The Panhandle Import Reduction Initiative (PIRI) Calls for New White House Policy: Unfair Trade Endangers U.S. Oil Industry Too

The full press release is here-> http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20170518005304/en/Panhandle-Import-Reduction-Initiative-PIRI-Calls-White

May 18, 2017 06:00 AM Mountain Daylight Time 

AMARILLO, Texas–(BUSINESS WIRE)–In a letter directed to the President of the United States and received by the White House, the founders of (PIRI), the Panhandle Import Reduction Initiative representing thousands of independent small producers of oil in the Southwest United States wrote, “We call upon President Donald J. Trump for a second Presidential Memorandum to order the Secretary of Commerce, to establish the crude oil industry as a “Core” industry to be added to steel, aluminum, vehicles, aircraft, shipbuilding and semiconductors. Crude oil should be recognized as one of the critical elements of US manufacturing and defense industrial bases, which we must defend against unfair trade practices and other abuses.”

“We call upon President Donald J. Trump for a second Presidential Memorandum to order the Secretary of Commerce, to establish the crude oil industry as a “Core”

The PIRI founders further stated in the letter “Following the Presidential Memorandum on the case for steel against Chinese export practices that you signed, PIRI further calls for an immediate Investigation by the Department of Commerce of Saudi Arabia and OPEC abuse between August 2014 and March 2016 of the American oil industry by expanding production to lower world oil prices to destabilize and cause hardships to American producers mainly of light tight oil (shale oil). This was an announced effort to undermine and shut-down producers with higher costs of production. According to one estimate some 150 US companies filed bankruptcy and $150 billion in capital outlay postponed or cancelled. More than 300,000 US industry-related jobs were lost.”

Dr. Daniel Fine: OPEC oil and ours, who wins? Daily Times 10/29/16

The full article is here->  http://www.daily-times.com/story/opinion/columnists/2016/10/29/fine-opec-oil-and-ours-who-wins/92440428/

This is an excerpt of the article ”

Has the oil price and market share war ended with a Saudi Arabian win?  Or, as some fund managers and speculators argue, has Midland won? We are now in a trading range high of $50 per barrel for West Texas Intermediate.

Looking back two years, Wall Street, the oil and gas industry and its trade associations got it all wrong. I was a minority of one in New Mexico with my OPEC analysis of a low of $23 to $28 per barrel which was realized earlier this year.  Once again there is triumphalism and  hubris about winning the war against OPEC.

What is it all about?  If OPEC agrees to freeze production at August output that would put OPEC between 32.5 and 33 million barrels per day. In 2013,  OPEC was below 30 million.   If they “freeze” it will be at 2.5 million more than early 2014 while our production had dropped almost 1.5 million.

In other words,  OPEC oil expanded its market share and more significantly has displaced our oil here at home in the American market by nearly one million barrels per barrel.  This is a double win for OPEC and Saudi Arabia:  more of their oil imported into our market and fewer barrels of our oil produced, which is the loss of rigs and jobs and a painful downturn.

The Permian Basin and its Delaware Basin extension into New Mexico has become the new North Slope  Alaska of the 1970s.  It is there that drilling rigs and well completions will be re-activated next year.  The “breakeven” price is lower because of  geology and cost-cutting service contracts.   The downturn contracts, however, will expire and non-Haliburton contractors will ask for more.   Margins will tighten as costs increase.   But North Dakota has leveled off and Eagle Ford is not the Permian.”

Oil leaders: OPEC threatening U.S. economy and New Mexico’s lifeblood; Nation has lost 400,000 oil and gas jobs in past two years

The full article is here-> http://rdrnews.com/wordpress/blog/2016/10/08/oil-leaders-opec-threatening-u-s-economy-and-new-mexicos-lifeblood-nation-has-lost-400000-oil-and-gas-jobs-in-past-two-years/

Dan Fine, an oil economist with the New Mexico Center for Energy Policy, speaks at a conference in Carlsbad recently about how foreign oil imports are hurting the American oil industry. Fine said OPEC has flooded the U.S. market with foreign oil since 2014 in an intentional effort to put U.S. producers out of business, while Saudi Arabian-backed companies are trying to buy American companies in an effort to control the flow of oil within U.S. borders. (Hobbs News-Sun Photo)

CARLSBAD — Oil experts say America is under attack by Saudi Arabia and OPEC, but instead of bombs, the OPEC oil cartel is dropping millions of barrels of oil on the U.S. economy in a clear effort to undermine the nation’s oil producers and kill any chance of American energy independence.
The first to feel the flood of foreign oil into the U.S. are the independent oil producers, whose stripper wells in Texas alone account for 20 percent of the nation’s oil and gas production, said Judy Stark, executive vice president of the The Panhandle Producers & Royalty Owners Association.
Stark was one of the half dozen speakers at an event of 25 people Sept. 27 in Carlsbad where the Panhandle Import Reduction Initiative, a group of independents seeking import quotas on foreign oil, met to announce their “white paper” that will be presented to the next president.
“We know OPEC has toyed with our market for many years but what I see coming now is a threat, without a doubt, to our national security,” Stark said. “The Middle East wants control of the U.S. market. When they came out and decided to flood the market with oil and drive U.S. producers out of business, their whole point was to take back their lost market share — our production. They are telling us is they are not going to let us produce our own natural resources. Guess what? They have done a pretty good job.”
The Sept. 27 Carlsbad meeting was a first battle cry that Dan Fine, a co-founder of the initiative and oil economist with the New Mexico Center for Energy Policy, said won’t be taken up by the nation for two years — when the rest of the country wakes up and finds it is too late to stop OPEC from controlling America’s energy industry.
“We are pioneers,” Fine said. “My point is, we are sitting here today 18 months to two years ahead of everyone. Sometime in early 2018, the country will discover what we are having a discussion about here today.”

