The recent escalation in the violent conflict in the Niger Delta has brought the region to the forefront of international energy and security concerns. This book analyses the causes, dynamics and politics underpinning oil-related violence in the Niger Delta region of Nigeria. It focuses on the drivers of the conflict, as well as the ways the crises spawned by the political economy of oil and contradictions within Nigeria's ethnic politics have contributed to the morphing of initially poorly coordinated, largely non-violent protests into a pan-Delta insurgency. Approaching the issue from a number of perspectives, the book offers the most up-to-date and comprehensive analysis available of the varied dimensions of the conflict. Combining empirically-based and analytic chapters, it attempts to explain the causes of the escalation in violence, the various actors, levels and dynamics involved, and the policy challenges faced with regard to conflict management/resolution and the options for peace. It also examines the role of oil as a commodity of global strategic significance, addressing the relationship between oil, energy security and development in the Niger Delta.

The Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries, commonly known as OPEC, has been a notoriously opaque and mysterious organization. In this book, Fadil J. Chalabi, an insider who spent many years at the heart of the organization as Iraq's permanent undersecretary for oil, invites us to discover the intrigue and arguments that have shaped OPEC policy since its inception in 1960. The author interweaves his analysis with first-hand experiences that give authenticity to momentous events, including the infamous 1975 Vienna hostage-taking when Carlos the Jackal kidnapped a number of OPEC ministers, including the author. From the time of Egypt under Nasser, Gaddafi's Libya, Saddam's Iraq and Khomeini's Iranian revolution, Chalabi uses his unique position and his unparallelled insider knowledge to illuminate an organization that has, at times, been accused of fomenting economic turmoil, political unrest and even military action.

Benefiting from the perspective of an insider who understands the inner workings of OPEC and its dramatic impact on world politics and economics, this book is an essential read for those who wish to look beyond the myths of this highly influential and at times controversial organization.

Out of sight, out of mind. That's the general public's reaction to the crucial movement of oil around the world's oceans. Yet this vital supply chain that allows the world to function is constantly under enormous, largely unreported pressure. The uninterrupted flow of oil is essential to globalization and increasingly so as manufacturing and markets move Eastwards to Asia. However, it is threatened by conflicts between nation states, pirates and global warming. All too often the movement of oil by ocean is something taken for granted by the majority of the world yet it is fraught with difficulty, and could haemorrhage global growth if issues covered in this book are not resolved or allowed to escalate. From reporting onboard giant tankers to looking at the geopolitical shift in oil consumption, "Oil on Water" is holistic, all encompassing and engrossing look at the way oil is moved and consumed mixing reportage, examples and hard-hitting facts.

'The Squeeze' is an invaluable account of the modern oil industry and vital to understanding the awful truth about the current disaster in the Gulf of Mexico. With unprecedented access to their engineers and executives in London and Houston, Tom Bower tells the inside story of BP's history of alleged negligence. Over the last 20 years, oil prices have soared from $7 a barrel to $147 and down to $37. Amid economic boom and bust, speculators, traders, politicians and monarchs have plotted to earn fortunes from oil, and prayed for salvation from unpredictable natural and man-made disasters. Behind the headlines are the crushing rivalries between men and women exploring for oil five miles beneath the sea, battling for control of the world's biggest corporations and gambling billions of dollars twenty-four hours every day on oil prices. Success or failure for all those extraordinary personalities depends on squeezing their rivals and squeezing the crude out of the rocks. Overweening vanity and greed absorb those titans whose ambitions are forging the world's quest for oil. Exploiting unprecedented close access to the lives of irrepressible traders in New York, oil-oligarchs in Moscow, corporate chieftains in Dallas and London and wily politicians floating in jets across the globe, Tom Bower presents the untold story of the most important quandary of our times: why, if there is plentiful oil in the earth, does mankind face a dire shortage threatening our lives? Self-interest is propelling the squeeze and there seems to be no salvation.

The global market for oil and gas resources is rapidly changing. Three major trends --the rise of new consumers, the increasing influence of state players, and concerns about climate change --are combining to challenge existing regulatory structures, many of which have been in place for a half-century. "Global Energy Governance" analyzes the energy market from an institutionalist perspective and offers practical policy recommendations to deal with these new challenges.

