Petroleum prices and profits in the 90 days following the invasion of Kuwait.

摘要

For the third in the past 20 years the world has experienced an interruption in the flow of oil from the Persian Gulf. The Iraqi invasion of Kuwait on August 2, 1990, and shut down of Kuwait oil production capacity followed by the United Nations boycott of Iraqi oil removed 8 percent of the world's oil supply. The result was a sharp increase in the process of crude oil and petroleum products. These events raised numerous questions about the performance of energy markets and energy firms. This report supplies a first answer for some of those questions. At the time this report was prepared the invasion has been in effect for 90 days. Not all the data is available to fully answer every question. Some issues can only be completely resolved after more time has passed in which the invasion and its effects have had an opportunity to be fully assimilated. This report was specifically requested by W. Henson Moore, Deputy Secretary of Energy as a way of supplying the American public with what could be said about the current situation. Rumors abound and mixconceptions have proliferated. This report strives to give a proper perspective on some of the more vexing issues which the invasion produced. The Energy Information Administration (EIA) has addressed many questions in this report. By the way of summary these are the 10 most most frequently asked questions and EIA's quick answers. The page references tell the reader where to look in the report for further explanation. These are not the only issues addressed and EIA hopes that readers will be able to satisfy their curiosity about their own questions within the pages of this report.