What’s at stake?

What’s at stake is some 276 billion barrels of oil reserves now estimated to exist in the United States.
According to Fine, that number surpasses what Saudi Arabia has and they are terrified. Fine quoted Harold Hamm, CEO of Continental Resources, concerning the shale oil discoveries made in the United States.
“The United States has increased oil production by an enormous 65 percent over the past five years,” Fine said, quoting Hamm’s statement. “We can and should use our nearly unlimited oil and gas supplies to drive a stake through the heart of OPEC forever.”

Oil producers want U.S. to restrict imports

By Kevin Robinson-Avila / ABQ Journal Staff Writer

The full story is here-> http://www.abqjournal.com/803674/oil-producers-want-u-s-to-restrict-imports.html

“ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — New Mexico and West Texas oil producers are gearing up for a national effort to draw all major U.S. oil basins into a grassroots movement to restrict crude imports from overseas.

Leaders of the Panhandle Import Reduction Initiative, which launched in April in the Permian Basin, are seeking public meetings and rallies in other oil-producing zones to convert what’s now a regional initiative into a national movement, said Daniel Fine, associate director of the New Mexico Center for Energy Policy, who is working with local producers.

Those efforts will kick off in September with a presentation at the fourth Southeastern New Mexico Energy Summit in Carlsbad. After that, initiative leaders expect to hold public meetings in other shale oil basins, including the Bakken in Montana and the Dakotas and the Eagle Ford in South Texas.

“We’ll take it to Carlsbad first, and then it goes national,” Fine said. “We want to organize public rallies with producers and field workers whose jobs are at stake. This is a grassroots effort in the basins where the oil bust has taken place.”

The initiative is a reaction to the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries’ aggressive oil-pumping policies since mid-2014, which have helped drive global oil prices to ten-year lows and thrust domestic U.S. production into crisis. Initiative leaders say those policies were a deliberate effort by the mid-Eastern members of OPEC, particularly Saudi Arabia, to drive U.S. producers out of business.

Banning crude imports from overseas would undercut OPEC’s ability to manipulate prices, they say, and allow U.S. producers to ramp up domestic production to supply the U.S. market.”

TV BROADCAST:OIL IMPORT QUOTAS RALLY

Published on Jun 21, 2016

“FARMINGTON – A group of oil and gas executives and energy policy experts from the Texas Panhandle and New Mexico’s piece of the Permian Basin are pushing a plan to restrict seafaring imports of foreign oil from coming into the U.S. in order to stabilize the oil and gas industry and bring back lost oilfield jobs.

The group’s plan, which would exempt crude oil imported from Mexico and Canada, is an effort to push back against the price wars the group said are being waged by OPEC, or the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries, led by Saudi Arabia.

Members met at the School of Energy at San Juan College Tuesday to promote the “Panhandle Import Reduction Initiative,” which they say could be implemented in multiple phases within 90 days of the next administration, with the ultimate goal of reducing heavy crude oil imports to about 10 percent of demand.” SEE VIDEO-> OIL IMPORT QUOTA RALLY: TV BROADCAST

Energy group hopes to reduce foreign oil imports

by James Fenton

The full article is at–> http://www.daily-times.com/story/money/industries/oil-gas/2016/06/14/energy-group-hopes-reduce-foreign-oil-imports/85855044/

“FARMINGTON – A group of oil and gas executives and energy policy experts from the Texas Panhandle and New Mexico’s piece of the Permian Basin are pushing a plan to restrict seafaring imports of foreign oil from coming into the U.S. in order to stabilize the oil and gas industry and bring back lost oilfield jobs.

The group’s plan, which would exempt crude oil imported from Mexico and Canada, is an effort to push back against the price wars the group said are being waged by OPEC, or the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries, led by Saudi Arabia.

Members met at the School of Energy at San Juan College Tuesday to promote  the “Panhandle Import Reduction Initiative,” which they say could be implemented in multiple phases within 90 days of the next administration, with the ultimate goal of reducing heavy crude oil imports to about 10 percent of demand.

Launched in November, the initiative aims to cut foreign oil imports enough to activate more domestic drilling rigs and boost domestic production to meet current demand levels within four years.

Former state legislator and Four Corners Economic Development Chief Operating Officer Tom Taylor said the drop in natural gas prices eight years ago and the fall of crude oil in 2014, has delivered prolonged pain to the regional economy.

