrecked it. I like the incentives side a little better. In Obama’s 2009 stimulus bill, there were tax credits for 1/3 of your cost to put energy upgrades on your home – solar panels, a geothermal furnace, or even just thermal windows for efficiency. That policy was new for us, and only the first of many of that sort needed. The costs of these products will fall with mass production, just as your ink-jet printer did.
Some firms and nations are already moving to seize the dawning commercial opportunities in green products, so I think prospects for change are good. Which does not mean world leaders do not need to make a priority of it. They need to be at the helm with both speech and policy, until their nations have completed their conversion.
Do you mean nuclear power was abandoned for South Africa?
Great comments.