Is the Future of U.S. Oil Really Secure?
July 29, 2010 at 09:22 AM EDT
By Marin Katusa, Chief Energy Strategist, Casey Energy Report Two words that any oil company dreads to hear are “export duty.” Especially if the word “increases” or “introduced” is floating around there too. So when Kazakhstan introduced an oil export duty to meet shortfalls in the national budget, the mood wasn’t exactly jovial. On July 13, the Kazakh government brought back the tax that had been abolished during the financial crisis. A US$20 tariff will be levied on every ton of crude oil exported from the Central Asian nation. The hope: collect some US$406 million in additional revenue by the end of the year. The energy-rich, former Soviet republic has some of the largest oil and gas reserves in the Caspian Sea basin, producing…