[Novus]

About 300k barrels can fit into a single super tanker.

[seahorse2]

Here's a recent Bloomberg article confirming rising tanker rates due to rising demand.

Bloomberg

So, reading the Saudi statement more carefully, they are saying most of the "heavy oil" has been loaded on a tanker. No market for the heavy stuff, which gets us back to the probable peak in light sweet, and not enough refinery capacity for the heavy.

[SD_Scott]

If I'm not mistaken the big tankers hold over a million barrels. To say that there's 350K floating around is strange. That is a very small number. That is less than 1 day of feedstock for many refineries.

[SD_Scott]

A typical modern supertanker can carry approximately two million barrels of oil. In "single-hulled" tankers, the hull is also the wall of the oil tanks, and any breach will result in an oil spill. Newer tankers are "double-hulled", with a space between the hull and the storage tanks, to reduce the risk of a spill in the event that the outer hull is breached. This space is used to carry water ballast when the ship is not carrying an oil cargo.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supertanker

Wow, even more than I thought.

[PWALPOCO]

Im sorry but I find the whole concept unreal !

First they expect us to beleive they loaded a ship with some oil , despite it not being sold and despite the ship costing a pretty penny or two to lease.

Then they expect us to beleive the ship set sail , for destination uknown waiting for someone to buy the oil.

Youre telling me that over a period of days not one buyer has come forward to buy the stuff.

Out of the millions of barrels that are bought and sold each day , nobody has placed an order for the particular grade thats in that ships hold.

Hmmmmm


Paul

[jato]

A typical modern supertanker can carry approximately two million barrels of oil

Source

350k barrels is under %20 capicity of a supertanker.

[Cyrus]

Doesn't this fallacy they're feeding us prove something is up?

[Armageddon]

I think counties are saying, " dont send that heavy shit over here, we want the good stuff "

[jato]

[joewp]

I think he's talking about the wrong boat or something. Remember this?

Today in Odd History, an unassuming barge called the Mobro 4000 began a 6,000 mile voyage, looking for a port that would take its cargo--nearly 3,200 tons of trash. With its escort, the tugboat Break of Day, the Mobro would sail along the coast of the Eastern and Southern United States, down into the Gulf of Mexico and through the Bahamas, before finally returning to New York, still bearing its load of garbage.

That's the last time I heard about a boat wandering around in search of a place to deliver its cargo!

[seahorse2]

According to Simmons latest presentation, his "educated hunch" is that Saudi production will drop to 8mbpd in 2006. We have to hope he's wrong as hell, but, SA production has dropped 500kbpd in two months, so, there is some support for Simmons.

Many of you on the forum read the many debates where it was argued SA is untruthful versus, we can't assume that. What I always found interesting was what poster Shakespear said (he's in the energy industry in Poland). Shakespear pointed out that all the info to determine the truth of SA production, reserves etc could fit on one computer CD. He felt the CIA probably had access to that. Because such information could easily be stolen and contained on a simple CD.

Remember Valerie Plame? She was heading a CIA front company called Brewster and Jennings which reportedly was set up to infiltrate Saudi Aramco and other Opec countries. Wikipedia Brewster and Jennings So, this only buttresses the idea that the Saudi info has been accessed by the CIA or other US intelligence networks.

Because the US probably has access to the SA info, I've always wondered if Simmons has had access to that data too. I've wondered this bc Simmons is a confident of Cheney and was on the secret energy task force, whose discussions were deemed "executive privilege" and exempt from disclosure by the US Supreme Court.

Just brainstorming here, trying to make sense of Saudi statements that don't make sense and trying to come up with "missing data" for some of Simmons statements.

[dhfenton]

Sounds like several stories happening concurrently.

1) There is excess tanker capacity for light crude. So a tanker that was set to sail probably had a compartment filled with heavy crude that was pumped, even thought here is no immediate market for it. The excess tanker capacity acts as storage, and the heavy crude would serve as ballast, if nothing else. It might return with the ship to the middle east. This is why there is an expected drop in the tanker fleet over the next few years.

2) Light crude has peaked. They couldn't pump it fast enough to fill the supertanker in time to sail.

3) There is not a sufficient existing market for heavy crude, as there are few refineries capable of handling it.

What this will mean, if it continues as is, is that the transportation cost of light crude is going to increase per barrel. The rise at the gas pump is inevitable. Also, as refineries are converted to process heavy crude, there will be capital costs for the conversion, and increasing costs per barrel for a more complicataed refinement process. Again, the cost at the pump will go up.

