Things Moving Quickly; Abqaiq Back In The News -- September 14, 2019

Link here.

WWII mentality:

The UK’s emergency petroleum stocks will more than halve in the event of a no-deal exit from the EU, reducing the buffer of strategic reserves available in the event of severe global supply disruption.

The government would no longer require industry to hold the EU-mandated levels in the event of a hard Brexit, defaulting instead to much lower reserves stipulated by the International Energy Agency, the UK’s energy department said.

The Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy told the Financial Times that EU rules require each member state to hold 61 days’ worth of consumption in reserve, which for the UK is equivalent to 11m tonnes or roughly 85m barrels. Under IEA rules, which are based on net imports, the government said the level of stocks held in reserve would drop to 4.5m tonnes or 35m barrels.

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Mideast On The Brink

Quick, before we get started: which US state is most dependent on Saudi oil? 

Abqaiq back in the news.

We talked about Abqaiq eight years ago:

June 15, 2011: Saudi oil terminal vulnerable to terrorism.

When al-Qaida suicide bombers tried on Feb. 24, 2006, to blow up Saudi Arabia's Abqaiq oil processing facility, arguably the world's most important petroleum hub, it was taken as a sign of strength that internal security had foiled the attack. Secret U.S. State Department cables obtained by WikiLeaks and shared with news organizations show otherwise. Even though 70 percent of Saudi Arabia's oil exports flow through the Abqaiq facility, Saudi security forces were woefully ill-prepared to defend it, investigations into the attack found, according to the cables.

Major export terminal on fire in Saudi Arabia. I'm amazed to hear that folks in the Mideast say this is "no big deal. Things will be back to normal by Monday."

If so, it certainly suggests that a lot of stuff at Abqaiq is absolutely unnecessary or redundant. I would assume that every cog in this machine is part of a very, very complicated enterprise. If "massive" fires are no big deal, it certainly raises a lot of questions about veracity of reports coming out of the Mideast ....

Biggest oil story of the year, and oilprice is not reporting it. Posted: 2:07 p.m. CT, September 14, 2019. [Later, 3:40 p.m. CT, I see oilprice has posted the Saudi terrorism story. The time date stamp had it at 2:30 p.m. CDT but I sure didn't see it at that time. So far, oilprice seems not to have given this story much thought.]