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China is now the world's greatest oil power

economist.com

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Re: China is now the world's greatest oil power

#11

Post by 1234letshaveatw »

0xbadcafebee wrote: post #4
sgt wrote: post #3

Isn't that pretty misleading? About the production that can be cranked up / lowered as per needs, so the US likely remains the biggest oil power.

Not even close. 1) US has at least 4x lower oil reserves than China so it can't outlast China in a game of energy chicken, 2) US produces mostly light crude while almost all its refineries are for heavy crude so it can't even use the stuff it makes, 3) China has the ability to control its own industries like flipping a switch so they can halt oil-demanding (and refining) immediately to control 15% of the world's dema…

very interesting! So US refineries that can handle heavy crude are unable to handle light crude?

Re: China is now the world's greatest oil power

#12

Post by 1234letshaveatw »

Gys wrote: post #9
ApolloFortyNine wrote: post #5

China = clicks nowadays I guess? The US produces more oil products than anyone else by a large margin [1] and extracts more than anyone else [2]. [1] https://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.php?id=709&t=6 [2] https://tradingeconomics.com/country-list/crude-oil-producti...

> This ability to turn oil demand on and off, ostensibly at low economic cost, allows the world’s biggest oil importer to move prices just as the Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (opec) and its allies have long done through their control of half of global output. This is not about production. You should read the article and not only the title.

does decreasing demand raise prices?

Re: China is now the world's greatest oil power

#13

Post by kajaktum »

tristanj wrote: post #10
WarmWash wrote: post #6

The most fascinating thing about this is how oil futures markets were able to capture this while the media was endlessly blasting stories about oil shortages. Anyone paying attention to oil prices since the start of the war has been confused about the total disconnect between oil future and the existential situation on the ground. Even the media seemed mystified by this. Well, now we all know the answer.

No, it's because oil is still transiting the strait. A select group of tankers has been bypassing the Iranian "blockade" and ferrying oil across for months now. > US Energy Secretary Chris Wright said Wednesday that the American military continues to escort barrels through Hormuz, and that about 13 million barrels a day are leaving the Gulf — half through the strait and half via bypass pipelines. US Central Command s…

There’s also a landed pipeline that is able to carry oil out to the west

Re: China is now the world's greatest oil power

#14

Post by IAmBroom »

ApolloFortyNine wrote: post #5

China = clicks nowadays I guess? The US produces more oil products than anyone else by a large margin [1] and extracts more than anyone else [2]. [1] https://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.php?id=709&t=6 [2] https://tradingeconomics.com/country-list/crude-oil-producti...

Yes, the US still outproduces China in oil by nearly a factor of three. The actual meaning of the vague title is that China temporarily buffered world crude prices.

TFA notes that China controlled prices during the Iran/"Orange Idiot" war in three ways: (1) they had fortunately filled their storage during a recent price drop, (2) they restricted exports of China oil, and (3) domestic use "sharply" decreased.

The article concludes that this 3-pronged approach is "manageable", but not sustainable:

> But the Iran war has shown that, in practice, China can singlehandedly stabilise the global oil market over a period of many months. Leaders of the increasingly fractious oil cartel can only dream of doing the same. ■

Re: China is now the world's greatest oil power

#15

Post by IAmBroom »

1234letshaveatw wrote: post #12
Gys wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This ability to turn oil demand on and off, ostensibly at low economic cost, allows the world’s biggest oil importer to move prices just as the Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (opec) and its allies have long done through their control of half of global output. This is not about production. You should read the article and not only the title.

does decreasing demand raise prices?

No, it lowers prices... which is what happened (effectively) versus expectations.

Re: China is now the world's greatest oil power

#16

Post by mytailorisrich »

chasil wrote: post #8
sgt wrote: post #3

Isn't that pretty misleading? About the production that can be cranked up / lowered as per needs, so the US likely remains the biggest oil power.

It might be said that this article casts China as a "super capacitor" in that it can store and release massive quantities of oil at will. It also has its own domestic oil production of 4.3 million barrels per day.

Yes and they seem good at this, too. News reports are that they started stockpiling in January at the latest in prevision of a conflict in Iran that did start right at the end of February.

Re: China is now the world's greatest oil power

#17

Post by IAmBroom »

kajaktum wrote: post #13
tristanj wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, it's because oil is still transiting the strait. A select group of tankers has been bypassing the Iranian "blockade" and ferrying oil across for months now. > US Energy Secretary Chris Wright said Wednesday that the American military continues to escort barrels through Hormuz, and that about 13 million barrels a day are leaving the Gulf — half through the strait and half via bypass pipelines. US Central Command s…

There’s also a landed pipeline that is able to carry oil out to the west

It's all of these. If you maintain any major export path, or decrease demand, prices rise far less than they would otherwise.

Re: China is now the world's greatest oil power

#18

Post by matthewdgreen »

sgt wrote: post #3

Isn't that pretty misleading? About the production that can be cranked up / lowered as per needs, so the US likely remains the biggest oil power.

Oil producer != oil power. What matters is the ability for a government to routinely influence prices. The US government could, in theory, ban all exports or manually dictate production but we tend not to do that (yet). Our main government price-control lever comes from SPR releases, but we're nearly tapped out. China has no real legal restrictions on what its government can dictate except for what makes sense geopolitically, so at any moment it can make oil vastly cheaper or more expensive, even moreso than OPEC can by manipulating supply.

Re: China is now the world's greatest oil power

#19

Post by stevenwoo »

ApolloFortyNine wrote: post #5

China = clicks nowadays I guess? The US produces more oil products than anyone else by a large margin [1] and extracts more than anyone else [2]. [1] https://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.php?id=709&t=6 [2] https://tradingeconomics.com/country-list/crude-oil-producti...

China had the foresight to fill its petroleum reserves when prices were lower( so much so they raised prices just by that action) and can keep going for four more months with very little impact from the USA/Iran/Israel war. They simply raised gas prices to get consumers to stop driving ICE so much and moved its internal petrochemical industry (largest in world according to article) to replace Middle East imports and stop exporting (causing the mini crisis in neighbors who imported from China). The standoff situation in Middle East has to continue for four consecutive months before we see China having to take other measures.

Re: China is now the world's greatest oil power

#20

Post by petesergeant »

tristanj wrote: post #10
WarmWash wrote: post #6

The most fascinating thing about this is how oil futures markets were able to capture this while the media was endlessly blasting stories about oil shortages. Anyone paying attention to oil prices since the start of the war has been confused about the total disconnect between oil future and the existential situation on the ground. Even the media seemed mystified by this. Well, now we all know the answer.

No, it's because oil is still transiting the strait. A select group of tankers has been bypassing the Iranian "blockade" and ferrying oil across for months now. > US Energy Secretary Chris Wright said Wednesday that the American military continues to escort barrels through Hormuz, and that about 13 million barrels a day are leaving the Gulf — half through the strait and half via bypass pipelines. US Central Command s…

Adding in this chart: https://www.iea.org/data-and-statistics/charts/oil-producer-...
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