How "Talking Heads" See Energy Sector Changing -- For Archival Purposes Only; This Really Is Quite Incredible: China Bigger Oil Importer Than The US

CNBC is reporting:

Without fanfare, China passed the United States in December to become the world's leading importer of oil-the first time in nearly 40 years that the U.S. didn't own that dubious distinction. That same month, North Dakota, Ohio and Pennsylvania together produced 1.5 million barrels of oil a day--more than Iran exported. [Maybe Jane Nielson needs to read this article. Incidentally it looks like Jane gave up; her most recent post is dated July 23, 2012, and it includes Part IV of a five-part series. No Part V was posted at her blog unless I missed it.]

By the way, the photo at the linked article has this caption: "Oil pumpjacks are seen during sunrise in Williston, North Dakota March 14." The pumpjacks probably look the same today. What intrigues me about the photo is that the North Dakota landscape has not changed one bit despite the Bakken boom -- except for two pumps, which are less obvious and less noisy than a pair of wind turbines. Just saying.

Three takeaway points from the linked article:

• energy focus shifting back to the western hemisphere (we've talked about that before)
• consumption focus shifting from Europe to China (we've talked about that before)
• Mideast could become more unstable due to local unrest

What was not mentioned is almost deafening:

• Do a word search for "Germany" and the word shows up once ("... a former Iranian ambassador to Germany .."

• Do a word search for "Russia": the word comes up three times:

1) oil less than $110/Brent barrel will barely meet Russia's budget requirements
2) Russia, as in BRIC (Brazil, Russia, India and China) when examining future of Mexico
3) its near monopoly on natural gas exports to Europe (Gazprom)

Only once does the reference to Russia have anything to do with energy, and it's almost irrelevant.

Two things come immediately to mind. I had forgotten that the "R" stood for Russia. Wow. Even Turkey is not considered a BRIC. Communism set Russia back 100 years and it looks like the country will never recover. But I digress. If Russia is a BRIC it can pretty much be ignored for purposes of this discussion.

So, back to Germany. And that takes us back to article linked earlier: Why Only Obama Can Save Europe, Now, written by the President, MSI Global, at CNBC.

When U.S. President Barack Obama looks at the dangerous euro wasteland that once was a prosperous region driving nearly one-fifth of the world economy, he probably has flashbacks of repeated rebuffs he got from German Chancellor Angela Merkel when, in late 2011, he asked for more economic growth and less austerity.  

Whether more spending and less austerity is/was the answer, the fact is that Germany is in deep trouble. And if Germany is in deep trouble, where does that leave the rest of Europe (perhaps excluding Great Britain)?

Indeed, just four days before the Holy Week came this heartbreaking report from Caritas (one of the world's largest humanitarian organizations): more than 3 million people in Spain currently live in extreme poverty (families with an income of less than $390 per month), and more than one million are barely surviving on charitable donations – an increase of 150 percent from the pre-crisis levels.

One can debate and discuss all the reasons Germany is in trouble, but among them is their attitude toward energy: no fracking, no nuclear, back to coal. At least coal is cheap. The Germans may come roaring back, but in the meantime, Canada and the United States are turning their attention more and more to China.