oil and gas

UXBRIDGE, Canada, Sep 30 (IPS) – Why do U.S. oil companies — some of the most profitable corporations on the planet — receive 20 to 40 billion dollars a year in subsidies from the U.S. government?

And, in a time of skyrocketing oil prices and profits, why did the George W. Bush administration in 2005 authorise an additional 32.9 billion dollars in new subsidies over a five-year period?

“Those are very good questions,” said Doug Koplow of Earth Track, Inc., an independent energy information research organisation in Boston, Massachusetts.

Try accessing through this link if above link fails. Asia Pacific Energy Research Center.

International Center for Technology Assessment.  Review of costs of defending oil shipments from the Persian Gulf and other sources, such as Colombia.  Also includes Strategic Petroleum Reserve and other domestic security maintenance services in shipping lanes and roads.

Produced by Revenue Watch of the Open Society Institute, the Center for Policy Studies at Central European University, and the International Budget Project. Guidance manual for how to track oil and gas revenues using government budget documents.

(Word Document). Doug Koplow, Dale Andrew, Jean Marc Burniaux, and Erkki Adorian. OECD, Joint Working Party on Trade and Environment, September 2001. Also available in French.

(Abstract). (Full report can be emailed to you). Department of Finance. This paper is a study of the federal tax treatment of the oil sands industry centered in Alberta.

Amy Taylor, Matthew Bramley, and Mark Winfield, The Pembina Institute for Appropriate Development. This report, commissioned by the Climate Action Network Canada, identifies and quantifies federal government expenditure on Canada's oil and gas sector. It also investigates both federal and provincial support for oil sands developments. Useful information, though the subsidy numbers were lower than expected for resource-rich Canada. There may be programs or subsidy types that have not yet been counted.