Buy PhotoFour Corners Economic Development interim Chief Operating Officer Tom Taylor speaks on Tuesday at San Juan College School of Energy in Farmington. Taylor and others are promoting quotas on oil imports as a way to stabilize the domestic oil and gas industry. (Photo: Jon Austria/The Daily Times)

“We find ourselves … in a situation now where we’re down about 6,000 jobs, most of those in the oil and gas industry,” Taylor said of the San Juan Basin. “We have about 11,000 people who have left (San Juan County) … So while we’re down 6,000 jobs and down 11,000 people, we’ve built seven fast-food restaurants, three more under construction, and two big box stores. It’s a different world out there.

“But the fact of the matter is that the economic base of the community is in trouble. And not only is the community in trouble, but the state of New Mexico is in trouble, and not only is New Mexico in trouble but our nation and its security. It’s all tied together. It’s a very difficult situation we find ourselves in when we have one country that can control oil prices. It goes beyond free trade. It’s a problem we need a solution to. We are at the dependence of foreign oil.”

Taylor said about a third of New Mexico’s general fund comes from the oil and gas industry in the form of taxes and fees.”

JOIN THE FIGHT TO GET OIL FIELD JOBS BACK! REDUCE FOREIGN OIL IMPORTS:

 

 

For Immediate Release Farmington, New Mexico
Contact: Dr. Daniel Fine 505-771-1865
Christa Rommé 505-566-3618
THE SAN JUAN BASIN IS JOINING THE FIGHT TO REDUCE FOREIGN OIL IMPORTS TO INCREASE LOCAL PRODUCTION
The Panhandle of West Texas, a center of American oil since early in the 20th century, answers OPEC and Saudi Arabia with a call for a Presidential Proclamation to establish quotas on imports of foreign oil. And they have asked the San Juan Basin to join this call. Presenters from Texas and New Mexico will be leading a local discussion about what measures can be taken to reduce our national dependency on foreign oil. Similar to “buy local” campaigns across the nation encouraging retail consumers to spend their dollars at home, this proclamation would have Americans buy oil produced in America. Demand for US production would then go up, putting recently laid-off workers back in the field. The United States should no longer allow Saudi Arabia and the middle east to manipulate our economy by crippling our ability to produce and use our own natural resources. We have been forced to comply with the consequences of decisions made by a country whose intent was to take over a “market share” that was ours and make it theirs. The results were oil prices plummeting to $26 a barrel.

The “bust” in oil exploration and production has left families, companies, both large and small, with bankruptcy and hundreds of thousands out of work. Since Thanksgiving of 2014, Saudi Arabia has increased its production to lower prices to shut-in unconventional oil in all areas of the US. It is a price war which has suspended the prospect of American energy self-sufficiency.

The Panhandle Import Reduction Initiative for oil import quotas on foreign oil is nothing new. It aims to revive the 1959 quota system of President Eisenhower who acted to sustain a healthy oil industry and middle class communities which it employs for reasons of national security. And it worked for 14 years to keep domestic oil from going out business because of foreign imports.

Import quotas on light tight oil will be 100% — no more imports within the first 60 days of the new American President’s term next year. Light tight oil or oil from shale is an American technology triumph and the pathway to abundance and security against foreign oil supply cut-off threats. Southwest and Dakota oil will be unbound. North American oil will avoid the risk of dependence on the world ocean as the transportation for imports. Oil from shale has so far supported national income savings in the balance of payments of over 500 billion dollars in the last five years.

President Eisenhower’s import quotas limited heavy sour oil to 10-12% of yearly American oil demand — enough to take care of Canada’s current exports to the United States.
The lower the oil price goes and the longer it stays there because of the Saudis flooding the market, the higher it will go and the longer it will stay there when demand gets greater than supply but it could be too late for the US because the US operators and other international companies are not investing in exploration, the oil that we will need in 5 to 10 years is not being discovered and developed today. OPEC cannot supply all the world’s needs. When demand outpaces supply, the price will skyrocket and stay there until the oil operations that are now curtailed can ramp back up. That may take years due to all the layoffs taking place today. All consumers will be hurt by the high prices. That would not happen if we had reasonable prices today to let us keep exploring for and developing new oil reserves for our future needs.

We are at a cross road and its time we take a stand. Imported oil is rapidly increasing and could or will return our country into the same dependency which began in the late 1970s and lasted to 2010; therefore, risking our national security. American investment in major oil projects has been stopped by the price war. So far OPEC and Saudi Arabia are over-producing in world conditions of over-supply to lower prices enough to prevent required replacement of shale reserves. This is the Panhandle Import Reduction Initiative’s answer to Doha and later OPEC in June and beyond:
Import Quotas will start a new cycle.

The presentation, featuring Dr. Daniel Fine with New Mexico Tech and New Mexico State Energy Policy, T. Greg Merrion and other industry experts will take place on Tuesday, June 14th from 11:00am – 12:45pm in the Merrion Room at the School of Energy at San Juan College, 5301 College Boulevard, Farmington. This event is free and open to the public.