Slowly but surely, the US is diversifying its crude supply sources — lessening its dependence on the “unstable” Middle East! For last two consecutive years, President Bush has been stressing on lessening the dependence for oil on the countries of the Middle East. In his 2005 State of Union address, he strongly took up the case of “US oil addiction” on Middle East countries and the need to lessen it. In his next State of the Union address, January this year, President Bush for the second time in a row targeted the issue of US oil independence — from the Middle East.
US think tanks across the board — from left to right — have also been pleading to lessen the dependence of the country on the Middle East. There seems to be unanimity of views — across the divide on the issue.
Not bad indeed! Only if somehow the US could change its prevailing lifestyle and reduce its consumption, it would be a blessing in disguise, rather than a curse for the overall energy balance. This would also be a boon to the issue of climatic changes — looming very much upon the globe. The US however, seems to be striving — to somehow wriggle out of the Middle Eastern energy stranglehold — not by reducing consumption — rather by diversifying its supply base.
As per recent reports, Africa has surged ahead of the Middle East in 2006, in meeting the crude needs of the world’s largest consumer. In 2006 US crude oil imports from Africa surged ahead of the total imports from the Middle East for the first time in 21 years, government data showed.
As recently as 2001, US imports from the Middle East were ahead of African supplies by more than 10 percent, or 1.3 million barrels a day. This situation has changed for the first time in 2006. Many now believe in the years to come, crude supplies from the African continent would grow over the next years — widening the lead over the Middle Eastern supplies in the coming years.
Crude from Africa in 2006, at 2.23 million barrels a day, was at the highest since 1979 and a 4.8 percent jump from 2005. The 22 percent share — the biggest in 25 years — compares with 21 percent last year and a share of less than 13 percent in 2002.
US crude imports from Angola surged 41 percent in December from a year earlier, capping a 12.5 percent full-year gain to a record average of 513,000 barrels a day.
US crude imports from Algeria jumped 57 percent to 357,000 barrels a day in 2006, the highest volume since 1980.
For the second straight year, crude imports from Chad rose by nearly 30 percent, reaching a high of 95,000 barrels a day in 2006.
However, US imports from Nigeria — Africa’s biggest oil producer — dropped 3.2 percent on the year to 1.043 million barrels a day, the lowest level since 2003 as civil unrest in the oil-producing Delta region disrupted supplies throughout the year.
The volume of US crude imports from the Middle East, at 2.22 million barrels a day, dipped just 20,000 barrels a day on the year but marks the third straight annual decline. The flow of Middle East crude into the United States was at the lowest level since 1998, and the 22 percent share is the slimmest since 1997.
Surging growth from Asia —led by China, where oil demand is expected to grow 6.2 percent this year — is drawing huge volumes of Middle East crude. Major regional producers are targeting more volumes to China and other growing economies of Asia such as India and Pakistan.
“Strong demand growth in Asia is pulling Arabian Gulf crude eastward, and the new supply from Africa is staying in the Atlantic Basin,” said Greg Priddy, global energy analyst at the Eurasia Group in Washington, D.C.
Supplies to the US from other traditional top suppliers Mexico and Venezuela are also going down because of the decline in their output. US crude oil imports from Venezuela hit a 12-year low in 2006 amid increasingly strained political ties between the two countries. Preliminary data from the US Energy Information Administration showed that Venezuela was still the fourth-largest supplier of US crude imports behind Canada, Saudi Arabia and Mexico.
The world’s leading oil consumer imported 1.139 million barrels a day from Venezuela in 2006, down 8.2 percent from 1.241 million the previous year, according to the EIA. That’s the lowest level since 1994, when the United States imported 1.034 million barrels a day.
US officials have said the country must become less dependent on crude from politically unfriendly nations, including Venezuela. President Hugo Chavez has threatened to cut off oil to Venezuela’s No. 1 market, said that prospect does not concern him.
Canada remains the top US crude supplier, a title it has held each year since 2004. In 2006, Canada supplied 1.782 million barrels a day to the United States, the most ever from a single source and a 9.1 percent jump from a year ago.
It is apparent that rather than dampening the demand on fossil fuel, the global gas guzzler has simply diversified the supply base, leaving the overall energy equation unchanged as some in the energy fraternity had been clamoring for.