Much of the existing discourse on energy governance deals with hard security issues but neglects the challenges to global governance. "Global Energy Governance" fills this gap with perspectives on how regulatory institutions can ensure reliable sources of energy, evaluate financial risk, and provide emergency response mechanisms to deal with interruptions in supply.

The authors bring together decisionmakers from industry, government, and civil society in order to address two central questions:

-What are the current practices of existing institutions governing global oil and gas on financial markets?

-How do these institutions need to adapt in order to meet the challenges of the twenty-first century?

The resulting governance-oriented analysis of the three interlocking trends also provides the basis for policy recommendations to improve global regulation.

Contributors include Thorsten Benner, Global Public Policy Institute, Berlin; William Blyth, Chatham House, Royal Institute for International Affairs, London; Albert Bressand, School of International and Public Affairs, Columbia University; Dick de Jong, Clingendael International Energy Programme; Ralf Dickel, Energy Charter Secretariat; Andreas Goldthau, Central European University, Budapest, and Global Public Policy Institute, Berlin; Enno Harks, Global Public Policy Institute, Berlin; Wade Hoxtell, Global Public Policy Institute, Berlin; Hillard Huntington, Energy Modeling Forum, Stanford University; Christine Jojarth, Center on Democracy, Development, and the Rule of Law, Stanford University; Frederic Kalinke, Department of Politics and International Relations, Oxford University; Wilfrid L. Kohl, School of Advanced International Studies, Johns Hopkins University; Jamie Manzer, Global Public Policy Institute, Berlin; Amy Myers Jaffe, James A. Baker Institute for Public Policy, Rice University; Yulia Selivanova, Energy Charter Secretariat; Tom Smeenk, Clingendael International Energy Programme; Ricardo Soares de Oliveira, Department of Politics and International Relations, Oxford University; Ronald Soligo, Rice University; Joseph A. Stanislaw, Deloitte LLP and The JAStanislaw Group, LLC; Coby van der Linde, Clingendael International Energy Programme; Jan Martin Witte, Global Public Policy Institute, Berlin; Simonetta Zarrilli, Division on International Trade and Commodities, United Nations Conference on Trade and Development

Oil has played a major role in Venezuela's economy since the first gusher was discovered along Lake Maracaibo in 1922. As Miguel Tinker Salas demonstrates, oil has also transformed the country's social, cultural, and political landscapes. In "The Enduring Legacy," Tinker Salas traces the history of the oil industry's rise in Venezuela from the beginning of the twentieth century, paying particular attention to the experiences and perceptions of industry employees, both foreign and Venezuelan. He reveals how class ambitions and corporate interests combined to reshape many Venezuelans' ideas of citizenship. Middle-class Venezuelans embraced the oil industry from the start, anticipating that it would transform the country by introducing modern technology, sparking economic development, and breaking the landed elites' stranglehold. Eventually Venezuelan employees of the industry found that their benefits, including relatively high salaries, fueled loyalty to the oil companies. That loyalty sometimes trumped allegiance to the nation-state.

North American and British petroleum companies, seeking to maintain their stakes in Venezuela, promoted the idea that their interests were synonymous with national development. They set up oil camps--residential communities to house their workers--that brought Venezuelan employees together with workers from the United States and Britain, and eventually with Chinese, West Indian, and Mexican migrants as well. Through the camps, the companies offered not just housing but also schooling, leisure activities, and acculturation into a structured, corporate way of life. Tinker Salas contends that these practices shaped the heart and soul of generations of Venezuelans whom the industry provided with access to a middle-class lifestyle. His interest in how oil suffused the consciousness of Venezuela is personal: Tinker Salas was born and raised in one of its oil camps.

Refine your path to career success

Get started in a career that has a promising future and is financially rewarding. "Opportunities in Petroleum Careers" provides you with a complete overview of the job possibilities, salary figures, and experience required to enter the petroleum industry.