[rockdoc123]

when you take this in light of earlier statements made by the Saudis and later by Al Attiyah in Qatar it makes some sense that they would load the tanker with heavy crude. As stated tankers are hard to come by....if you have one contracted hold on to it. The statement was it was a seasonal drop in heavy crude demand and they anticipated the demand for this crude type to return to normal in the fall. If they had let the tanker go I would assume it could have gone off to contract somewhere else. So from the Saudis perspective it is cheap storage. This is obviously one reason the Saudis have contracted to build a couple of refineries capable of cracking the heavier oils.
As to whether light sweet has peaked in Saudi...not according to the production numbers from IHS Energy. I did a calculation awhile back and about 90% of the crude production is still light and sweet or superlite or ultralight. I'm not sure how the fact they have stopped selling some heavy crude shows that light sweet has peaked? The fields coming on stream over the next few years are all light or superlight and sulphur is pretty low. So if they can get to the 12 MMBPD rate with the new projects light sweet will certainly not be at a peak in Saudi. Worldwide? Could be but it is pretty hard to figure this out from the databases.

[seahorse2]

When I said a peak in light sweet, I meant a world-wide peak, not a peak in light sweet for Saudi Arabia. Light Sweet is and has been $70+ for awhile, so, people are gobbling it up. There are other articles saying world production figures show a peak in light sweet world wide, which arguably is supported by the fact the price keeps rising.

[Aimrehtopyh]

Suezmax vessels – 159,000 tonnes, with a cargo capacity of 1.1 million barrels of oil – are the maximum size of vessel that can transit the Suez Canal, the next size up from Aframax, which carries 700,000 – 800,000 barrels of oil.

http://www.teekay.com/index.aspx?page=n ... icle_id=73

The T.T. Jahre Viking is a Norwegian-operated supertanker built in Japan 1976-79, formerly known as the Seawise Giant. Its 1504 feet in length and 226 feet in width makes it the largest ship in the world. T.T. Jahre Viking has a deadweight of 564,763 metric tons and summer displacement of 647,955 metric tons when laden with nearly 4.1 million barrels of crude oil. When fully loaded, she is too big to fit through the English Channel. Sunk by Iraqi missiles in the first Gulf War, she was raised and converted to a floating storage facility.

http://www.njscuba.net/artifacts/ship_tanker.html

[Concerned]

Just because a vessel can carry a 2million bbl limit does not mean it will always be full or deliver a full load every time.

Trucks are a good example, many times you see them carrying part loads.

Nothing sinister in 350K bbl on a 2000K bbl ship IMO.

[Geko45]

Nothing sinister in 350K bbl on a 2000K bbl ship IMO.

Sinister? No. Incompetent? Most definately yes. I can just see how that conversation would go.

Mid-level Manager: "Boss, we only had enough crude to fill that super-tanker to 18% of capacity, but I went ahead and sent it on its way even though we don't have a buyer yet."

Executive: "You did what! Do you have any idea how much it costs to sail one of those things round trip to the other side of the planet?! You're fired! *picks up phone* Personnel department? Can you find me someone who isn't a complete idiot to manage shipping."

Not a likely scenario if you ask me.

[Concerned]

Nothing sinister in 350K bbl on a 2000K bbl ship IMO.

Sinister? No. Incompetent? Most definately yes. I can just see how that conversation would go.

Mid-level Manager: "Boss, we only had enough crude to fill that super-tanker to 18% of capacity, but I went ahead and sent it on its way even though we don't have a buyer yet."

It could have been 100% full and the 350K is what is left over. Not great but I could see it happening.

Just sail her on home use the 350K oil as ballast instead of water and fill her up again.

Simple and no problem.

[GreyZone]

Earlier, I asked a question here but the moderators chose to move it to the Depletion Modeling forum. My question remains though - given that Ghawar and other supergiant fields are using horizontal drilling and water (or some gas) injection as Yibal did, is there any reason to believe that Ghawar will not ultimately collapse as catastrophically as Yibal?


Yibal peaked at 72% of URR and then collapsed dramatically.

(WARNING! PDF IN LINK!)
Laherrere's Yibal production plot

[emersonbiggins]

600' tanker, I believe, unloading unleaded.

[web]http://cbs4boston.com/local/local_story_199231149.html[/web]