Your humble scribe was surprised to see this report in his interwebnetpipes this morning:
BEIJING, Sep. 6, 2010 (Xinhua News Agency) -- Ecuador finance minister Patricio Rivera has said the country would sell 360,000 barrels/day of crude oil to PetroChina (601857.SH; PTR.NYSE) in the next four years, according to a Dow Jones Newswires report.
The South American country's finance minister was quoted as saying that the crude oil will be sold at market prices. CONTINUES HERE
Why so? Time for the funmath!
1) According to home gov't and EIA figures (which unlike Venezuela largely agree) Ecuador currently produces 490,000 barrels of oil per day (bbl/d)2) Ecuador's internal consumption of oil currently runs at 180,000bbl/d3) This means that even in the very VERY unlikely event that Ecuador stops selling its wares to traditional partners (such as main customer USA or next door Peru) they still have another 50,000bbl/d to magic up from somewhere.
So tell me again how this greenheaven Yasuní ITT initiative will work? Meanwhile, today's pretzel math gives us a great chance to CUE THE MUSIC!