No passado sábado decidi experimentar uma deslocação ao meu treino de natação seguindo uma política de redução das emissões de carbono. A bicicleta é um veículo excelente porque é um meio de transporte rápido em percursos citadinos de pequena distância.
Entre o Alto do Lumiar (freguesia da Charneca) e a piscina da Cidade Universitária (freguesia do Campo Grande) são cerca de 2,5 km.
O caminho mais rápido entre estes dois pontos, indo de automóvel, implica a utilização do eixo norte-sul e apenas se gastam uns 5 a 8 minutos numa manhã sem trânsito. Se utilizar os transportes públicos tenho que recorrer à combinação dos autocarros da Carris com o metro o que me obriga a gastar, em média, 40 minutos. Se fizer uma combinação entre andar a pé e o metro consigo demorar cerca de 45 minutos. Utilizando o automóvel particular e o metro o tempo médio gasto nesta deslocação reduz-se a 30 minutos. Fazendo o uso da bicicleta consigo fazer este trajecto em cerca de 15 minutos!
Fazendo o balanço poderei dizer que a bicicleta ganha se considerarmos simultaneamente o factor tempo, a poupança de energia, a não emissão de poluentes e os benefícios para a saúde!
Tudo somado fiz 5 km a pedalar e mais 1,6 km a nadar. Muito bom para um dia de treino. Quem me dera poder fazer isto 3 vezes por semana!
Eis umas pequenas metragens do meu regresso para casa:
domingo, 30 de março de 2008
quarta-feira, 26 de março de 2008
A outra face do elevado preço do petróleo
Segundo a reportonbusiness.com:
"Reserves don't matter as much as the cost of getting the oil out the ground
by CARL MORTISHED
carl.mortished@thetimes.co.uk
March 20, 2008
LONDON -- Oil and gas reserves don't much matter any more. You arrive at that conclusion after listening to Royal Dutch Shell's strategy presentation in which the company this week finally allowed investors to have a look at the gauge on its fuel tank.
Shell caused an uproar in late January when it failed to publish its reserve numbers at the same time as its 2007 earnings, and said it would follow Exxon Mobil's example and delay publication until it filed its 20-F statement to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. Some feared that the delay masked a problem (another case of disappearing barrels, whispered the doubters) but there was no problem. Shell topped up its tank and added a little bit more.
Reserves on their own don't matter. What matters is the cost of getting the reserves. Shell's investment per barrel of oil and gas has increased fourfold in just three years, a period during which the oil multinational's output has not increased. The company displayed another chart showing the average spending of the big oil companies. Per barrel of hydrocarbons, spending rates were pretty static during the 1990s at between $5 (U.S.) and $6 a barrel. In 2003, the rate of investment began to escalate and is now shooting higher, rising at an alarming pace. Last year, the average investment per barrel was just shy of $15.
On top of that, you must load the daily cost of operating wells and pipelines and the colossal overhead of running a big oil company. Moreover, we know that the $14-to-$15-a-barrel average investment is just an average and it is rising. Every new barrel is a more expensive barrel because in order to get the oil, Western oil companies must push the technology envelope even further, into deeper water and more heavy oil, such as Alberta's oil sands. The only giant discovery of the past decade has been Tupi, the eight-billion-barrel oil field discovered offshore of Brazil in water depths of two kilometres.
Technology is expensive, but it is the materials, manpower and energy cost that hurts. Shell estimates that the operating cost per barrel of the Athabasca project is between $20 and $25, of which a third is energy - the cost of natural gas used to heat water to extract bitumen from sand. Shell won't reveal the capital cost of an Alberta oil sands barrel, but it is certainly a lot higher than its average of $7 and likely near the top rate of $15 to $20.
The point of all this is that it helps to explain the current $105-a-barrel oil price and its extraordinary resilience to weakening demand signals. Oil price speculators know that the U.S. is heading into recession and they can see the signs of weakening gasoline consumption, but they are maintaining long positions in West Texas Intermediate and Brent, the benchmark futures contracts. If they remain bullish, it is not because they believe oil is running out but because they believe the cost of producing the marginal barrel will remain high and will continue to rise, regardless of a U.S. recession.
