On Iran, I’d like to get some nuts and bolts — sorely missing in much mainstream coverage — about actual shipments and cargoes now. I’ve got good information about how Iran’s discounts system is working. In short, it’s keeping Asian buyers sweet at a cost of about $1.20 per barrel per month. The method is a little more complex than that… But I’ve also got contradictory information about the White House’s effort, now that it has realised the potential impact of them, to minimise the sanctions. I’m reliably told it wants a 25% drop in volumes, which is hardly earth shattering. (That said, Iran’s at the table to negotiate, or may be soon, so it might be working.)

On Iraq, the piece is done. But all information on Iraq is gratefully received. 

On Libya, well, I’d really like to get there again. Failing that, I’m working on a wider story or two. One, naturally, is about Cyrenaica and will ask whether Libya is going to fall apart. The other one remains: where is the oil money going? 

Please get in touch.

For now, I’ve used some downtime in Djerba to update more recent published pieces, mainly for The Economist and Petroleum Economist. They’re here.

It’s just a bit easier on the eye and definitely smart-phone friendly.

Sad Salloum (Photo: Eric Kampherbeek, www.lacouleur.nl)

I promised myself that when I was back from Libya I’d do a favour to other journalists — especially the freelance ones like me — and write a post about the specifics of getting into the rebel-held east. Forget the fears about heading into a warzone: before I left for Libya, it was the logistics that troubled me most. And, specifically, I was worried about how dicey or otherwise the trip across the north of eastern Libya would be.

It isn’t. The trip was safe. There’s a big difference between going to Benghazi, now deep inside rebel territory, and going to, say, Brega or Misrata. This post isn’t about that kind of trip.

So here, to prevent others going through the same fruitless Google search for information, is my Guide on How to Get from Egypt to Benghazi. 

We went through Cairo. On the flight from Zurich, I was sitting next to a man who looked an awful lot like a young Muamnar Gaddafi (crossed with Jim Morrison) and, it turned out, he was from the Benghazi. So he offered to do the journey with us. We didn’t go with him in the end, because our fixer in Egypt thought he might be a Gaddafi spy (paranoid nonsense) and persuaded Eric, the photographer I was travelling with, and me to ditch him. But I learned an alternative and straightforward route from Muammar Morrison: go to the bus station in Cairo and, for very little money, catch a bus to Benghazi. That’s what he was going to do and I’ve since met many journalists who’ve done the same. I can’t vouch for how comfortable the ride is, but my guess is not very. But it’s a way in.

Instead, we met two Egyptian contacts a friend of Eric had arranged from Holland. One of them helped arrange a driver from a tourist shop off Tahrir Square. The driver, Mohammed, agreed to take us by car to Marsa Matrough, where we’d booked a hotel. The hotels in Marsa are cheap. And, because many of the European flights to Cairo get in in the afternoon, we wanted to stay somewhere close to the Egypt-Libya border and pass through the next day.

We got to our hotel — an out-of-season resort-type place called Carols Beau Rivage — at about 1am in the morning after a long drive from Cairo. (We left Cairo at about 5pm.) We paid around $100 for the bed in Marsa. And we paid about 550 Egyptian pounds (about $100) to Mohammed, plus a tip.

Marsa to the Salloum border crossing was a two hour drive with another taxi: we paid about $60 for that. The border crossing is about five kilomotres drive from the town itself. And you don’t want to spend too long in either place. (We did, for a story I was working on for The Economist about the refugee crisis in the town. That’s published next week.)

Our Egyptian fixer was planning to come to Libya with us. But he wasn’t allowed across the border. Meanwhile, the driver he’d tried to arrange to take us from Salloum to Benghazi didn’t show. And because the Libyana mobile network isn’t taking incoming foreign calls, we couldn’t get hold of him. So when we passed through, we were on our own.

Well, that’s not quite true. The border crossing is overrun with desperate refugees fleeing Libya — and with journalists trying to get in. We’d arranged to meet up on the other side of the border and share a cab with Adam Holloway, an MP and former ITN journalist. (My thinking: if he’s a Tory MP, David Cameron will probably send in the SAS to fetch him if something goes wrong. He also had a sat-phone.)

That didn’t work out either. He’s a nice guy n’all — truly — but Adam and his friend had already left for Benghazi. We were late, so I don’t blame them.

None of it mattered, though. After passing by foot into Libya and, thanks to our essential press cards, assuring the rebel border guards that we were journalists we simply rented one of the many drivers lined up to take hacks to Benghazi. We paid $300 for that trip, plus a tip. We left Salloum at about 3pm and were in Benghazi before 10pm. Our driver didn’t speak a word of English, but bought us some ropey food on the way and looked after us. We stopped in Tobruk to visit the World War II cemetery and the port. He drove like a maniac, but when you’ve already exceeded your risk quotient for the week by illegally entering a dictatorship engulfed in war, 180-km/h on a desert road without seatbelts doesn’t register much.

So: into Benghazi from Cairo took about two days, with a layover, and cost us about $500 for the driving.

