Caspian Oil Pipeline

Guest · Posted: Mon Dec 06, 2004 5:30 pm Post subject: Caspian Oil Pipeline

BBC2 in the UK tonight aired a documentary about a pipeline from the Caspian to the Mediterranean. The documentary quoted 200+ billion barrel reserves in the Caspian, with this pipeline pumping 1 million barrels / day in 2005.

Anyone else heard of this. The piple ine is owned by BTC, and BP is a big player in the area.

Key point about this pipeline was to reduce US and European dependence on the middle east and Russian oil supply.

Might not 200 billion barrels might delay the advent of peak oil by a few years also?

kambei · Tar Sands Joined: Dec 03, 2004 Posts: 31 Location: UK

Guest · Posted: Mon Dec 06, 2004 6:08 pm Post subject:

Current proven reserves in the Caspian are 30 billion bbl. Thats about 1 years supply at current demand. Sad

marek · Posted: Mon Dec 06, 2004 7:01 pm Post subject: Re: Caspian Oil Pipeline

0mar · Posted: Mon Dec 06, 2004 7:29 pm Post subject:

It's also sour crude. It's more difficult to refine Sad

But every little bit helps I guess. If we make strides towards a sustainable society, then yes, we need all the time we can get. If not, then time only exacerbates the problem.
_________________
Joseph Stalin
"It is enough that the people know there was an election. The people who cast the votes decide nothing. The people who count the votes decide everything. "

Such · Posted: Mon Dec 06, 2004 10:56 pm Post subject: sour

The fact that it is sour crude is probably a good thing in the long run... I would rather have a very soft sort of gradual peak than a bump-and-rundown of light sweet in the Caspian which rise in production very quickly and fall off just as fast.

I want oil that gonna make the other side of the peak a bit less steep.

savethehumans · Light Sweet Crude Joined: Oct 20, 2004 Posts: 1541

There are pipelines from there to Pakistan, India, Iran, and China on the board, too--pipeline building ain't a bad job to have right now...even with so little oil to pump! Razz

skiwi · Posted: Tue Dec 07, 2004 1:19 am Post subject:

THE PIPELINE
Azerbaijan - Georgia - Turkey

FACTS ABOUT THE BTC PIPELINE

It will take 150 thousand sections of pipe to build the pipeline, enough steel for a half million cars.

The pipeline will be 85-115 cm in diameter and carry the oil at 2 metres per second.

It will carry 1 million barrels of oil per day, for an estimated 40 years.

It reaches a maximum altitude of 2800 metres and will cross 770 roads and 1500 waterways.

There will be 8 pumping stations and 4 metering stations.

Is it part of the three part series Oil - The World Over a Barrel which I
see is jointly made by the BBC and a most interesting watch

Oil: The World over a Barrel

Web site

http://www.cbc.ca/documentaries/oil/

On the PBS web site under the programme title "Extreme Oil".

http://www.pbs.org/wnet/extremeoil/

As the World searches for more sources of oil in increasingly remote
locations, this documentary looks at the benefits - or not - to the
residents of the areas where the oil is found.

This is a 3 part documentary jointly made by the BBC/CBC/PBS networks.

Part 1 - Pipeline. Follows the building of an 1,100 miles pipeline from
the Caspian Sea to the Mediterranean Sea.

Part 2 - The Oil Curse. Oil is discovered in Ecuador and Angola. But will the
people benefit or just corrupt government officials?

Part 3 - Wilderness. The USA eyes the prestine Alaskan Widerness to exploit
the oil. In Alberta, Canada, oil is removed from tar sands

Hey good timing 50th post and I can edit those urls correctly Shocked

.

skateari · Intermediate Crude Joined: Sep 26, 2004 Posts: 548

200 billion barrel's my ass

Guest · Posted: Tue Dec 07, 2004 11:10 am Post subject: re: 200 billion barrels

Since watching the TV show y'day, I've done some research. They did mention 200 billion barrels of oil reserves in the Caspian on the BBC documentary, but I think you guys are correct - ie. this seems v overstated. Other people say 15 - 30 billion barrels. The documentary's point was that a lot of it was deep water reserves that the Soviets etc had previously been unable to tap.

0mar · Posted: Tue Dec 07, 2004 1:58 pm Post subject:

The thing is, the media can report the total reserve of the field (unrecoverable and recoverable combined) and no one would be the wiser. The Caspian field may very well have 200 billion barrels, however, only 20-30 billion may be recoverable.
_________________
Joseph Stalin
"It is enough that the people know there was an election. The people who cast the votes decide nothing. The people who count the votes decide everything. "

Canuck · Heavy Crude Joined: Jul 07, 2004 Posts: 172

Do the total reserves really matter? There is lots of oil in the ground. The problem is the speed at which it can be sucked up and delivered to the market. Production declines when exploiting the second half of the resource. The bottleneck in this case is the pipeline.

The key number is 1 million barrels per day. We need it, but we are kidding ourselves if we think we can solve Peak Oil with this kind of project. As with most of the "happy" oil stories these days, there is a pessimistic point buried in this find.

If there was any easy oil left would anybody be spending the enormous amounts of money to build this pipeline?