That doesn't mean the oil price won't dip or suffer a short-term plunge. There will be temporary gluts of gasoline as America works through its credit crunch, but it is the cost of producing extra barrels and the price of alternatives such as biofuels that will determine what we pay for oil in 2012. According to the New York Mercantile Exchange, that price is currently around $100 a barrel and most of the long-dated WTI futures reflect a belief that the world will still be paying close to a three-digit oil price in five years time.
The high oil price is sucking cash into the pockets of national and multinational oil companies and the cash is needed. At the time of Big Oil's investment nadir at the turn of the millennium, Shell spent a net $1.5-billion on its business after deducting cash inflows from disposals. At that time, the oil industry was in survival mode, coping with $12 oil prices, but the investment famine was unsustainable and today, we are paying for it. The question is whether we will run into another bust cycle.
That can happen only if the West's big oil companies repeat their achievements of the 1970s and 1980s with a series of exploration successes, such as Brent and Forties in the North Sea and Prudhoe Bay. The worry is that today's spending is not delivering many more barrels, just more expensive barrels. The cheap barrels are out of reach in Iraq, Iran and Russia. It's not peak oil we have to worry about but oil inflation."
Esta é uma análise importante e vem demonstrar uma das realidades bem pesadas acerca dos custos da extracção do petróleo. Durante muito anos, entre o meio da década de 1980 e o fim do século XX, o baixo preço do barril de petróleo afastou as companhias do investimento na prospecção. O resultado está à vista: o mundo hoje consome diariamente mais de 80 milhões de barris por dia. Só Portugal consome 300.000 por dia, tudo importado! Ora, como existem muitas zonas produtivas antigas em declínio, é natural a existência de dificuldade na satisfação do aumento da procura por parte dos países em grande crescimento económico, como é o caso da Índia ou da China.
"Reserves don't matter as much as the cost of getting the oil out the ground
by CARL MORTISHED
carl.mortished@thetimes.co.uk
March 20, 2008
LONDON -- Oil and gas reserves don't much matter any more. You arrive at that conclusion after listening to Royal Dutch Shell's strategy presentation in which the company this week finally allowed investors to have a look at the gauge on its fuel tank.
Shell caused an uproar in late January when it failed to publish its reserve numbers at the same time as its 2007 earnings, and said it would follow Exxon Mobil's example and delay publication until it filed its 20-F statement to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. Some feared that the delay masked a problem (another case of disappearing barrels, whispered the doubters) but there was no problem. Shell topped up its tank and added a little bit more.
Reserves on their own don't matter. What matters is the cost of getting the reserves. Shell's investment per barrel of oil and gas has increased fourfold in just three years, a period during which the oil multinational's output has not increased. The company displayed another chart showing the average spending of the big oil companies. Per barrel of hydrocarbons, spending rates were pretty static during the 1990s at between $5 (U.S.) and $6 a barrel. In 2003, the rate of investment began to escalate and is now shooting higher, rising at an alarming pace. Last year, the average investment per barrel was just shy of $15.
On top of that, you must load the daily cost of operating wells and pipelines and the colossal overhead of running a big oil company. Moreover, we know that the $14-to-$15-a-barrel average investment is just an average and it is rising. Every new barrel is a more expensive barrel because in order to get the oil, Western oil companies must push the technology envelope even further, into deeper water and more heavy oil, such as Alberta's oil sands. The only giant discovery of the past decade has been Tupi, the eight-billion-barrel oil field discovered offshore of Brazil in water depths of two kilometres.
Technology is expensive, but it is the materials, manpower and energy cost that hurts. Shell estimates that the operating cost per barrel of the Athabasca project is between $20 and $25, of which a third is energy - the cost of natural gas used to heat water to extract bitumen from sand. Shell won't reveal the capital cost of an Alberta oil sands barrel, but it is certainly a lot higher than its average of $7 and likely near the top rate of $15 to $20.
The point of all this is that it helps to explain the current $105-a-barrel oil price and its extraordinary resilience to weakening demand signals. Oil price speculators know that the U.S. is heading into recession and they can see the signs of weakening gasoline consumption, but they are maintaining long positions in West Texas Intermediate and Brent, the benchmark futures contracts. If they remain bullish, it is not because they believe oil is running out but because they believe the cost of producing the marginal barrel will remain high and will continue to rise, regardless of a U.S. recession.
