Archives » Friday, December 05, 2008
-
Larry Kaplow
|
Dec 5, 2008 11:28 AM
There was oil in
little jars, gyrating on swiveling chrome and glass shelves along with
kerosene and gasoline. On display were scale models and designs of gas
stations
that could be built in the future and pieces of pipeline skillfully
welded by
Iraqi technicians. And in case anyone missed the point, Iraqi Oil
Minister
Hussein Shahristani today opened the first Iraq Energy Expo and
Conference with
a reminder that Iraq, with 115 billion barrels under the desert,
has 10 percent of the world's oil reserves. "This is a big number but I
submit to you that
it's underestimated," Shahristani told the crowd after his
battering-ram
contingent of guards and aides propelled him to a waiting lectern.
Iraq's oil
industry is battered and antiquated but on the mend, at least according to the
country's petro-boosters. Shahristani lamented how the industry had been "imprisoned
in a 1970 time capsule" during the years of Saddam Hussein and the UN sanctions. It then suffered "near collapse" in the chaos after
the 2003 American invasion – though the Baghdad
complex of the oil ministry was one of the few locations that U.S. troops
protected from looters. Shahristani, a nuclear scientist, was himself jailed by
Saddam and managed to escape to refuge in the Kurdish north and, eventually, in
exile. Now, he said, the Iraqi oil industry is "bootstrapping our way forward."
The country's oil production still hovers around levels it averaged in the five
years before the war started in 2003.
The Expo also required
a bit of "bootstrapping." The three-day event was originally scheduled for
October but was delayed because construction in the convention center was
ongoing. The center, located conveniently for foreign executives inside the
fortified Baghdad
International Airport
complex, was still not quite finished, with ductwork and conduits showing
where hanging ceilings should be. And amid the booths, there was chatter about
the major companies that were absent—Chevron, Royal Dutch Shell and others. They
may not have considered it necessary to set up booths and oil jars to do
business but some took it as a slight against the expo itself.
But the
participants were upbeat and the event did bring together a critical mass of
deal makers. ConocoPhillips was one of the big players that did show. Russia's
LukOil, trying to revive major contracts from the Saddam era, had Moscow-based
execs on hand. The 50-plus booths gave a chance
for American soldiers to browse the brochures of an Iranian transformer
manufacturer. The government-owned Trade Bank of Iraq had an elaborate two-story
pavilion to introduce its credit cards and other services. The booth for the Iranian
PetroPars showed its work on a rig in the Persian Gulf
and boasted "Over 10 years of successful achievements."
As with most
business gatherings in Iraq,
security firms advertised their bodyguard and perimeter protection services.
Some of the representatives on hand said Iraq's security, though improved,
still is not ready for business and noted that they would have had trouble
attending the event had it not been at the airport. Abdellatif Hasni, director
of well services for the Iraqi oil services company OilServ, said it's the time
for risk-takers: "We have to get the oil out."
More