This career-boosting book will help you: Determine the specialty that's right for you, from scientific research to oil refining to petroleum sales Acquire in-depth knowledge of the petroleum industry Find out what kind of salary you can expect Understand the daily routine of your chosen field Focus your job search using industry resources

ENJOY A GREAT CAREER AS A:
Drilling/production engineer - Environmental scientist - Chemical plant operator * Process engineer * Independent seller

How did they do it? How did a profligate who killed a deputy sheriff before reforming, a mining engineer who went AWOL from the Austrian Navy, and three East Texas drillers join forces with other equally colorful characters to drill on Spindletop hill? Giant Under the Hill is a scholarly work firmly rooted in the narrative tradition, a great story intriguingly told by three Beaumont historians: Jo Ann Stiles, Ellen Rienstra, and Judith Linsley. Using material collected over decades, much of it never before published, they bring to life the efforts of Pattillo Higgins, Anthony Lucas, Al and Curt Hamill, and Peck Byrd to master the Spindletop salt dome that culminated in the discovery of the great Lucas gusher. Their find subsequently transformed not only the state of Texas but the entire oil industry. Giant Under the Hill is the definitive story of one of the most significant and colorful moments in Texas history.

The authors delved deeply into available records and found treasures at every turn. As news of their work spread, people came forward from all over the country with even more photographs and documents.

This exhaustively researched book focuses on the Lucas gusher in Beaumont in 1901, as well as the events leading up to it and the immediate aftermath. It's all here -- the challenge and frustration of the search, the excitement of the discovery, the euphoric chaos of the boom, and the genesis of the giant companies. After the gusher came in, life would never be the same.

Alberta's oil sands represent a vast and untapped oil reserve that could reasonably supply all of Canada's energy needs for the next 475 years. With an estimated 300 billion barrels of recoverable oil at stake, the quest to develop this natural resource has been undertaken by many powerful actors, both nationally and internationally. Using research that integrates the economic, political, scientific, and business factors that have been influential in discovering and developing the sands, this book provides a comprehensive history of the oil sands project and a window on the nature of the complex relationships between industry, government, and transnational players. This book is the first comprehensive volume to examine the origins and development of the oil sands industry over the last century.

In 2006, world oil consumption will exceed one. thousand barrels per second. The news marks an. important change that will have a far-reaching. impact on world economies, investments, and business. profitability..

In "A Thousand Barrels a Second," Chief Energy. Economist of ARC Financial Peter Tertzakian. delivers a provocative look at the future of oil and. offers fresh insight into what it will take. to rebalance our energy needs and seize new. opportunities..

Tertzakian provides a unique analysis of shifts in. energy trends, describing how past critical junctures. -what he calls energy break points-developed, . evolved, and shaped nations; changed consumer. behavior; and launched or ruined businesses.. With the world already consuming 85 million. barrels of oil a day, Tertzakian answers the top. questions that business leaders, policy makers, . investors, and concerned citizens are asking him. as we approach the coming break point: . . Are today's high oil and gas prices. part of a routine business cycle, or are. there more profound forces at play?. Have we entered a new multi-polar. world where energy is the primary. source of geopolitical tension?. Are hybrid vehicles our only solution. against high gasoline prices?. Is China's growing thirst for energy. sustainable?. What sort of global landscape will. emerge from the turmoil?. Which government policies work and. which do not?. Will nuclear power and coal save the. day-again?. .

Tertzakian also offers a realistic, informed look. into the volatile future of our energy supply chains. and how our consumption patterns may evolve, . revealing how governments, businesses, and even. individuals can meet the coming challengeswith. better solutions and innovations..

Serving as a sobering yet hopeful wake-up call, . this book shows how the lessons of history will. help us find our way toward a better, more. secure energy future.. .

