Natural gas integration in Latin America: Moving forward or backward?
By Edmilson Moutinho dos Santos, Victorio Enrique Oxilia Dávalos, Murilo Tadeu Werneck Fagá

Throughout the 1990s and up to the year 2000, energy integration was seen as a major goal in the South Cone of South America. The regional perspective for energy was related to an even more challenging objective, i.e., the Latin American economic integration, which was quickly moving forward by the constitution MERCOSUR, the free trade zone built by Argentina, Brazil, Uruguay and Paraguay, and also having

Bolivia and Chile as special partners. MERCOSUR was getting stronger and becoming a successful political project. Trade conflicts existed, but they were considered normal and nobody would disagree about the viability of MERCOSUR.

Energy companies were expected to play an important role on fostering this regional economic integration through more energy trading as well as pursuing bi-national energy investments, which should consolidate a common infrastructure. High complementarities between energy exporting countries such as Argentina, Bolivia and Paraguay, and energy importing nations such as Brazil, Chile and Uruguay were supposed to be strong enough to promote a large integrated energy market.

Argentina was believed to become the "energy-exporting axis" of the region, shipping oil, natural gas and electricity to the other countries. Paraguay should continue exporting hydroelectricity while Bolivia should increasingly focus on gas. Brazil, on the other hand, was believed to be the largest "energy-importing anchor", as the country was abandoning old policies focused on energy self-sufficiency.

The Law of Unintended Consequences: A Change in the Value of Brent
By Liz Bossley

When the partners in the Buzzard field chose the Forties pipeline over The Flotta pipeline to bring their oil to market, little did they know as They compared the transportation tariffs on offer that their decision would Have consequences for the price of two thirds of the world's oil. Now Buzzard Is on stream and the uncertainty surrounding its future production profile Has prompted the oil trading community at a meeting in London on 27th March. To question Forties' role as a deliverable grade in the influential Brent contract. What they decide has far reaching consequences throughout the industry.

In 2002 Forties Blend and Oseberg Blend were included as substitute grades in the assessment of the value of the benchmark dated Brent price and as deliverable grades in the Brent forward contract. So what had been 15-Day Brent became 21-Day Brent / Forties / Oseberg or '21- Day BFO'. All three of these grades were very similar in quality and were logical contractual substitutes at that time.

European Energy policies - 10 questions, 10 answers for the future
by Dr. - Ing. Hildegard von LIECHTENSTEIN

The European energy question is crucial but complex. It can be summed up in 10 important questions and their answers:

1. Power gap: when and how important?
2. Energy resources: for how long?
3. What about renewable energies?
4. What about sustainable energy economy and savings potential?
5. What about future technologies, notably hydrogen technology, cold or hot fusion, superconduction and generation IV nuclear technology in which there are a lot of hopes?
6. What are really the accident risks
7. Does Europe risk a Political crash: or a political dependency on its energy suppliers?
8. Does Europe risk an Economic crash: and what would be the economic and social consequences in Europe and in the world?
9. Does Europe and does the world risk a Climate crash through greenhouse gases?
10. What are the burdens we are passing on to the next generations?

These questions consequently lead to the following core question: what are the most urgent measures needed in Europe to avoid the 3 following crashes: political crash, economic crash, climate crash?

China's Debate over Vietnam's Reforms
By Willy Lam

A DEBATE is raging within the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) over whether it should emulate the relatively bold structural reforms that the Vietnamese Communist Party (VCP) had introduced earlier this year. The VCP's reforms have included the "multiple-candidate" election of the party chief, meaning that more than one cadre is allowed to contest the post of general secretary during major party congresses. Nevertheless, CCP Chairman and People's Republic of China (PRC) President Hu Jintao, currently busy laying the groundwork for the 17th CCP Congress next year, has already ...