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If you study the oil business you will find it mercilessly competitive. The "Seven Sisters" are a bogyman.

Developing new reserves has become amazingly expensive. The Sakhalin Island project is expected to cost another $40 Billion. The entire Caspian area was recently drilled and the oil found did not cover 10% of the costs except offshore Kazakstan. The pipelines will cost billions and the bribes way more.

China is offering a lot more for the oil than the western firms can afford. The Chinese have an infinite supply of dollars and figure oil is going to get expensive pretty soon. They are doing a huge project in north west Brazil that will be a loss unless oil hits $100 a barrel. The Chinese are paying the entire bill up front, offering trade concessions and major technology, the rumor is nuclear weapons, aircraft, and long range missile tech for starters.

The Japanese offered the Russians a multi-billion dollar project for free and did not even ask for any oil later. The Chinese outbid them. The rate of increase in world oil consumption has been much larger than the rate of increase in reserves and production for decades.