A smattering of small foreign firms have signed contracts to pump oil in the country, mostly in the semi-autonomous Kurdish region in the north. But until pipelines stop blowing up and a stable national government is in place, the big western firms like Exxon Mobil (Charts, Fortune 500), BP (Charts), Royal Dutch Shell (Charts) and Chevron (Charts, Fortune 500) – and the big money they could spend on exploration and infrastructure – will stay away.
“You would need a very stable, long-term legal environment” for the big western oil companies to invest the tens of billion of dollars needed to really ramp up production there, said Greg Priddy, a global energy analyst at the Eurasia group, a political risk consultancy. “Everyone sees this as a long-term opportunity, but they have to get the political situation sorted out first.”
Now we know why the Kurds get such an excellent press. As for opportunity, we need to ask, opportunity for who?
It would really be much cheaper to simply buy the oil from whichever Iraqi faction emerges as dominate. That and follow Al Gore’s advice to develop green energy.
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BAGHDAD, Iraq (AFP) – Such enthusiasm was clearly on show at an exhibition earlier this month in which majors such as ConocoPhillips of the United States and Russia’s Lukoil and Gazpromneft were among 40 major participants.
But BP, Exxon and Total were notably absent after initial service contracts that were to be signed in June never came to fruition.
Royal Dutch Shell agreed to a gas joint venture in September estimated to be worth four billion dollars, while China National Petroleum Corp (CNPC) followed in November with a three-billion-dollar deal to develop the Al-Ahdab oil field in Wasit province.
OPEC website
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."