julie myerson, computer bks desktop publishing, 3 fatmen, mapping, baby phat, health & fitness / weight loss, uranium, mystery & detective women sleuths, arts and entertainment, gee, palomares, laura dern, amazon.com, site y, ubo.net,
|
So, for example, some years ago, vintage Aramco and Texaco formed a joint US refining venture, Motiva, which became a Shell operation when Chevron merged vintage with Texaco. So if you buy Shell gasoline on the East Coast of the US, there is a good likelihood you are buying gasoline refined from Saudi crude. There are all kinds of vintage marketing arrangements in the US (and elsewhere), some much less secretive than Motiva (you'll notice there is no Motiva-brand gasoline out there). Stop into a Citgo station east of the Rockies and you are likely filling up with gasoline refined from heavy sour Venezuelan crude (the Venezuelan state oil company PDV owns Citgo). And you're helping out Hugo Chavez's "Bolivarian Revolution" too. Olé! OPEC's power has also been pretty thoroughly cut by the large number of non-OPEC producers, like Russia, Norway, Mexico, Canada, and up-and-coming producers like Brazil and Equatorial Guinea. Today, OPEC only produces about 30 million barrels per day, less than half of the 80 million barrels consumed every day.
|