What is happening with oil prices ?

The Energy Crisis we are facing today can be summarised as below…

• The world price of oil in US dollars has doubled in the last year (June 2007 to June 2008) from US$67/barrel to over US$135/barrel
• The world price has gone up by 6 times in 6 years, from US$20/barrel in 2002 to over US$135/barrel by mid 2008
• With hindsight we can see that the great cheap oil era lasted 16 years from 1986 to 2002 when the price was mostly in the range $15 – 25/barrel, coming off a $39 peak during the “oil shock” of 1980 (equivalent to about US$95/barrel in 2008 money). The short sharp spike seen at the end of 1990 was due to the first Gulf War.

Whats happening?

Obvious questions raised by the price rises are:

1. What has caused the startling rise over the last 12 months?
2. Why has the price risen steadily for the past 6 years?
3. Why shouldn’t we get back to the $20/barrel we enjoyed in the 1990’s?
4. What caused the noticeable dip in price from mid 2006 to early 2007?
5. Why does the oil price seem to be going up at an accelerating rate since the dip in 2007?
6. Has the price stopped going up yet?
7. What prices might we expect over the next 1, 3 or even 5 years to come?

Check Out http://anz.theoildrum.com/node/4260 for the full story…