Current Oil Price

Guest · Post by **Guest** » 10 Mar 2011, 17:57

RalphW wrote:I suspect the answer is 'it depends'...

Most oil comes out of the wellhead mixed with gas, water, and other impurities. These are usually separated out before the oil is transferred. How long this takes I just don't know.

It does depend on the quality of the crude. Light sweet is easy, and according to this reply I found it takes seconds to process a barrel of oil. This does make sense if we're processing 85 mbpd.

The amount of time required to refine a barrel of oil varies depending upon the quality of the oil. The first part of the process removes particulates and various other stuff. There is various equipment that may be in use such as cat crackers. With sweet crude (from middle east) this might not even be necessary. Crude oil in California needs alot more processing. In fact, we use steam injection during extraction just to get it flowing at a good rate.

The rest of the refining process is a distallation process. From a barrel of oil, you actually get several products. You will get kerosene's, diesel, gas, propane and oils. Probably some other byproducts. There are several stages at specific temperature / pressure for each distilate to be extracted.

The process occurs really quickly so I would say it takes a few seconds at the most.

http://www.answerbag.com/q_view/37801#ixzz1GDjGFct8

Post by **adam2** » 10 Mar 2011, 20:39

emordnilap wrote:Thanks for that. My understanding has always to err on the side of longer rather than shorter time lags. Even six months might be optimistic in some cases.

That aside, is it true that (current) crude prices will dictate (roughly current) pump prices?

The price lag, as distinct from the physical transport and refining of the oil, seems to be about 2 weeks in practice in the UK.
Retail petrol in London had been about £1.30 for a while, it increased to about £1.35 recently, roughly 2 weeks after significant crude price increases.
Brent crude has been fairly steady at about $110/115 for a week or two, therefore I doubt that near term petrol prices will change much.
In the long term of course, increases are likely.

ziggy12345 · Post by **ziggy12345** » 15 Mar 2011, 11:14

With the Japanees economy in tatters, troops invading Bahrain and Ghadafi getting the upper hand against the rebels oil price is heading south very quickly. almost $4.00 drop today

RevdTess · Post by **RevdTess** » 15 Mar 2011, 13:38

ziggy12345 wrote:With the Japanees economy in tatters, troops invading Bahrain and Ghadafi getting the upper hand against the rebels oil price is heading south very quickly. almost $4.00 drop today

That's the strange thing about oil markets. Bad news for 'them' is so often good news for 'us'.

Tawney · Post by **Tawney** » 15 Mar 2011, 19:54

$ 97.36. A rival energy source (nuclear) has taken a hit so I'd have expected the oil price to go up, rather than down.

Moratorium Seen as Ploy to Placate Voters

Chancellor Angela Merkel has announced the temporary shutdown of seven of Germany's 17 nuclear plants pending a three-month safety check in response to the Fukushima accident.

http://www.spiegel.de/international/ger ... 44,00.html

Post by **adam2** » 15 Mar 2011, 21:10

Not much oil is used to generate electricity.
Natural gas is often the alternative to nuclear. Gas prices have increased somwhat, and will probably rise more.

Oil demand is likely to fall in the near term as the Japanese disaster leads to demand destruction.
Many factories in Japan are shut or working at reduced capacity due to flood damage or power shortages.
Problems will spread to other countries as factories run out of components, all this implies less economic activity and less oil used.
.
It is noteworthy that copper prices have fallen, again suggesting a reduction in manufacturing

PS_RalphW · Post by **PS_RalphW** » 17 Mar 2011, 15:26

Oil prices rebounding sharply today. Up $3.50 for Brent so far and rising steadily. All spot prices up about equally.

Clearly the market does not expect demand to fall, but is uncertain about supply.

Given that nuclear is being shut down in several countries, a world wide energy crunch seems in the offing. Natural gas is back up to the winter high price already here in UK. Nuclear shutdown is raising NG price, and Libya/ME tensions is raising oil price.

Aurora · Post by **Aurora** » 19 Mar 2011, 07:05

18/03/11 - Middle East tensions send cost of crude to $117 per barrel, but falls to $114.50 after Libyan leader announces ceasefire.

See: http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2011 ... tion-libya

Aurora · Post by **Aurora** » 21 Mar 2011, 05:31

BBC News - 21/03/11

Oil prices jump $2 after US leads air strikes on Libya

Oil prices have climbed after the US led a series of air strikes against Libya.

Brent crude rose as much as $2.26 to $116.19 a barrel, while US light crude rose as much as $2.12 to $103.19.

Article continues ...

PS_RalphW · Post by **PS_RalphW** » 31 Mar 2011, 14:21

The rebels are losing again.

Brent just went through $117. Again.

We have been stuck at $115 for nearly a month now.

http://www.upstreamonline.com/marketdat ... _crude.htm

If the Libya hadn't exploded and the previous price spike had held steady,
we would be just passing $115 now...

PS_RalphW · Post by **PS_RalphW** » 01 Apr 2011, 17:01

Brent is $118.50 and rising on the BBC site.

I guess all this talk of a ceasefire in Libya is locking in a divided country and an Iraq style hiatus in oil production.

raspberry-blower · Post by **raspberry-blower** » 01 Apr 2011, 19:10

Zero Hedge report that Brent has reached $119.44

Just checked on Upstream - they have Brent trading at $119.24 just now...

Aurora · Post by **Aurora** » 01 Apr 2011, 19:16

Scarey isn't it?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business/mark ... _month.stm

raspberry-blower · Post by **raspberry-blower** » 01 Apr 2011, 19:56

OK who thought Saudi Arabia would make up the shortfall from Libya's curtailed production? Nope, me neither. Anyway, OPEC's oil production for March is down to its lowest level since September - this from Bloomberg:

Libyan oil production tumbled by 995,000 barrels in March to 390,000 barrels a day, according to the survey of oil companies, producers and analysts. Libya was the third-largest oil producer in Africa before the conflict, pumping 1.59 million barrels a day in January, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries’ crude output dropped 363,000 barrels in March to an average 29.022 million barrels a day, the lowest level since September, as increases from Saudi Arabia failed to make up for the decline in Libyan production. Saudi output rose by 300,000 barrels a day to 9 million, the survey showed.

Continues

PS_RalphW · Post by **PS_RalphW** » 04 Apr 2011, 17:05

Brent just passed $120 on the BBC front month future site.