Public and private institutions in the United States have long been home to a variety of art works, antiquities, and ethnological materials. For years, these collections have been seen as important archives that allow present and future generations to enjoy, appreciate, and value the art of all cultures. In the past decade, however, questions have been raised as to exactly what constitutes legal and ethical ownership of art and other cultural property. Some observers believe that art and ethnological materials should remain in source countries, and have lobbied for an end to art trading. Recent changes to U.S. law may curtail both private and public collecting. Contributors to "Who Owns the Past?" include legal scholars, museum professionals, anthropologists, archaeologists, and collectors. In clear, nontechnical language, they provide a comprehensive overview of the development of cultural property law and practices, as well as recent case law affecting the ability of museums and private collectors to own art from other countries. Topics covered include rights to property, ethical ownership, the public responsibilities of museums, threats to art from war and development, and international cooperation to preserve collections in the developing world. Engaging all perspectives on this debate, "Who Owns the Past?" challenges all who care about the arts to work together toward policies that consider traditional American interests in securing cultural resources, and respect international concerns over loss of heritage.

"Paul Sabin has written a brilliant case study of how legal and political choices construct 'free markets'. He shows how battles over property rights, regulation, taxes, and highway and environmental policy shaped the oil market and with it the future of California's cities, roads, coastline and public finance. Clear-headed, meticulous, and filled with the drama of momentous conflicts between public and private interests, "Crude Politics" is legal-economic history at its best."--Robert W. Gordon, Chancellor Kent Professor of Law and Legal History, Yale University
"Paul Sabinis lucid analysis of how the oil industry and the auto industry shaped California's environment is a wonderful blending of political economy and environmental history. Sabin convincingly demonstrates how the market for oil, like all modern markets, was a political creation whose ramifying and surprising effects from freeways and pollution to state parks and public access to beaches are all too often unrecognized."--Richard White, Margaret Byrne Professor of American History, Stanford University
"To a much greater degree than most Americans usually appreciate, the central story of the past century was the story of oil. Paul Sabin's "Crude Politics" is a pioneering effort to trace for a single key state--California--the evolving web of relationships needed to sustain the production, distribution, and consumption of a critical resource on which virtually every aspect of modern life now depends. As we contemplate the waning future of that resource in the twenty-first century, we would do well to heed the insights about its twentieth-century past offered by this important book."--William Cronon, author of"Nature's Metropolis: Chicago and the Great West"
"Getting energy prices right is key to addressing our global climate crisis. With graceful prose and forceful argument, Paul Sabin shows how petroleum prices today are a product of more than a century of fierce political struggle over oil supply and demand. Anyone who wants to understand the political and economic factors that have created our present dependence on cheap oil should read this book."--James Gustave Speth, author of "Red Sky at Morning: America and the Crisis of the Global Environment"

Corporate Social Responsibility Failures in the Oil Industry directly challenges the oil industry's claims of corporate good citizenship, now widely advanced as part of a global public relations initiative. The volume spans the industry's reach, from the troubled waters of the UK offshore Continental Shelf, with its horrendous legacy of the Piper Alpha oil rig disaster, to the inhospitable shores of Newfoundland with its own tragic legacy of lost lives; to the new frontier of oil corporate colonialism in the former Soviet Union and the icy plains of Alaska. The central theme of violations of basic labour rights and of health and environmental protection standards will make uncomfortable reading in the boardroom. It is equally essential reading for those who seek to improve the position of workers and industries within the oil industry's global reach.

This volume reports the results of discussions with representatives of refining firms, technologies and services providers, research institutions and other organizations on current and future trends in the US refining industry.

On February 22, 1895, a British Naval Force under the command of Admiral Sir Frederick Bedford laid siege to Brass, the chief city of the Ijo people of Nembe in Nigeria's Niger Delta. After severe fighting, the city was razed to the ground. More than 2000 people, mostly women and children perished in that attack - launched at the behest of a British company in the name of Queen Victoria. writer, political activist and leader of the Niger Delta's Movement for the Survival of the Ogoni People. Again, the people of Nembe were locked in a grim life-and-death struggle to safeguard their livelihood from two forces: a series of corrupt and repressive Nigerian governments and another British company, the giant multinational Royal Dutch Shell. the Nigerian military, demonstrating (in contrast to Shell's public profile) how irresponsible practices have degraded agricultural land and left a people destitute. Compelling and angry, it draws attention to a grave injustice. The plunder of the Niger Delta has turned full circle as crude oil has taken the place of palm oil, but the dramatis personae remain the same: a powerful multinational company bent on extracting the last drop of blood from the richly endowed Niger Delta and a courageous people determined to resist.