That doesn't mean the oil price won't dip or suffer a short-term plunge. There will be temporary gluts of gasoline as America works through its credit crunch, but it is the cost of producing extra barrels and the price of alternatives such as biofuels that will determine what we pay for oil in 2012. According to the New York Mercantile Exchange, that price is currently around $100 a barrel and most of the long-dated WTI futures reflect a belief that the world will still be paying close to a three-digit oil price in five years time.
The high oil price is sucking cash into the pockets of national and multinational oil companies and the cash is needed. At the time of Big Oil's investment nadir at the turn of the millennium, Shell spent a net $1.5-billion on its business after deducting cash inflows from disposals. At that time, the oil industry was in survival mode, coping with $12 oil prices, but the investment famine was unsustainable and today, we are paying for it. The question is whether we will run into another bust cycle.
That can happen only if the West's big oil companies repeat their achievements of the 1970s and 1980s with a series of exploration successes, such as Brent and Forties in the North Sea and Prudhoe Bay. The worry is that today's spending is not delivering many more barrels, just more expensive barrels. The cheap barrels are out of reach in Iraq, Iran and Russia. It's not peak oil we have to worry about but oil inflation."
Esta é uma análise importante e vem demonstrar uma das realidades bem pesadas acerca dos custos da extracção do petróleo. Durante muito anos, entre o meio da década de 1980 e o fim do século XX, o baixo preço do barril de petróleo afastou as companhias do investimento na prospecção. O resultado está à vista: o mundo hoje consome diariamente mais de 80 milhões de barris por dia. Só Portugal consome 300.000 por dia, tudo importado! Ora, como existem muitas zonas produtivas antigas em declínio, é natural a existência de dificuldade na satisfação do aumento da procura por parte dos países em grande crescimento económico, como é o caso da Índia ou da China.
segunda-feira, 24 de março de 2008
quarta-feira, 12 de março de 2008
O grande desafio do século XXI
Por todo lado estão a multiplicar-se as vozes acerca do desafio energético causado pelo natural declínio da extracção de petróleo. Richard Heinberg é uma das personagens envolvidas neste debate mundial. Este pequeno vídeo mostra bem a abrangência deste problema. Segundo fontes não oficiais, mas de elevada confiança científica, o pico de extracção de petróleo a nível mundial já foi atingido. As grandes reservas do México (Cantarell) e do Médio Oriente estão a entrar em declínio e as novas descobertas não estão a compensar o declínio dos antigos campos.
Tudo isto não estará relacionado com a turbulência que os mercados financeiros estão a viver? Isto não andará tudo ligado?
Tudo isto não estará relacionado com a turbulência que os mercados financeiros estão a viver? Isto não andará tudo ligado?
terça-feira, 11 de março de 2008
Preços altos do petróleo
Preços altos da matéria prima compensam investimentos avultados. Nesta perspectiva a GALP está a investir fortemente na extracção de hidrocarbonetos através das concessões que tem espalhadas pelo mundo fora.
Segundo o "Público" de hoje:
"Galp tem 1500 milhões para petróleo no Brasil e em Angola
Por Ana Brito
Galp Energia vai investir 3300 milhões de euros
até 2012. A maior fatia vai para Sines, para a refinação
e distribuição
A Galp Energia anunciou ontem que irá investir nos próximos anos 1500 milhões de euros na exploração de petróleo nos blocos que detém no Brasil e em Angola. Um montante que representa quase um terço do volume total dos investimentos que a empresa tem planeados até 2012 (5300 milhões de euros).
No ano passado, a petrolífera portuguesa participou na maior descoberta de petróleo do mundo, no poço Tupi Sul, em águas ultraprofundas da bacia de Santos, Brasil. Neste poço, onde está em consórcio com a brasileira Petrobrás e a britânica BG Group (com 65 e 25 por cento, respectivamente), a Galp tem uma participação de dez por cento, ou o equivalente a 773 milhões de barris. Mas, até ontem, quando apresentou formalmente o plano de investimentos para o período 2008-2012, a petrolífera não tinha ainda divulgado quanto teria disponível para iniciar a exploração deste e de outros blocos.
