Brent Crude and Russia (AlFinEnergyBlog)

MONDAY, FEBRUARY 20, 2012

Russian Mischief at Focus of Current Global Price Runup

Clearly, given their growing capability to produce and deliver oil wherever the market dictates, and the tie between the price of oil and price of gas in Russian supply contracts, it is in the clear interest of the Russians to push up the price of Brent crude. Therefore, could it be that the tumult around deliveries of Iranian oil is merely a smokescreen to escalate prices, and that some thing far more nefarious is taking place? _Learsy_HuffPost

Russia is having problems with its own ineptitude and corruption. It is also troubled by the threat of the coming global shale oil & gas boom. Other competitive pressures likely to arise in the near future include massive supplies of unconventional liquid fuels from GTL, CTL, BTL, bitumens, kerogens -- all eventually facilitated by high quality nuclear process heat.

It is clear that Russia had to take matters into its own hands in order to drive up oil prices -- one way or another.

As the NYTimes reported, "The Russian oil industry was already reaping the rewards of higher oil prices from Iranian tensions." The Russians have been cashing in brilliantly while rendering support to Iran by such acts as vetoing or emasculating any and all meaningful U.N. resolutions that would force Iran to comply with the terms of the U.N.'s International Atomic Energy Agency mandates. It is an open question whether this is being done in solidarity with Iran, or more malignly, to solidify Iranian intransigence on matters nuclear, in the hope that the European and other world consumers' boycott of Iranian oil has maximum impact, making Russian oil more sale-able at ever higher prices. _Learsy

READ MORE HERE