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Comment by mchannon | Hacker News Reader

What is remarkable about the world map in this article is how many petrostates buy our oil: UK and Norway, and the UAE(?!).

I get that there's probably been a fair bit of empty tanker capacity over the past few decades going back the other way, but I wonder what's so special about US oil that merits taking it all the way to the Persian Gulf. Surely our military didn't need that much for its operations in the neighborhood?

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>I get that there's probably been a fair bit of empty tanker capacity over the past few decades going back the other way, but I wonder what's so special about US oil that merits taking it all the way to the Persian Gulf. Surely our military didn't need that much for its operations in the neighborhood?

West Texas Intermediate is the lightest, sweetest crude on earth. Most refineries are built to handle medium density/sulfur, so everyone else has to buy it to mix with theirs.

https://qph.fs.quoracdn.net/main-qimg-1792854eec3801b00a6ba6...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/West_Texas_Intermediate

Fascinating, though the factoid about being the lightest and sweetest appears to be a bit off the mark:

https://rentar.com/best-crude-oil-world-crude-oils-better-ot... (end of the article)

>Fascinating, though the factoid about being the lightest and sweetest appears to be a bit off the mark: https://rentar.com/best-crude-oil-world-crude-oils-better-ot.... (end of the article)

Malaysian Tapis is a small deposit used as a benchmark, but isn't traded globally the way WTI is. As far as usable reserves go, WTI is still the best.

This isn't just crude oil: it's "crude oil and refined petroleum products". Oil refining is something the US has massive capacity for; we can ship oil in, refine it, and ship gasoline etc back out, often cheaper than refining the oil closer to its origin. It helps to remember that shipping on bulk liquids is very inexpensive per ton.

Huh that explains things then. I was wondering why more refining wasn't done locally to reduce shipping costs given that it is preferable to ship lumber instead of timber and ingots instead of ore. I guess tanks would have lower expenses with loading and unloading since it is just a matter of hooking it up and pumping.

Also a matter of expense: a lumber mill is extremely cheap when compared to a refinery. Refinery costs are one of the main reasons crude is shipped unprocessed.

Whereas mines often do process on-site, since for something like gold ore you will be shipping multiple tons per ounce of product, plus then the remainders from the ore become a disposal problem at the processing site.

Same reason silicon foundries aren't necessarily located anywhere near where the raw materials are sourced from.

> ... given that it is preferable to ship lumber instead of timber

There are also regulatory reasons for this one. As I understand it, as a general rule, you cannot legally export raw timbers harvested from federal and state lands in the US. [1] There are also trade problems when wood products come from federal lands because of potential subsidies. (You want to get a Canadian to talk your ear off, just bring up softwood in the context of US trade.) [2]

Raw timbers and cants also have pest concerns that kiln-dried lumber doesn't.

[1] https://www.fs.fed.us/pnw/pubs/pnw_gtr208.pdf [2] https://fas.org/sgp/crs/misc/R42789.pdf

Interesting. Given that I heard about those in third world contexts I thought those raw lumber regulations were intended as a slight slow-down to excessive exploitation - that you have to set up at least a lumber mill and process everything in-situ to at least give a stable direct or peripheral income to inhabitants instead of a locust like clear cut and ship out the wood approach. The previous even if it left them deforested would give enough to live on at least short term.

Lumber mill jobs require some basic numeracy and literacy or trade training as opposed to just "any strong man" and would be a more sustained task. The two together imply that the locals would reap some benefits during the operation through at very least selling services - even if they leave after they work through the forests it would be less likely to cause a humanitarian crisis and/or insurrection.

Even a sociopathic imperialist leader would be annoyed that they have to keep wasting resources cleaning up after timber barons instead of scheming after things of far more value.

The UK's oil production has been falling steadily since the mid-nineties, and consumption has remained relatively flat, so it makes sense that they'd import oil. Petrostate also implies that the nation's wealth stems from oil, which was never the case for the UK.

UK oil production during the last five years has been a quarter of what it was during the 80’s and 90’s.

IIRC oil comes in many different grades, I believe North Sea Oil is a higher grade/more expensive than general US oil (West Texas Intermediate I think it's called), so we export North Sea Oil and then buy cheaper oil for our own needs.

Our military does use an insane amount

Interestingly the US military is investing heavily in solar, if only because it reduces the logistics tail of deployed units and reduces the overall attack surface (less resupply needed, fewer transports to be attacked) [0].

US military use of oil has also fallen compared with a few years ago because of reduced ground combat tempo in Afghanistan / Iraq.

They are still a massive oil user though, so a long way to go.

[0] https://www.energydigital.com/renewable-energy/us-military-w...

I don’t think it’s safe to call the UK a “petrostate”

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