America's LargestPosts Tagged Venezuela
China’s Quest to Dominate 21st Century Oil Supplies
China, through its national oil companies, has recently invested at least $40 billion in oil ventures in over twenty countries, the Journal of Energy Security reported earlier this month. It’s bought large interests in oil fields in Nigeria, Sudan, and Kazakhstan; built pipelines in Myanmar, Sudan, and Kazakhstan; built refineries at home and abroad; bought [...]
Read More »Heating Oil Dealer Vows to End His Company’s Dependence on Unfriendly Oil
Our soil, our oil—that’s the slogan of a Northeast heating oil dealer who has stopped selling foreign oil. As of May 31st, the company’s 25,000 customers only receive home heating oil produced in North America, the news site lancasteronline reported. The same pledge applies to the other fuels they also sell—diesel and biodiesel immediately, [...]
Read More »Chávez Nationalizes Oil Service Companies in Venezuela
Over the weekend Venezuela’s President Hugo Chávez made good on his promise to further nationalize the oil industry in the country. Taking advantage of a law passed in the National Assembly just hours before, President Chaves ordered the military to seize the assets of sixty oil field service companies, several of which are foreign. This [...]
Read More »Should Big Oil Return to Venezuela?
An article in the Houston Chronicle this week reports that Venezuela has recently “put out feelers for the majors to consider new projects in the country’s oil-rich Orinoco Belt.” The question the article raises is this: Should Big Oil accept the invitation?
When crude was selling for $120 a barrel, Venezuela’s socialist president Hugo Chávez made [...]
Hugo Chávez Feels Intensifying Pain of Low Oil Prices
Most of us knew him or her in high school: the rich kid who bought popularity with daddy’s money. Inviting people to big parties; giving them rides in a new car—the rich kid was big man or woman on campus because of what they could buy, not because of who they were. And if the [...]
Read More »Victory for Chávez: Venezuelans Approve Referendum Abolishing Term Limits
Voters decisively passed the closely watched referendum to abolish term limits for the president and all other elected officials in Venezuela by a margin of 54.4 percent to 45.6 percent yesterday, the New York Times reports.
The referendum’s passage provides president Hugo Chávez with a huge political mandate, as he had said he required time beyond [...]
U.S. Can’t Buy Iraq’s Oil Directly
In a recent “Q & A” article, the Associated Press responded to a good question from a reader: why can’t the U.S. import its oil directly from Iraq to help boost the Iraqi economy and take oil revenues away from anti-American nations?
It is a perfectly reasonable idea—the U.S. spends billions on dollars on imported oil [...]
Chávez Races to Hold Off Economic Catastrophe Before Referendum in Venezuela
Hugo Chávez, the autocratic and loudly anti-American president of Venezuela, is on the verge of securing his position as head of state indefinitely, unless the effects of falling oil prices foil his plans. On Sunday, the people of Venezuela will vote on a referendum that Chávez called in which they will endorse or reject his [...]
Read More »Chávez Says U.S. Can’t Kick Oil Habit
Hugo Chávez, the bombastic and often inflamatory president of Venezuela, gave an interview to CNN en Español last night. He spoke on the anniversary of his rise to power, a period that Venezuelan state television called “a decade of successes,” according to cnn.com.
On the subject of the United States, Chávez said he hopes to resume [...]
UPDATE: CITGO Comes Through With First Heating Oil Donation
The International Herald Tribune reported today that CITGO has made its first donation of heating oil this season to a shelter in Washington, D.C.
Joseph Kennedy, the head of Citizens Energy, the non-profit organization that manages the program, announced on January 5th that the donations would be suspended until further notice, citing economic concerns brought about [...]
Venezuela Cuts Output, Seeks “Stabilization” of Oil Prices
The International Herald Tribune reported yesterday that Venezuelan Energy Minister Rafael Ramirez had identified a target of price of $70 to $90 per barrel. He announced that Venezuela will continue to reduce outputs in accordance with OPEC targets, and stated that the country is “aiming for a stabilization of oil prices.”
The target range laid out [...]
Chávez Opens Venezuelan Oil Reserves to Western Corporations
On January 6th, CITGO announced it would discontinue the assistance program that had provided millions of dollars’ worth of free and discounted heating oil to poor Americans. Just two days later, the president of Venezuela himself, Hugo Chávez, intervened to reinstate the program, most likely because he could not politically afford to lose such a [...]
Read More »Chávez Reclaims Political Capital by Reinstating U.S. Heating Oil program; Why Don’t American Oil Companies do the Same?
As The HEAT Zone reported yesterday, the CITGO heating oil assistance program was hastily restored after a brief two-day suspension brought on by economic concerns in the Venezuelan government as a result of slumping oil revenue. In response to the rapid policy change, Time writer Tim Padgett wrote an intriguing article wondering why American [...]
Read More »In Abrupt About-Face, Chávez Reinstates U.S. Heating Oil Program
Yesterday, CITGO Chairman Alejandro Granado announced that the Venezuelan-owned company would resume the program that has brought discounted and free heating oil to needy Americans for the last four years. The reversal came just two days after Joseph Kennedy II, President of Citizens Energy, the non-profit organization that administers the program, announced that it would [...]
Read More »Cancellation of Heating Oil Assistance Program Deals Political Blow to Chávez
As explained in yesterday’s HEAT Zone post, global recession and tumbling oil prices have forced the Venezuelan government and its American affiliate CITGO to halt their heating oil assistance program in the U.S. The program was, as the Christian Science Monitor describes, “a public relations bonanza for Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez.” Although Chávez has framed [...]
Read More »Falling Oil Revenue Forces Venezuela to Discontinue Heating Oil Assistance Program in the U.S.
Beginning in November of 2005, CITGO, the American arm of the government-owned Venezuelan oil company Petroleos de Venezuela SA, provided free and discounted heating oil to poor Americans in 23 states. The program was administered by the non-profit Citizens Energy, which helped select recipients of the oil and arranged for distribution.
Yesterday, Citizens Energy president Joseph [...]
Oil Prices Up on Expectations of Record Production Cut at OPEC Meeting Tomorrow
As representatives of OPEC member nations arrived in Oman, Algeria for tomorrow’s meeting, oil prices rose steadily, showing strong expectations of a production cut that could be the biggest in the cartel’s history. The price for a barrel of crude had risen about 2.5% to $45.66 and the price of heating oil had increased by [...]
Read More »Falling Oil Prices Sap Power of Anti-US Regimes
Image: Claudio Munoz/The Economist
While rapidly-declining oil prices are bad news for the world economy, we often note here at the Zone that the upside of cheaper oil around the world is cheaper heating oil and gasoline here at home. There is another upside–a factor that affects international relations rather than Americans’ pocket books.
Three anti-US nations [...]
Federal Regulators to Investigate Price Fluctuations; Oil Prices Cool Off
The U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) announced yesterday that it would investigate crude oil futures prices on the New York Mercantile Exchange (NYMEX). The CFTC’s announcement came on the heels of the largest-ever one-day gain in crude oil prices, which had clearly drawn the regulatory agency’s attention. The agency is “closely monitoring” the historic [...]
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