Search Results

This chapter examines the property rights over petroleum in situ between the federal, state, and local governments in a federation. It also discusses the legal character of the various property rights given to companies for exploration and development under the various petroleum licences and leases, production-sharing contracts, pure service contracts, joint ventures, and other petroleum arrangements, as well as the rights of communities where petroleum exploration and production activities are carried out. The chapter focuses particularly on developing countries, although, where necessary and relevant, comparisons are made with more developed economies.

Since the early 1970s, state ownership has been an important element in the management of petroleum resources on the Norwegian Continental Shelf (NCS). In recent years however, important developments have taken place, both as regards the organization and the management of state ownership. This chapter analyses these developments. Section I makes a basic distinction between state ownership of subsea petroleum deposits and state ownership of licence interests. Section II discusses state ownership of the subsea petroleum deposits. Section III discusses how the state manages its ownership in the petroleum activities, i.e. exploration, production, transport, and eventually, abandonment. Section IV further analyses how the state manages its licence interests through the state company Petoro; Section V concludes.

This chapter analyses the scope and limitations of the principle of national property over natural resources of the subsoil established by Art 27 of the Mexican Constitution. It discusses the difference between state and national property from a comparative perspective. In addition, it describes the evolution of the constitutional and legal framework regarding the role private investment has played in the public monopoly of oil exploration and exploitation. From this analysis, the chapter proposes the adoption of a new approach to make effective the principle of national sovereignty over oil resources without excluding the possibility of private investment participating in oil exploration and exploitation.

This chapter challenges a key assumption underpinning classic oil war claims. It argues that, although oil war believers correctly observe that petroleum is extremely valuable, they make a mistake in jumping to the conclusion that fighting for oil pays. It also describes four sets of impediments to seizing and exploiting foreign oil resources, all of which reduce the petroleum payoffs of classic oil wars: invasion, occupation, international, and investment obstacles. The chapter analyzes the intensity of each of the four obstacles that varies temporally and geographically. It discusses the petroleum payoffs of international aggression that are far lower than classic oil war believers have assumed even under favorable conditions. It also points out how states are likely to avoid fighting for petroleum resources.

This chapter begins by tracing oil's development from a largely invisible, worthless material into a vital natural resource. It discusses oil's contemporary military and economic significance for petroleum-exporting and petroleum-importing states. It also cites existing international relations debate about the value of conquest, showing how oil's exceptional utility has led most theorists to assume that the resource is worth fighting for. The chapter talks about oil war skeptics that have questioned claims on the significance of oil and yet have failed to dislodge classic oil war beliefs. It introduces the idea of the oil wars myth as a powerful story told about countries' willingness to fight over petroleum resources.

This chapter examines over six hundred militarized interstate disputes (MIDs) in order to determine whether oil ambitions motivate militarized conflict. It provides evidence of classic oil wars, in which severe militarized interstate conflicts are driven largely by participants' desire to obtain petroleum resources. It also points out how MIDs in oil-endowed territories were either very minor or motivated by other issues. The chapter introduces four new categories of conflict: oil spats, red herrings, oil campaigns, and oil gambits. It explains that oil spats are minor confrontations driven by petroleum ambitions, such as China and Vietnam's 2014 confrontation over a drilling rig in the South China Sea. It also describes red herrings, which are not fought for oil, but instead, aggressors are motivated predominantly by aspirations to political independence or regional hegemony.

The concept of eminent domain is defined more as an emanation of public powers than as an outright property right, referring thus to the authority of the Sovereign to legislate and to set forth rules applicable to the private parties. The two main issues that appear constantly in this sector are: (i) the Sovereign rights and authority over underground natural resources (eminent domain) versus the acquired rights (and thus, property rights) by holders of title to exploit such resources (with respect to reserves, as well as to the hydrocarbons produced); and (ii) the limits to regulatory powers, especially facing what is now being invoked as a state of necessity, whether as an exception to international law standards' enforcement or as a modification of the latter. The nature of the eminent domain is affirmed in Argentina's Hydrocarbons Law and in its Constitution, which refers to it as dominio originario in the new section 124. This chapter analyses the past, present and future of Argentine regulations in the light of the dialectic interplay between state intervention policies and private business initiative. It also describes the new scenarios resulting from these changes.