Estes 1500 milhões de euros que a Galp vai investir nas actividades de exploração e produção destinam-se igualmente a financiar outros projectos em Portugal, Moçambique, Timor-Leste e Venezuela.
O presidente da empresa, Ferreira de Oliveira, afirmou ontem que o objectivo da Galp é satisfazer a longo prazo o consumo nacional de petróleo. "Esperamos, num horizonte não muito longo, atingir os 150 mil barris por dia, mas a nossa ambição é atingir os 300 mil diários, o que corresponde às necessidades do consumo nacional", afirmou Ferreira de Oliveira, citado pela Lusa. A Galp pretende ainda atingir uma produção entre os três e os seis mil milhões de metros cúbicos de gás natural, o que corresponde a entre 45 e 95 por cento do mercado de gás natural em Portugal.
A maior fatia dos investimentos anunciados (65 por cento ou 2600 milhões de euros) tem por destino as actividades de refinação e distribuição, com destaque para os mil milhões de euros que serão utilizados na modernização das refinarias do Porto e de Sines. Dentro dos planos está ainda o desenvolvimento de unidades de produção de biodiesel, revelou a Galp, que antecipa, com estes projectos, uma redução da factura das importações energéticas em cerca de 6,6 por cento, resultando em poupanças anuais de 520 milhões de euros. No total, a Galp espera investir cerca de 3300 milhões de euros em Portugal até 2012 e criar 7300 empregos directos e indirectos. Segundo Ferreira de Oliveira, a empresa prevê contribuir para um aumento anual de 0,4 por cento (ou 610 milhões de euros/ano) do crescimento económico português.
0,4%
Segundo Ferreira de Oliveira, os investimentos da Galp vão criar 7300 empregos e contribuir com 0,4 por cento para o PIB."
A corrida ao "ouro negro" não pára, apesar de os sinais de abrandamento da economia mundial serem muito evidentes. De facto, sendo o petróleo um recurso tão versátil, é natural que a procura mantenha um ritmo elevado mesmo com sinais de recessão económica.
Pelo que tenho lido sobre este assunto parece-me que estamos a deixar a era do petróleo barato. A própria OPEP diz que não quer aumentar a produção. A meu ver a OPEP está de mãos e pés atados porque já tem muitas zonas em declínio de produção. Estamos, por isso, a entrar numa fase em que as novas regiões produtivas não conseguem compensar o declínio das regiões antigas. O declínio da produção à escala mundial começará a fazer efeito quando os super-campos petrolíferos começarem a definhar a um ritmo elevado. Nessa altura o preço do crude dispará a um ritmo exponencial e a economia irá, para nosso mal, colapsar. Haverá um milagre?
Segundo o "Público" de hoje:
"Galp tem 1500 milhões para petróleo no Brasil e em Angola
Por Ana Brito
Galp Energia vai investir 3300 milhões de euros
até 2012. A maior fatia vai para Sines, para a refinação
e distribuição
A Galp Energia anunciou ontem que irá investir nos próximos anos 1500 milhões de euros na exploração de petróleo nos blocos que detém no Brasil e em Angola. Um montante que representa quase um terço do volume total dos investimentos que a empresa tem planeados até 2012 (5300 milhões de euros).
No ano passado, a petrolífera portuguesa participou na maior descoberta de petróleo do mundo, no poço Tupi Sul, em águas ultraprofundas da bacia de Santos, Brasil. Neste poço, onde está em consórcio com a brasileira Petrobrás e a britânica BG Group (com 65 e 25 por cento, respectivamente), a Galp tem uma participação de dez por cento, ou o equivalente a 773 milhões de barris. Mas, até ontem, quando apresentou formalmente o plano de investimentos para o período 2008-2012, a petrolífera não tinha ainda divulgado quanto teria disponível para iniciar a exploração deste e de outros blocos.
Estes 1500 milhões de euros que a Galp vai investir nas actividades de exploração e produção destinam-se igualmente a financiar outros projectos em Portugal, Moçambique, Timor-Leste e Venezuela.
