Iran leader hails rising oil prices as ‘very good’

[Clarkie1]

Updated: 9:39 a.m. ET April 21, 2006
TEHRAN, Iran - Iran’s president said on Friday the rise in oil price was “very good,” Iran’s Mehr News Agency reported, emphasizing the hawkish position of the world’s fourth largest oil exporter as crude prices have hit record levels.

“The increase of the oil price and growth of oil income is very good and we hope that the oil prices reach their real levels,” Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said as he toured an oil exhibition in Tehran, the agency reported.

He did not say what those real levels should be. But these and other earlier remarks suggest he believes crude prices should rise above this week’s record high of over $74 a barrel. On Friday, European Brent crude fell below $73.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/12417998/

[shain from kane]

1. Oil been very good to me. n/t

[skooooo]

2. free market capitalism!

Americans should have no problem with this, right?

[SlipperySlope]

4. Personally, I don't have a problem.

Let the markets decide the price of Oil.

Better then letting the warmongers sent troops everywhere to hold Oil down.

Besides, higher oil prices help Hugo Chavez, and he is THE MAN!




:toast: :toast: :toast: :toast:

[Zynx]

8. The right-wingers don't want to drill more oil.

They want CONTROL over oil supplies, not more of it. Their intention is not to keep oil prices down but rather to control supplies to keep them up.

[Tight_rope]

9. Well whatever the fuck they are trying to do "AIN'T" working...

They should stop thinking because it's killing us.

[Zynx]

10. They want higher prices. It's working from their perspective.

[sam sarrha]

3. there is more than one way to kick your enemy in the balls...

[Coastie for Truth]

5. It's good for "coal country"

---like West Virginia and the Monongahela Valley and I-70 corridors in Pennsylvania, and across Ohio and Indiana and Illinois on I-70, and down through West Virginia and Kentucky on I-79.

Why.

Because "Fischer-Tropsch Gasoline" is now cheaper then gasoline from crude oil. Link to article in Wikipedia -

Don't knock Fischer-Tropsch gasoline from domestic coal -- I worked in a Fischer-Tropsch lab and pilot plant when I was in college. The only real problem with Fischer-Tropsch was that OPEC could cut the cartelized price of crude and thereby kill Fischer-Tropsch.

[Ghost Dog]

13. Yes. Interesting Reuters article on this today

right here: http://today.reuters.co.uk/news/newsArticle.aspx?type=reutersEdge&storyID=2006-04-21T090655Z_01_NOA132477_RTRUKOC_0_ANALYSIS-LIQUID-COAL.xml

...Industrial giant China is leading the way and others may follow since oil has hit records above $70 on strained supplies that may last around 40 years, whereas the world may have ample coal for a couple of hundred years if it can be converted to clean fuels cheaply enough.

"In the light of very high oil prices and slowing coal prices, coal-to-liquids technologies are becoming a burning issue in developing Asia and the United States," said Alexandre Kervinio of SG Commodities.

China's largest coal producer Shenhua Group Corp. and South Africa's Sasol say their coal-to-liquids technology is worthwhile if oil stays above $30 or $35 a barrel, half its current price. New York oil futures for December 2012 delivery are above $66.

High oil prices have also made clean renewable energies such as wind competitive, but these cannot deliver liquid fuel to power cars. Biofuels are booming but are likely to remain limited in volume, and a wide network of hydrogen gas filling stations for fuel cell vehicles is not considered viable before 2020.

However, other technologies such as coal gasification and gas-to-liquids (GTL) are currently cheaper than coal liquefaction and so firms worried about a downturn in oil prices and seeking the best investment returns may opt for those instead.

<snip>

The United States is building a fleet of new coal power plants to use the world's largest reserves, but only a fraction will gasify coal and have the ability to capture emissions of greenhouse gases, blamed for global warming.

However, the U.S. government is hoping to wean itself off Middle East oil dependency and is providing tax and loan incentives. This has spurred five projects expected to be onstream by 2010, said SG Commodities.

"Converting just 5 percent of the U.S. coal reserves to Fisher-Tropsch fuels would equate to the existing U.S. crude reserves of 29 billion barrels," said a spokesman for Canadian company Syntroleum, refering to liquefaction technology.

/more...

[Coastie for Truth]

15. To think

my first job was in Fischer-Tropsch at Bruceton Lab, worked p/t while in college on Fischer-Tropsch, then turned down a well paying assistantship in Fischer Tropsch at West Virginia Univ - cause "I didn't want to go anywhere that would offer me THAT MUCH MONEY."

[greenman3610]

6. the only language Joe Sixpack understands

[Voltaire99]

16. A fool and his full SUV tank are swiftly parted.

The sooner SUV Merka learns to drive reasonably-sized cars, the better.

[Benhurst]

7. As a farm-owner, I like it when corn and soy bean prices go up,

so I'm hardly shocked by this from an oil producer.

Jimmy Carter tried to get us to address the problem of our dependence on foreign oil and was vilified for doing so.

Wake up, America.

And selling a limited natural resource for whatever price it can command is one thing. The gouging of consumers by the big oil companies is another.

[sarcasmo]

11. This is the only thing that may stop WWIII.

If oil goes over $4.00 a gallon this summer there is no way the Decider can invade Iran.

[jseankil]

12. $100 billion should be annually allocated for alternative energy sources

fund the project in the name of national security. Take it from the defense budget, it's the best defense project that this nation can undertake.

[anakie]

14. won't the price of oil rise even more when sanctions are

imposed on Iran - or will oil be exempt. Maybe the Iranians plan to keep and sell their oil at top price while they develop a nuclear energy industry. Sort of like a dealer with a major addict and only a limited supply of heroin.

[moondust]

17. "Bush agrees but declines comment."

:smirk:

[depakid]

18. Nothing new here at all

Even the old Shah of Iran was a proponent of extremely high oil prices. It took the wiley Sheik Yamani to convince OPEC that it was in their interest to reign in prices, lest the West to conserve and convert to alternative energy sources.

Now of course- that's no longer a concern. The US is hopelessly addicted- and the Republicans will ensure that responsible measures are NEVER taken to encourage conservation or jump start conversion.

Best of all possible worlds for Iran and Saudi Arabia.