Comparative analyses of social actors and policy outcomes in Bahia and Texas show the similarities and differences in the actors and the policies adopted in each case. As a result of historical and structural developments in Bahia and Texas, Cetrel operates under pollution-control standards and technologies for protecting the environment and workers that are similar to those of the GCA. This convergent trend is characterized as dependent convergence between developing and developed countries. The author makes recommendations for stronger international solidarity among progressive forces in developed and developing countries to promote preventive alternatives to pollution control.

Traditional accounts of John D. Rockefeller and the Standard Oil Company, as well as more recent best-selling books on the subject, still accept without question charges of unethical and anti-competitive behaviour by the American oil industry. In this synthesis of cultural, business, gender and intellectual history, Roger and Diana Davids Olien explore how this negative image of the petroleum industry was created -and how this image in turn helped shape policy toward the industry in ways that were sometimes at odds with both the goals or reformers and the public interest. By turning a critical eye on sources that have often been accepted at face value and examining the self-interests of oil industry critics, the authors seek to produce a more balanced, complex picture of the industry. Their case study of the impact of technology offers an example of how business must be understood through its cultural context and offers an approach to understanding problems of regulation and reform.

Maples presents an organized look at yield data and properties of products from refinery processes, how to use this information in performing various process economics studies, and discusses operating and capital costs for economic evaluation of both single processes and complete refineries. Yield correlations are presented for all of the important commercially-established petroleum refinery processes, each accompanied by operating requirements and capital cost of a typical unit. Here the user has all of the information required to perform a preliminary economic evaluation. For each process yield correlation a simplified process flow diagram and brief process description is given. Contents: Correlation methodology Crude oils, hydrocarbons, and refinery products Refinary processing overview Energy resources and transportation fuels The environment and the refinery Crude oil and residual oil processing Solvent deasphalting Visbreaking and aquaconversion Delayed coking Fluid coking/flexicoking Heavy distillate processing Fluid catalylic and heavy oil cracking Hydrocracking Hydrotreating Light distillate processing Naphtha desulfurization Catalytic reforming Light hydrocarbon processing Isomerization Alkylation Catalytic polymerization and dehydration Oxygenates Treating and other auxiliary processes Aromatics extraction Hydrogen manufacture Sour water stripping Sweetening Acid gas removal Sulfur recovery Tail gas cleanup Water treatment and waste disposal Blending Process economics Economics.

Growing Up in the Oil Patch chronicles the adventures and achievements of some of the most colourful, ambitious people of their time: statesmen, scoundrels, visionaries and developers. Participants all in the growing oil patch

The author presents a highly readable, informative and entertaining account of the early years in the development of Canada's gas and oil industry. Based upon five years of research, interviews, and his fortuitous discovery of a rare, historically important scribbler, John Schmidt traces the paths of two enterprising American-born drillers, "Frosty" Martin and "Tiny" Phillips, whose drive and ingenuity were encouraged by British and Canadian promoters and financiers. Their entrepreneurial spirit took them initially to Leamington, Ontario, and ultimately into the heart of the oil patch in Western Canada.

Contemporary life is founded on oil - a cheap, accessible, and rich source of energy that has shaped cities and manufacturing economies at the same time that it has increased mobility, global trade, and environmental devastation. Despite oil's essential role, full recognition of its social and cultural significance has only become a prominent feature of everyday debate and discussion in the early twenty-first century. Presenting a multifaceted analysis of the cultural, social, and political claims and assumptions that guide how we think and talk about oil, Petrocultures maps the complex and often contradictory ways in which oil has influenced the public's imagination around the world. This collection of essays shows that oil's vast network of social and historical narratives and the processes that enable its extraction are what characterize its importance, and that its circulation through this immense web of relations forms worldwide experiences and expectations. Contributors' essays investigate the discourses surrounding oil in contemporary culture while advancing and configuring new ways to discuss the cultural ecosystem that it has created. A window into the social role of oil, Petrocultures also contemplates what it would mean if human life were no longer deeply shaped by the consumption of fossil fuels.