O presidente da empresa, Ferreira de Oliveira, afirmou ontem que o objectivo da Galp é satisfazer a longo prazo o consumo nacional de petróleo. "Esperamos, num horizonte não muito longo, atingir os 150 mil barris por dia, mas a nossa ambição é atingir os 300 mil diários, o que corresponde às necessidades do consumo nacional", afirmou Ferreira de Oliveira, citado pela Lusa. A Galp pretende ainda atingir uma produção entre os três e os seis mil milhões de metros cúbicos de gás natural, o que corresponde a entre 45 e 95 por cento do mercado de gás natural em Portugal.
A maior fatia dos investimentos anunciados (65 por cento ou 2600 milhões de euros) tem por destino as actividades de refinação e distribuição, com destaque para os mil milhões de euros que serão utilizados na modernização das refinarias do Porto e de Sines. Dentro dos planos está ainda o desenvolvimento de unidades de produção de biodiesel, revelou a Galp, que antecipa, com estes projectos, uma redução da factura das importações energéticas em cerca de 6,6 por cento, resultando em poupanças anuais de 520 milhões de euros. No total, a Galp espera investir cerca de 3300 milhões de euros em Portugal até 2012 e criar 7300 empregos directos e indirectos. Segundo Ferreira de Oliveira, a empresa prevê contribuir para um aumento anual de 0,4 por cento (ou 610 milhões de euros/ano) do crescimento económico português.
0,4%
Segundo Ferreira de Oliveira, os investimentos da Galp vão criar 7300 empregos e contribuir com 0,4 por cento para o PIB."
A corrida ao "ouro negro" não pára, apesar de os sinais de abrandamento da economia mundial serem muito evidentes. De facto, sendo o petróleo um recurso tão versátil, é natural que a procura mantenha um ritmo elevado mesmo com sinais de recessão económica.
Pelo que tenho lido sobre este assunto parece-me que estamos a deixar a era do petróleo barato. A própria OPEP diz que não quer aumentar a produção. A meu ver a OPEP está de mãos e pés atados porque já tem muitas zonas em declínio de produção. Estamos, por isso, a entrar numa fase em que as novas regiões produtivas não conseguem compensar o declínio das regiões antigas. O declínio da produção à escala mundial começará a fazer efeito quando os super-campos petrolíferos começarem a definhar a um ritmo elevado. Nessa altura o preço do crude dispará a um ritmo exponencial e a economia irá, para nosso mal, colapsar. Haverá um milagre?
segunda-feira, 10 de março de 2008
A crise energética mundial
Uma crónica recente do Jornal "The Independent"
Outside View: We can't cling to crude: we should leave oil before it leaves us
Faith Birol
Sunday, 2 March 2008
We are on the brink of a new energy order. Over the next few decades, our reserves of oil will start to run out and it is imperative that governments in both producing and consuming nations prepare now for that time. We should not cling to crude down to the last drop – we should leave oil before it leaves us. That means new approaches must be found soon.
Even now, we are seeing a shift in the balance of power away from publicly listed international oil companies. In areas such as the North Sea and the Gulf of Mexico, production is in decline. Mergers and acquisitions will allow "big oil" to replenish reserves for a while,and new technologies will let them stretch the lives of existing fields and dip into marginal and hard-to-reach pools. But this will not change the underlying problem. Oil production by public companies is reaching its peak. They will have to find new ways to conduct business.
Increasingly, output levels will be set by a very few countries in the Middle East. This does not necessarily mean an immediate return to the price shocks of the 1970s, because producing countries have learnt that stability is in their interests. Even so, it is not certain that they are ready to increase production to meet growing world demand. Building new capacity takes time.
On the demand side, we see two big transformations. Wherever possible, people have already switched from oil, particularly for industrial use, home heating and electricity generation. In future, oil will mainly be used in the transport sector, where we have no readily available alternatives.
The other transformation is that the bulk of demand growth is coming, and will come in the future, from China and India. Here again, car ownership is the main driver. By 2020, India will be the world's third-largest oil importer, and we expect China will be importing 13 million barrels in 2030, which means another US in the market. In terms of car sales, we estimate that by 2015 at the latest, more cars will be sold in China than in the US.
