Since the Industrial Revolution, energy is an international concern: one fifth of international trade of goods is the supply in energy of the companies. At the beginning of the century, oil became the most important energy source. Today, oil represents the most important share of the energy market. Indeed, it covers 40% of the world-wide primary energy offer. That's why, oil is considered as a "strategic" raw material. There is an important political dimension in the international oil relationship which leads to a more geopolitical vision of the international energy market than an economical vision. The oil issue being very political reached the highest point during the 1970's and the energy crisis. The most dramatic episode was the "Oil revolution" organized by the OPEC. After this crisis, the oil question appeared to be a national and international security stake. For the first time, energy stake divided the international political space between "friend and enemy". Whereas, some recommended military intervention against the country members of the OPEC, industrialized countries tried to react in creating the International Energy Agency. IEA was essentially a discussion and negotiation space between the states during in the elaboration of energy politics.
[...] The market began more flexible, the number of oil producing countries increased and the competition reinforced considerably. In this context, energy security is not the main objective of most of the countries and particularly not the United States. Energy interdependence between countries must be analyzed not only as a fact but also as a dynamic, energy relationships are very complex and constantly changing (the price of the oil on financial markets). Today, markets are more competitive because there is a possibility of conciliation between different types of energy and between suppliers. [...]
[...] If Iran burns, or if neighbouring Iraq descends further into anarchy, expect scattered strikes against oil installations, ports and power plants the world over. There will be more trouble in Nigeria and Ecuador. Hotspots will get hotter with conflicts spreading far and wide. With so much happening, renewed conflict in little-known Chad - among the five poorest nations in the world but one with a billion in crude reserves - may not blip on our media radar. The Ides of March have passed and it has left us with bad omens for the coming months. [...]
[...] One could affirm that the growth of the dependency of China in regard to the world oil market tends to align the Chinese strategic interests and Americans with respect to the Middle-East. China could one day estimate that it is in its interests to contribute directly to the military security, on the same basis as Europe. Let's see if a form of cooperation with the United States will be politically possible. In order to conclude we could share a journalistic point of view Crude oil has breached the $70 psychological barrier again. [...]
[...] The price of oil formula could be: Price X = reference price + differential There are four factors which are used to calculate the oil price: - the place where the oil is sold - the choice of the price reference - the time of shipment and the price fixation - the difference of quality and delivery place compared with the reference's oil The oil market is still not a competitive market. Indeed, on a competitive market the reference price should be around per barrel. [...]
[...] The capacity to be projected quickly and massively forces in the Persian one was well a corollary of the liberal orientation given to the American oil policy by the Reagan administration: the choice of the recourse to the market is accompanied by policies of security, including soldiers, of the world oil market. The "secularization" of Saudi Arabia pursued, but the mean threat evolved/moved with the world and regional strategic context: Soviet in the spirit of the American strategists having worked out the "Carter Doctrine", it became Iranian with the Islamic revolution, then Iraqi. [...]
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