On Fuel and Petronas

I receive this via email. An almost thorough explanation by a Petronas engineer himself. Do read.

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Dear All,

This is lengthy but please bear with me. This is worth reading through ALSO.

We're not actually comparing apple-to-apple here, as most countries listed have a very long reserve life (the amount of years they have till the oil is finished) and they have a low population compared to their oil reserve (hence they can cater to their own needs without any bother to the supply). Some research can do wonders instead of blaming others.

UAE
population = 4,380,000
oil reserve = 97 billion barrels
production rate = 2.5 million barrels per day
Reserve life = 107 years

Kuwait
population = 2,851,000
oil reserve = 99 billion barrels
production rate = 2.5 million barrels per day
Reserve life = 108 years

Saudi Arabia
population = 24,735,000
oil reserve = 260 billion barrels
production rate = 8.8 million barrels per day
reserve life = 81 years

Iran
population = 71,208,000
oil reserve = 136 billion barrels
production rate = 3.9 million barrels per day
reserve life = 74 years

Nigeria
population = 148,093,000
oil reserve = 36.2 billion barrels
production rate = 2.3 million barrels per day
reserve life = 43 years

Venezuela
population = 27,877,000
oil reserve = 80 billion barrels
production rate = 2.4 million barrels per day
reserve life = 91 years

Malaysia
population = 27,452,091
oil reserve = 4.8 billion barrels
production rate = 550,000 barrels per day (resources from internet salah. Aku kira production hari2, sila ikut nombor aku)
reserve life = 33 years

Sources:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oil_reserves
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Population
http://www.eia.doe.gov/cabs/Malaysia/Oil.html
http://www.malaysia-today.net/Blog-e/2006/03/petronas-profits-create-friction.htm

And the Ahmad fisherman notion that we extract oil from the ground without costs, or little cost, is NOT TRUE. Foolish, even.

FYI, to extract oil from the ground, there're 3 main cycle: Exploration, Development and Production. I wont go into lengthy explanation here, lets just have an overview of Drilling campaigns that needs to be carried out on all three cycles.

Drilling Campaign:

Rig: RM552,000 per day (minimum)

->We dont make rigs. We rent them. The deeper the ocean, the pricier the rig. And FYI, shallow waters of Malaysia is running out of oil. We are running the final race on shallow waters , have to concentrate on smaller pore-sized fields and taking the greater risk and more cost on deepwater fields.

Supply boat : RM 209,509 per day (minimum)

-> we need at least 2 supply boats.

Thats the cost of just two of many, many more items involved in Drilling campaigns alone. I'd like to reiterate that these campaigns occur in ALL of the 3 cycles, each campaign is at least 4 months. Do the maths or better yet, put it in a fancy Excel and publish it around.

Thats just costs involved in extracting the oil.

How about transporting it to shore? How about refining it for industries, daily stuff and for your car?

Some may ask why are we selling our oil, since we can use it? Well, here the answer: WE DONT HAVE MONEY. What else can we sell to make money? Tin? Gold? Pepper? Rubber? All these calculated together would not make even a small portion of profit in O&G. Our oil is of one of the best quality in the world because it is low in sulphur. Fyi, we dont need best quality oil for our cars, its only used in industries and in jets. In the international oil price is average USD130/bbl, ours would be close to USD140/bbl.

And then some might additionally ask, SO WHERE DID ALL THE OIL MONEY GO? Please refer to the statistics above, we have less than 50yrs of supply of O&G, although more explorations are aggressively being done in deepwater and smallfields. PETRONAS needs the money to ensure that we have the supply AFTER 50 years. PETRONAS is aggressively pursuing O&G projects overseas, and these projects does not come cheap. In other words, PETRONAS is not the nation's piggy bank, its THE bank for our children's children.

So please, do not be swayed easily by cheap-mouthed politicians who does not have the in-depth knowledge about how the process goes. If they say they want to use our oil money, please do consider our children's children. PETRONAS have been supporting the nation by giving back almost 60% if its profits.

Itu pakai cheap labor tu. Our skilled engineers, even often frustrated by the meager wages they get for risking their lives at sea, sometimes for weeks, still they stay and think of the country. I'm proud to say a lot of them are very patriotic. But also a lot of them are enticed by Middle East countries and others to work for them for more attractive salary. Nak recruit orang baru senang, but we have to train them and training takes 2-3 yrs!. Since we are running our last mile in our existing oilfields, we need experienced workers, and they dont come cheap.

So next time any politician says, DUIT PETRONAS PEGI MANA?, ask them back DUIT CUKAI SAYA PEGI MANA?

I think that would be more appropriate :p