I think I raised this topic about a year ago and was chased off as one of those scaremongerers. My observation is that opinion is probably changing.
But so is mine.
A lot of the price escalation now is to do with traders artificially pushing up the price. I mean really, pushing it up $4 a barrel over North Korea? Come on. Pull the other one. It is very much in OPEC's favour to talk up all these crisis - and Bush actually plays along. That I don't get.
If you don't think there is some huge profiteering going on at the moment you would be very nieve. Each little rise is usually the traders testing the resistance level.
I have little doubt that Peak Oil is a reality, and in fact there a lot of positives out of it - but not for the airline industry, and not in it's current cut throat guise. Have airfares ever been so cheap? Isn't that an obvious solution? How much travel is purely arbitrary? Quite a bit if websites like wotif are any indication.
Just 2 weeks ago the Chairman of BP was suggesting realisitc oil prices at the moment are around $40-45 USD a barrel. Now whay would a compnay that stands to lose profits from a drop in the oil price say things like that? To reign in the traders perhaps? And stop the development of alternative energy sources like Ethanol too quickly becoming a viable competitor?
The obscenity of it all, is that with the introduction of good quality alternative energy sources like Ethanol, Australia could probably be energy self sufficient with it's oil and gas reserves for about 100 years, and not have to compete in this global energy market where the US which accounts for 5% of the worlds population uses 25% of the worlds oil. I mean, the yanks actually burn the stuff to produce electricity! And each year here in Australia, our local fuel price goes up because of the "US Driving Season", and the "US Gulf Hurricane Season"!? Please....! Some fat arsed US Redneck wants to pack their family in to a 5.0l Chevy 4WD and visit all the drive thru Taco Bells and Burger Kings on a road trip from Toothpick, Arkansas to TrailerTown, Lousiana to and we take a 10c a litre hit in Australia? Bush got one thing right in his state of the union address - "The US is addicted to Foreign Oil".
And Australia is paying for it.
One thing I don't get with Greggs little piece - where are these Gulf State A380's all going to fill up when they get to the end of their sector? Is he suggesting that the other countries are going to charge the same price to an oil-subsidised carrier when it lands in LAX , LHR or SYD for this precious resource? I don't think so. Makes a mockery of the global market doesn't it?
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EDIT: Edited due arithmetic embarrassment (kudos to NFR )
Last edited by Shitsu_Tonka; 8th Jul 2006 at 10:11.