What will all this mean for the price of petrol? The indications are that if the producers don't bring a lot of oil to the markets, we may see very high prices – perhaps oil at $150 a barrel by 2030. If the governments do not act quickly, the wheels may fall off even sooner.
The developed, oil-consuming countries can do several things to ease the transition to the new energy order. One would be to boost vehicle efficiency. Another would be to make better use of biofuels, although to be helpful, these need to be produced cheaply in developing countries like Brazil, not by heavily subsidised farmers in the developed world.
High prices also make it profitable to produce fuel from unconventional sources such as tar sands. But to do this requires plenty of energy, mostly from natural gas, and the process emits lots of CO2. Tar sands are attractive, but like biofuels, they will never replace Middle East oil.
In the long term, we must come up with an alternative form of transport, possibly electric cars, with the electricity being provided by nuclear power stations. The really important thing is that even though we are not yet running out of oil, we are running out of time.
Dr Fatih Birol is chief economist at the International Energy Agency
O mercado petrolífero mundial não irá decerto aguentar a existência de dois gigantes importadores de petróleo: EUA e China. As reservas não chegam e as companhias não têm meios suficientes para satisfazer necessidades energéticas tão grandes. A ruptura está iminente, a preocupação é grande. Avizinham-se tempos difíceis, porque isto mexe com a base da economia mundial.
Outside View: We can't cling to crude: we should leave oil before it leaves us
Faith Birol
Sunday, 2 March 2008
We are on the brink of a new energy order. Over the next few decades, our reserves of oil will start to run out and it is imperative that governments in both producing and consuming nations prepare now for that time. We should not cling to crude down to the last drop – we should leave oil before it leaves us. That means new approaches must be found soon.
Even now, we are seeing a shift in the balance of power away from publicly listed international oil companies. In areas such as the North Sea and the Gulf of Mexico, production is in decline. Mergers and acquisitions will allow "big oil" to replenish reserves for a while,and new technologies will let them stretch the lives of existing fields and dip into marginal and hard-to-reach pools. But this will not change the underlying problem. Oil production by public companies is reaching its peak. They will have to find new ways to conduct business.
Increasingly, output levels will be set by a very few countries in the Middle East. This does not necessarily mean an immediate return to the price shocks of the 1970s, because producing countries have learnt that stability is in their interests. Even so, it is not certain that they are ready to increase production to meet growing world demand. Building new capacity takes time.
On the demand side, we see two big transformations. Wherever possible, people have already switched from oil, particularly for industrial use, home heating and electricity generation. In future, oil will mainly be used in the transport sector, where we have no readily available alternatives.
The other transformation is that the bulk of demand growth is coming, and will come in the future, from China and India. Here again, car ownership is the main driver. By 2020, India will be the world's third-largest oil importer, and we expect China will be importing 13 million barrels in 2030, which means another US in the market. In terms of car sales, we estimate that by 2015 at the latest, more cars will be sold in China than in the US.
What will all this mean for the price of petrol? The indications are that if the producers don't bring a lot of oil to the markets, we may see very high prices – perhaps oil at $150 a barrel by 2030. If the governments do not act quickly, the wheels may fall off even sooner.
The developed, oil-consuming countries can do several things to ease the transition to the new energy order. One would be to boost vehicle efficiency. Another would be to make better use of biofuels, although to be helpful, these need to be produced cheaply in developing countries like Brazil, not by heavily subsidised farmers in the developed world.
High prices also make it profitable to produce fuel from unconventional sources such as tar sands. But to do this requires plenty of energy, mostly from natural gas, and the process emits lots of CO2. Tar sands are attractive, but like biofuels, they will never replace Middle East oil.
In the long term, we must come up with an alternative form of transport, possibly electric cars, with the electricity being provided by nuclear power stations. The really important thing is that even though we are not yet running out of oil, we are running out of time.
Dr Fatih Birol is chief economist at the International Energy Agency
O mercado petrolífero mundial não irá decerto aguentar a existência de dois gigantes importadores de petróleo: EUA e China. As reservas não chegam e as companhias não têm meios suficientes para satisfazer necessidades energéticas tão grandes. A ruptura está iminente, a preocupação é grande. Avizinham-se tempos difíceis, porque isto mexe com a base da economia mundial.
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