Russia's Arctic Gas

Well , i hadn't the time to comment this on my blogue as i have to prepare examinations on other issues like strength of materials and kinematics for my students !

The fact that Russia will be the power broker in gaz and especially in arctic gaz the next decades certainly must make some " experts " nervous and some bloggers unhappy ;0)
Russia was right to developp Shtokman and Yamal fields and now is becoming self sufficient in off-shore arctic technologies with the near completion of the Prirazlomnaya platform .
Will this gaz be delivered to Europe or elsewhere by pipes or LNG tankers doesn't matters .
Now we also understand why some ( Norwegian ) experts say that " GAZPROM should abandon Shtokman and Yamal " ............
There will always be a " western investor " which will seek to make business with GAZPROM and have access to these fields , even StatoilHydro ASA which is desesperaly seeking new reserves is obliged to cooperate with Gazprom in the arctic .
Mr Aslund should be aware of that .
Of course we speak together of GAZPROM as we know that " Medvedev has given the continental shelf to Putin " ( It's the prime minister admnistration which give licenses for exploration and exploitation on the continental shelf and the criteria - experience in artic gaz exploitation - largely favor GAZPROM )
" Bypassing " Russia is a concept that all think-tanks must also abandon as the world's new energy sources are now in the arctic and especially in the Russian arctic !
And this survey doesn't speak of methane clathrates , the " burning ice " .....
The fact that the new Russian security doctrine warns of possible conflicts in the arctic , especially in the Barents sea, is not a " paranoid view " but an " hyperrealistic view " of the geopolitics of the region .
Nato has developped during Cold Response 09 military drills scenarii of " peace making " in an arctic zone on energy issues .
Russia was right
1- to developp its fleet of nuclear powered icebreakers as it will give it a substantial advance on asserting sovereignity and projecting power in these regions
2- create an arctic military command .

All the " friends of Russia " and " experts " who were saying that NPI were useless and costly will end of talking at last in front of these facts .
How can Canadians , Norwegians , and Americans will go in 2 or 3 m ice pack ? With their " sloche-breakers " like the Canadians say ?

All Russian arctic technology a legacy , and here i will see some faces turn outraged , of the " stalinist era " when Soviet Russia was developping arctic technologies and expeditions and controversial persns like Adm. Kolchak .
As a neutral observer of arctic issues , we must admit that today's Russia mastering of the arctic deserves much to Otto Schmidt , Cherchov , Papanine ..........And this is perhaps why Russians have this mixed approach to Stalin . The actic issue is not the one on this point of view .
For much Russians , the conquest of the arctic means not Gulag but the oddisey of the Chelyuskin and today geological bounties .

Poor old Ariel Cohen and Scott Borgerson : This last news will be hard to swallow for them as the wanted to " challenge Russia " in the arctic !

What a lot of drivel.

Right NOW Russia has more gas than it knows what to do with. Can't sell it, and Gazprom has whacked its dividend by 90%.

The very idea that gas is somehow going to float Russia's economy could only be conceived by the same idiotic propagandists who crushed the USSR.

So sad, so very sad.

Phoby, Phoby, Phoby.

You've got it all wrong! The propaganda line here is that Gazprom has failed to make adequate investments in developing gas fields, thereby placing European energy security at risk! Instead, Gazpom as preferred to spend money on acquiring various companies in Europe and elsewhere. Gazprom must instead make greater investments in gas fields! Oh, and submit unquestioningly to Western dictate like The Great and Powerful Yeltsin did.

Now get with the program!

Now, NG pices are slated to rise in a a bit, since the contract price tracks the pil price with a lag. I wouldn't b too concerned about Gazprom's prospects quite yet.

LaRus and Rkka, I think both of you overlook the biggest problem for Russia: having more gaz makes it less likely that Russia will want to diversify its economy. It will be more likely to go the Saudi Arabia / Arab Emirates way than the China / Japan way. Which would be a pity.

From short- and middle-term perspectives, building on your natural resources is of course great. Later on, however, this creates problems. Up until now, there has been very little real effort from the side of Russia to diversify its economy and go beyond a mere provider of resources for other countries. It is sad that a country with a great human potential as Russia has should go the Saudi Arabia way and just sell gaz in order to buy computers and plasma tvs from Europe, instead of actually building, researching and improving computers and plasma tvs like Japan (and now China) have done.

My native country -- Brazil -- also lived from its resources. First rubber, then coffee -- oh, how happy were Brazilians to get rich on one single product! And how dismayed they were when the market prices went down, creating a catastrophe; or when alternatives were invented (rubber from Asia, artificial rubber, etc.) that destroyed the market!

China is doing it right. There was a scare not so long ago about all those Chinese toys with poisonous substances in them; but the real lesson behind it is: how come China had cheap plastic toys being sold all over the world (and was getting money from it), and Russia hasn't?

Don't get me wrong -- I have a lot of problems with the authoritarian kind of government that China has. But as far as economics go, comparing these two clearly resource-rich countries, Russia and China, it's easy to see that China is going the right way and Russia is not.

I hope Russia will change that. It still has time, but not infinitely much.

It takes decades to go from economic collapse to a diversified economy. They don't spring out like Athena, fully armed, from the head of Zeus. Russia has had from 1998 to 2009. Russia has been investing in agriculture, and is already a major grain exporter. To the consternation of American and European meat exporters, Russia is also rebuilding her livestock herds, fully half-slaughtered during the 1990s, and is investing in food processing for the internal market.

And in line with the diversification strategy but to the further consternation of noisy Westerners, Russia is not investing to increase oil and natural gas production. Russian energy strategy seems to be to hold production at a more or less sustainable plateau, instead of quickly sucking their resource dry, like the Brits did with the North Sea oil fields. Silly Brits, going from peak oil exports (at $10/barrel) to net oil imports (at $30-40/barrel and soon to go much higher) in 2004. It is that steady, sustainable revenue stream from energy that will over time fund the diversification of the Russian economy.

The West, of course, really wants Russia to do like the Brits did. Hence all the noise on this blog and elsewhere about Gazprom failing to invest enough to grow their production, to meet the falling demand of people who babble endlessly about Russian dominance of their energy imports.