This chapter summarizes findings that challenge the oil wars myth by revealing how states are extremely reluctant to fight for petroleum resources. It explains how oil ambitions may inspire mild international sparring and occasionally affect the trajectories of wars that are already under way. It also discusses the minimal security threat posed by current and future oil competition. The chapter addresses the reasons petroleum has not been subject to the same imperialist logic that governed states' engagement with other natural resources. It also talks about the implications for other types of oil-related contention and US foreign policy, as well as the dangers of allowing myths to drive analysis and decision making.

At the start of the 1930s California oil producers and state government leaders explored national limits on imports as a way to solve the oil market problem but they were turned away by the Hoover administration. Although the major oil companies claimed that the Sharkey oil commission would bring “financial security,” some independent operators complained about the “great hardship” that the Sharkey bill would impose. The core leadership of the Oil Producers Sales Agency strongly backed the Sharkey bill when it came up on a ballot referendum in May 1932. The defeat of the Sharkey bill left a regulatory vacuum that oil industry leaders lamented as they criticized the narrow-mindedness of California voters. Oil operators sought to eliminate destructive competition by ordering and controlling the oil market to their advantage. Public and private regulation of the market prevented competitive overproduction by thoroughly squandering California's petroleum resources and from lowering oil prices to levels that would cause widespread well closures.

This chapter evaluates the unique historical oil gambit, focusing on Iraq's invasion of Kuwait in 1990. It recounts how Saddam Hussein initiated a severe conflict that aimed to seize Kuwait's petroleum resources. It justifies why labeling Iraq's invasion a classic oil war as an oversimplification. Although Saddam aspired to control Kuwait's oil, his broader goal was to resist a perceived existential threat emanating from the United States. The chapter emphasizes how Saddam believed that the US government was inciting Persian Gulf oil producers to drive down international oil prices in order to achieve its long-standing ambitions of preventing Iraq's regional rise and removing him from power.

This chapter investigates two prominent red herrings: the Chaco War from 1932 to 1935 and the Iran–Iraq War from 1980 to 1988. It explains that the two red herring conflicts were widely assumed to have been oil driven. It also mentions Bolivia and Paraguay that purportedly fought over the Chaco Boreal's prospective petroleum endowments, as well as Iraqi president Saddam Hussein who supposedly invaded Iran in order to seize its oil-rich Khuzestan Province. The chapter points out that in the Chaco War, Bolivia and Paraguay knew that the contested territory did not contain oil resources, while in the Iran–Iraq War, Saddam's territorial ambitions were limited to small areas along the states' bilateral boundary. It emphasizes how the Chaco War and Iran–Iraq War were not fought to grab petroleum resources.

Two problems have recently plagued South Africa: insufficient energy supply and water scarcity. Hydraulic fracturing for extracting shale gas forms the backdrop to the consideration of law making and governance patterns to meet challenges of integrating new technologies into the energy landscape. The chapter highlights the climate change imperative that necessitates law making for the integration of ‘new’ technologies into the sector, and the law’s role in their governance. It considers reasons for, and potential success of, hydraulic fracturing as a method of gas extraction, alongside the environmental concerns feeding off the water scarcity problem. Further cultural and contextual concerns with hydraulic fracturing in South Africa are also considered. Law and policy making has failed to address concerns that would speak against introducing this technology. The chapter critiques the Government’s choice of addressing weaknesses in the law by introducing secondary legislation rather than involving a parliamentary process for considering amendments.

It is common, if problematic, to refer to the Norwegian model of resource management as a blueprint for developing countries that wish to avoid the Paradox of Plenty. This introductory chapter lays out an argument for why the Norwegian model might provide useful lessons for others. In doing so, it has three objectives. First, it surveys the political territory where the world’s future petroleum resources are found. Most of these reserves lie under non-democratic and economically underdeveloped countries. Second, it introduces the sundry challenges facing petroleum-rich states: they often suffer from a Resource Curse. The chapter then pivots to show how Norway has avoided the Paradox of Plenty, and provides a brief overview of Norway’s relevant institutions and policies (as an outline for the chapters that follow).