Random Notes  

The Herald is reporting that airlines at Sydney airport may be forced to cut flights because of "unusable" jet fuel.

Airline passengers could face delays for some days after a significant portion of Sydney's jet fuel supply was found to be unusable. BP, Caltex, Mobil and Shell were alerted to the problem when standard testing yesterday showed fuel was "off specification"

Oil related matters are all over the local press this weekend, with the front page of the Herald declaring "Petrol: time to leave the car at home" and reporting layoffs at GM's local subsidiary Holden, blaming falling sales of larger cars (as well as moving some production to China). Sharing the front page is an article decrying inaction on global warming and the teaching of "intelligent design".

Soaring petrol prices are starting to bite into the economy, with motorists tipped to curb their driving soon and car firms feeling the pinch as buyers abandon fuel-guzzling vehicles. With the average household now spending $168 a month on petrol and prices expected to hit $1.30 a litre next week, the managing director of oil refiner Caltex, Dave Reeves, has warned: "If these prices remain or even go higher, I can expect some response from our customers."

His comments came as Holden announced it would lay off 1400 workers at its Adelaide plant, partly due to the growing popularity of fuel-efficient cars. Bureau of Statistics figures released this week showed demand for four-wheel-drives has plunged this year. Sales were down 3 per cent in the year to July, the biggest fall in five years. Mr Reeves said he had "seen fewer cars on the road" on the trip to the office each morning.

They quote a representative of a fuel price monitoring group as saying he didn't expect prices to drop "until February" - why he thought prices might drop then wasn't reported.

The Financial Review (no links because of their stupid pay wall and limited web publication policies) has an article on the prospect of Chile buying LNG from Australia with Woodside and Chevron tipped as possible suppliers of gas from WA. They note that Chile is suffering from a "national energy shortage" - I initially wondered why they aren't piping the stuff in from Bolivia instead (where it is plentiful) but it seems this was the plan but has been scrapped, apparently due to the political situation in Bolivia.

The same article notes that Federal Resources Minister Ian McFarlane (fresh from annexing the NT's uranium supplies) is in San Francisco lobbying on behalf of BHP's planned Californian LNG terminal. Elsewhere in the paper BHP and CEO Chip Goodyear get quite a lot of coverage, with Goodyear predicting that oil prices will "moderate" in future but adding that we'll never see US$20 oil again. Santos also get some coverage, with Trevor Sykes noting that they have 5 gas projects coming online over the next 18 months, plus giving the so-far disappointing Jeruk field some publicity by predicting more appraisal drilling could make it "much bigger".

The AFR also has a piece "Indonesia Acts To Prop Up The Rupiah" which looks at the enormous problem rising oil prices have had on the Indonesian budget deficit and currency. Fuel subsidies are expected to consume over 30% of total government expenditure this year, and the Indonesian is planning to cut these again, thoiugh the date for this happening isn't certain.

While peak oil hasn't got a run in any of the Australian press this week, WHT's home town paper has followed the lead of the New York Times and published an editorial on the subject.

Until recently, opinion on the future of world oil supplies was dominated by two views. One group of experts held that production would decline fairly soon, within a couple of decades at most. Another group argued that the crude would keep flowing for generations, thanks to ever-advancing detection and drilling technologies.

Either way, the scenario was for a gradual and orderly transition to fuels of the future. Now a third perspective is gaining both popular attention and professional respect -- the notion that oil's decline will be sharp and uncontrolled, following a peak that may be more or less at hand.

This "peak oil" theory is neither new -- some geologists think the world has already passed the high point of recoverable reserves -- nor universally accepted. But it is gaining ground as world demand surges, especially in China and India, and as the most important supplier shows signs of strain.

The Oil Drum is closely following the progress of Hurricane Katrina in the Gulf of Mexico and has a good round up of the news.

Africa is starting to get hit hard by rising oil prices, which is a sign of things to come for poorer countries (and poorer individuals in rich countries).

Thailand's Prime Minister has come up with a novel (albeit bizarre) mechanism for ignoring questions from journalists, though apparently questions relating to rising oil prices are OK still.

Morgan Stanley's Stephen Roach is still fretting about the impact of rising oil prices on the the US and world economies.

This is the first oil shock in the modern era of globalization. That means its impacts are likely to be compounded by the cross-border linkages that shape the global trade cycle. In today’s US-centric world, that spells unusual vulnerability. If higher oil prices take a toll on the over-extended American consumer, repercussions in the rest of an externally-dependent world will be all the more acute. That puts Asia, the world’s most rapidly growing region, right in the cross-hairs of the energy shock of 2005.

Globalization complicates the transmission of shocks around the world. That’s especially the case with respect to the current energy shock. Countries will be hit both by the direct effects of rising energy costs, as well as by the indirect impacts of energy-related pressures on their major trading partners. To the extent that the American consumer remains the principal engine of growth on the demand side of the global economy, those nations that rely on exports to the US as major sources of growth will be hyper-sensitive to any energy-related cutbacks in US consumption.

Both Mobjectivist (twice) and MonkeyGrinder have noted the attack of the Swift Boat "Veterans" on peak oil, with professional propagandist Jerome Corsi (wingnut America's Baghdad Bob) - pleased with the success of his reality-altering campaigns to revise John Kerry's military record and the nuclear warfare capabilities of Iran - turning his foaming muzzle onto the subject of peak oil and declaring we have nothing to worry about - oil is abiotic, joining other respected observers like Joe Vialls (http://joevialls.altermedia.info/wecontrolamerica/peakoil.html) in this camp.

The brownshirts are on the march in Hawaii as well, with the American Legion declaring that all dissent is treasonous - the war in Iraq may be both illegal and ultimately futile, but you still have to support it if you want to remain a good citizen of the homeland it seems. At least they aren't plotting a coup again.

The American Legion, which has 2.7 million members, has declared war on antiwar protestors, and the media could be next. Speaking at its national convention in Honolulu, the group's national commander called for an end to all “public protests” and “media events” against the war.

"The American Legion will stand against anyone and any group that would demoralize our troops, or worse, endanger their lives by encouraging terrorists to continue their cowardly attacks against freedom-loving peoples," Thomas Cadmus, national commander, told delegates at the group's national convention in Honolulu.

The delegates voted to use whatever means necessary to "ensure the united backing of the American people to support our troops and the global war on terrorism."

In his speech, Cadmus declared: "It would be tragic if the freedoms our veterans fought so valiantly to protect would be used against their successors today as they battle terrorists bent on our destruction.”

Past Peak has some good quotes on the Bush administration's admiration for fascism.

Lastly, the idea that we've slowly slipped into a totalitarian state has prompted the Ministry of Reshelving to commence a program of moving George Orwell's "1984" into the non-fiction section of book stores.