The New Seven Sisters and the Implications for Energy Security

After the breakup of Standard Oil, the seven companies that dominated global oil production became known as the "Seven Sisters". Yesterday, via the WSJ Energy Blog, we learned that the Finanical Times has designated seven new members of the sisterhood -- and the implications for the free world are rather alarming:

The new Seven, per the FT, are Saudi Aramco, Russia’s Gazprom, CNPC of China (parent of PetroChina), NIOC of Iran, Venezuela’s PDVSA, Brazil’s Petrobras and Petronas of Malaysia.

All are state-controlled. A few are owned by governments that are less-than-friendly, if not downright hostile, toward the U.S. Many are flexing their “resource nationalism,” wresting control of lucrative oil and gas projects from foreign companies, including the old Sisters.

Together, the FT points out, the new Sisters control more than 10 times the oil reserves of the old Sisters. They produce more than twice as much oil as the old Sisters.

The new Sisters only lag the old Sisters in net income. But the new group will likely control the world’s production for decades to come...

As if you didn't need another reason to give nuclear energy a second look. Did I forget to mention that the two nations with the largest proven reserves of uranium are Australia and Canada?