EIA Weekly Petroleum Report -- November 20, 2019

Updates

Later, 10:01 p.m. CT: a reader sheds a bit of light on the "increase" in storage -- see first comment --

There was a net withdrawal of crude from storage...did anyone report that?
The 85,000 barrel per day net withdrawal from our total crude inventories was due to a withdrawal of 282,000 barrels per day from our Strategic Petroleum Reserve, which was only partially offset by a 197,000 barrel per day addition to our commercially available stocks of crude oil. 

Original Post

Link here.

• US crude oil in storage: increased by 1.4 million bbls
• US crude oil in storage: at 450.4 million bbls is about 3% above the five-year average which continues to increase (the 5-year average continues to increase)
• WTI up slightly on the news; still below $57/bbls
• crude oil imports are averaging 18% less than same four-week period a year ago
• would be lower except that California legislators prefer Saudi crude to their own crude -- let's tak about the CO2 emissions from very large crude carriers -- LOL -- but at least we're getting a handle on those plastic straws
• refineries are operating at 89.5% of their capacity; gradually increasing over the past six weeks, but still historically very, very low

Re-balancing (note: some weeks are hidden to make the spreadsheet manageable):

Week	Week Ending	Change	Million Bbls Storage
Week 0	November 21, 2018	4.9	446.9
Week 1	November 28, 2018	3.6	450.5
Week 2	December 6, 2018	-7.3	443.2
Week 3	December 12, 2018	-1.2	442.0
Week 4	December 19, 2018	-0.5	441.5
Week 5	December 28, 2018	0.0	441.4
Week 43	September 18, 2019	1.1	417.1
Week 44	September 26, 2019	2.4	419.5
Week 45	October 2, 2019	3.1	422.6
Week 46	October 9, 2019	2.9	425.6
Week 47	October 17, 2019	9.3	434.9
Week 48	October 23, 2019	-1.7	433.2
Week 49	October 30, 2019	5.7	438.9
Week 50	November 6, 2019	7.9	446.8
Week 51	November 14, 2019	2.2	449.0
Week 52	November 20, 2019	1.4	450.4

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The Viking Age: Heathendom

From The Vikings: A History, Robert Ferguson, c. 2009, pages 47 - 48:

On the question of why raiding on northern Britain began in 793, and not fifty years earlier or forty years later, Norwegian historians and archaeologists have been increasingly attracted in recent years to an idea that looks outside Scandinavia for an explanation and takes into account the political tensions in northern Europe at the close of the eighth century.

The three major political powers in the world at that time were the Byzantine empire in the east, which had survived the break-up of the Roman empire and its disappearance in the west; the Muslims, whose expansion during the years 660 to 830 under the Umayyad and Abbasid caliphates had taken them eastward as far as Turkistan and Asia Minor to create an Islamic barrier between the northern and southern hemispheres; and the Franks, who had established themselves as the dominant tribe among the successor states after the fall of the Roman empire in the west.

The Byzantine empire, with its capital Constantinople, was remote from the Sandinavian lands and would be more or less able to dictate the terms of its encounters with the Viking phenomenon.

The Islamic expansion into Europe via the Iberian peninsula in the first half of the eighth century pushed European trade routes northwards, a developement which increased trading opportunities for the Scandinavian lands and also created ideal conditions for piracy in the North Sea area.

Of tth three major powers it was the Franks who would be most profoundly involved with the Vikings.

It was entirely coincidental to have picked up the history of Constantinople at the very time I picked up the history of the Vikings. Wow. I can't wait to talk to Arianna about this, but my hunch: she already knows. LOL.

And, although it's a stretch, if one connects enough dots, one will end up here:

Denis, Blondie