Oil and gas reality check 2012A look at 10 of the top issues facing the oil sector |
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- December 2011
- 3 MB
Oil and gas reality check 2012 (PDF)- Area: Energy & Resources
Background
2011 gave us all reasons to pause and think. From political uprising, unstable financial markets and the Japanese nuclear disaster, to the abundance of natural gas, rethinking of the nuclear emergence and rise of the consuming national oil companies (NOCs), 2011 was full of surprises. The speed at which the past year’s events unfolded and the impact they had could hardly be predicted nor mitigated. The uprising in Libya and the renewed production in Iraq did little to stabilise the world oil markets. The sudden loss of supply from North Africa may have caused Brent and West Texas Intermediate (WTI) prices to diverge even more than they would have based on North American inventories only. Despite economic uncertainty, global oil prices remained stubbornly buoyant and are expected to remain so in the upcoming year, according to both the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) and the International Energy Agency (IEA).
This report is not a predictive statement of the future experiences the oil and gas sector will face. It is, however, a story of the important and unfolding trends that may influence our way forward in the year ahead.
The themes covered in this report are:
- The future of oil production: Libya and Iraq are now part of the equation
- Join the game: The global development of shale gas assets
- The decoupling of oil and gas prices: Where and when?
- The new NOCs: The emergence of non-traditional consuming national oil companies
- Just because shale is in doesn’t mean conventional is out: New exporters come to market
- China is an upstream game, not just a consuming black hole
- WTI and Brent: Will the price gap close or stay at an abnormal divide?
- The new cool kid on the block: The American tight oil industry
- At a crossroads: Brazil’s challenge to distribute oil wealth while encouraging investment
- The people equation: Canadian oil sands industry to face tough labour issues