The oil price collapse of 1985-6 had momentous global consequences: non-fossil energy sources quickly became uncompetitive, the previous talk of an OPEC 'imperium' was turned upside-down, the Soviet Union lost a large portion of its external revenues, and many Third World producers saw their foreign debts peak. Compared to the much-debated 1973 `oil shock', the `countershock' has not received the same degree of attention, even though its legacy has shaped the present-day energy scenario. This volume is the first to put the oil `counter-shock' of the mid-1980s into historical perspective. Featuring some of the most knowledgeable experts in the field, Counter-Shock offers a balanced approach between the global picture and local study cases. In particular, it highlights the crucial interaction between the oil counter-shock and the political `counterrevolution' against state intervention in economic management, put forward by Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher in the same period.

Oil exploration requires proper understanding of the geological set-up of any area to make the process economical and effective. This involves geological, geophysical, geochemical surveys including studying the lateral variations in litho-stratigraphic units in the adjoining areas surrounding the bore-hole, done through study of Dipmeter logs. This book 'Dipmeter Surveys in Petroleum Exploration' giving all the required backup of the other allied subjects for easy and meaningful interpretations of the Dipmeter data, so that drilling of dry wells is avoided to maximum possible extent and new discoveries to be made, thereby enhancing the oil resource of a particular geographical location.

Shale Oil and Gas Handbook: Theory, Technologies, and Challenges provides users with information on how shale oil and gas exploration has revolutionized today's energy industry. As activity has boomed and job growth continues to increase, training in this area for new and experienced engineers is essential. This book provides comprehensive information on both the engineering design and research aspects of this emerging industry. Covering the full spectrum of basic definitions, characteristics, drilling techniques, and processing and extraction technologies, the book is a great starting point to educate oil and gas personnel on today's shale industry. Critical topics covered include characterization of shale gas, theory and methods, typical costs, and obstacles for exploration and drilling, R&D and technology development in shale production, EOR methods in shale oil reservoirs, and the current status and impending challenges for shale oil and gas, including the inevitable future prospects relating to worldwide development.

The past decade has been one of the most volatile periods in global petroleum markets in living memory, and future oil supply security and price levels remain highly uncertain. This poses many questions for the professional activities of planners and urbanists because contemporary cities are highly dependent on petroleum as a transport fuel. How will oil dependent cities respond, and adapt to, the changing pattern of petroleum supplies? What key strategies should planners and policy makers implement in petroleum vulnerable cities to address the challenges of moving beyond oil? How might a shift away from petroleum provide opportunities to improve or remake cities for the economic, social and environmental imperatives of twenty-first-century sustainability? Such questions are the focus of contributors to this book with perspectives ranging across the planning challenge: overarching petroleum futures, governance, transition and climate change questions, the role of various urban transport nodes and household responses, ways of measuring oil vulnerability, and the effects on telecommunications, ports and other urban infrastructure. This comprehensive volume - with contributions from and focusing on cities in Australia, the UK, the US, France, Germany, the Netherlands and South Korea - provides key insights to enable cities to plan for the age beyond petroleum.

Dynamic Risk Analysis in the Chemical and Petroleum Industry focuses on bridging the gap between research and industry by responding to the following questions: What are the most relevant developments of risk analysis? How can these studies help industry in the prevention of major accidents? Paltrinieri and Khan provide support for professionals who plan to improve risk analysis by introducing innovative techniques and exploiting the potential of data share and process technologies. This concrete reference within an ever-growing variety of innovations will be most helpful to process safety managers, HSE managers, safety engineers and safety engineering students. This book is divided into four parts. The Introduction provides an overview of the state-of-the-art risk analysis methods and the most up-to-date popular definitions of accident scenarios. The second section on Dynamic Risk Analysis shows the dynamic evolution of risk analysis and covers Hazard Identification, Frequency Analysis, Consequence Analysis and Establishing the Risk Picture. The third section on Interaction with Parallel Disciplines illustrates the interaction between risk analysis and other disciplines from parallel fields, such as the nuclear, the economic and the financial sectors. The final section on Dynamic Risk Management addresses risk management, which may dynamically learn from itself and improve in a spiral process leading to a resilient system.