The world seems to be divided between romanticists, who eagerly embraced the dawning of the new millennium last January, and scientists, who grumpily maintain the actual millennevent occurred only this week. A third group comprises the free-spirited and the superstitious. These folks celebrated both events either because they are the sort who need no excuse to celebrate anything or because they feared something bad might happen if they didn't.
The oil patch is shaping up to enter the new millennium with a boom, but not in the classical sense. The infamous oilman's prayer, "Lord, give me just one more boom, and I promise I won't screw it up this time," may come true, but those erstwhile oil men and women may never get the chance.
In their Pulitzer Prize-nominated book, The Color of Oil: The History, the Money and the Politics of the World's Biggest Business, authors Michael Economides and Ron Oligney close by stating their conviction that the world is not running out of oil or gas. They hold that natural market forces will generate the resources and technology to solve the world's seemingly insatiable thirst for hydrocarbon. But they warn that governments should stay out of the petroleum business.
To that I add an emphatic, "Amen!"
If ever there was a case where less is more, it is where governments are concerned. Past events considered, it is easy to predict that tomorrow's prayer might be, "Lord, give me just one more boom, and I promise I'll try to make the most of it before the government steps in and screws it up for everyone."
Whether it is by imposing onerous taxation or regulation, or by demagoguery, such as the politically motivated release of a pittance from the US Strategic Petroleum Reserve in a futile attempt to control prices, governments not only manage to do the wrong things, they manage to do them in grand scale.
The oil industry has the perfect business model. We are about finding, developing and supplying a vital resource that benefits every human being on the face of the earth. What's wrong with that? Governments should be cheering us on while encouraging the development of enabling technology to improve efficiency, while providing access to land and sea areas for exploration and production, and while funding basic research for sources of sustainable energy to preserve the future.
Will it happen? Not likely. Interestingly, nations with abundant supplies of oil and gas seem to be just as inept at managing affairs as energy-dependent ones. Even Opec, ostensibly organized to bring some semblance of order to the chaos, must constantly cope with cheaters who brazenly establish production quotas they have no intention of observing. Just as guilty are the bullies, who employ unilateral trade sanctions to get their way - most often to address issues having absolutely nothing to do with energy.
But aren't governments supposed to reflect the will of the people? Maybe so, but as Economides and Oligney point out, it is astounding how energy-illiterate people are. Nevertheless, if the recent popular uprisings in France and the United Kingdom are any indication, people are starting to get fed up with government actions that deny them access to reasonably priced energy. The sleeping giant is about to awaken. People are realizing that it's not the so-called Big Oil that is their adversary, it is their own governments.
The trouble with giants is that they have a tendency to thrash about. The giant is stirring. If he awakes, pray for us.