If I were going to do it again I’d fly to Alexandria and shave three hours off the Egyptian side. And I’d probably try to make it in a day — a long day, to be sure. But if you can cut out the faff-factor, it’s doable.

As for hotels in Benghazi, we stayed in Noran. It was more expensive than the other journalist hotels (we paid $150 a night for a double, compared with $70/night in the Uzu), but — as The Economist’s Nick Pelham advised me beforehand — houses fewer hacks. I recognised the NYT crowd, the Guardian and the Independent in the Noran; but, mercifully, there weren’t any TV journalists. Uzu, by comparison (which happens to have one of the only two reliable wifi connections), is a Soviet-style dive. If you’ve seen camera pieces on the news from Benghazi, don’t be fooled by the backdrop of water behind the broadcaster’s head. It’s there, and it may look pretty, but the rest of Uzu ain’t. My fellow craftsmen have, alas, trashed the place. It sells extraordinarily bad food, for extortionate prices. You can’t blame the locals for gouging the journalists, but do avoid the $30 plate of slop. If hanging with the pack’s your thing, though, Uzu is where they’re all gathered. And many of the TNC’s press conferences are held there. Tibesti is another option. I interviewed someone there, but only saw the bottom part of the hotel: it looks pleasant enough. In any case, all of these places are hotels in a warzone (or not too far from one). So don’t expect much comfort, though staff are doing their best; and do expect some noises. We watched random gunfire from our hotel balcony in the Noran one night: kids with guns, not terribly worried about keeping us awake.

You’ll need to register yourself as a journalist when you arrive in Benghazi. It’s easily done: just find the court house in opposite the port in the centre and show your press card. The women working the media centre are efficient and helpful, up to a point, although the hand-written request list for interviews is more useful as a guide for what other journalists are hoping to do than as a way of organising one-on-ones.

You’ll need a fixer in Benghazi. For a trip to the frontline, the going rate when we were there was between $150-200 for the day. For Misrata, you’re looking at a 20-hour boat trip. For ferrying around Benghazi, the fixer’s rates are $100-150. The best way to find your fixer is by recommendation, either in the press centre or from other journalists. Find someone who’s trustworthy (obviously) and actually knows people. With luck, he’ll even have a seatbelt in the car. English-speaking fixers are essential for non-Arabic-speaking journalists. Our fixer was fluent in English (with an annoying Liverpudlian accent), but lax with his timekeeping, which is a serious no-no. He also occasionally tried to interject during interviews, which irritated me immensely. But we owe him our gratitude: on the night we were isolated as the only Westerners in Benghazi’s central square and witnessed a lynching that led to a murder, he successfully navigated us through an angry crowd to safety. After that, the irritations felt minor.

He also arranged a local sim card for us. They’re easy to come by: you can probably buy one from one of the journalists leaving town, or when you’re in Salloum and meet some coming back the other way. Don’t forget an unlocked phone.

We also paid our fixer to drive us back to Salloum when we left. That cost $250 and was even less eventful than the drive in.

I had this great idea about six days ago: get to Benghazi and do a story on the Transitional National Council and its oil plans. Now that the tickets to Cairo for Eric Kampherbeek, a photographer, and me are booked, along with a hotel in Marsa Matruh (on the Mediterranean coast, west of Alexandria as you run your finger along to the Libyan border), I’m beginning to realise just how far in over my head I may be.

I’ve travelled a lot as a journalist, including to some troubled countries. The worst was Somalia, where I reported for Prospect on a dodgy London-listed Australian firm searching for oil in pirate-infested Puntland. It was dicey, and I saw a lot of technicals and small arms. But it wasn’t a warzone (I was nowhere near Mogadishu).

Benghazi should be relatively safe. And, I’m sure, it will be crawling with journalists who actually know what they’re doing. And I have no intention of going near the frontline. But, still. Once we reach Salloum, where we intend to cross from Egypt into Libya, we’ll have to find someone to drive us eight hours to Benghazi. Many things could go wrong — and I’m no CJ Chivers.

So I’m a little anxious.

If I’m honest, I’m also a little excited. I’m also pleased that Petroleum Economist, my main employer, agreed to the trip. It’s not a big magazine, but it punches way above its weight and its reputation is growing. I’m hoping to file a compelling story that rewards my executive editor and the other bosses for their faith — and maybe scoop the opposition. (I’m totally confident Eric, a quality snapper, will deliver the goods.)

But I’m also going because since becoming editor of PE last year I’ve spent too much time in front of a computer and not enough time in the field. My last off-diary trip (that is, excluding the increasingly tedious conference circuit) was to Canada’s oil sands, which yielded many articles, including a long one for The Economist, where I’m a stringer. I’m tired of watching big stories in my beat happen from a distance. It’s time to get out again. Either I do the job properly, or I get on and do something that’s a little more financially secure.

The other reason I’m going, in spite of my reservations, my lack of genuine warzone experience and the funny feeling in my stomach, is because I want to find out if this is another war for oil. Broad question, I know. And I’m not sure if I’ll find any definitive answer in Benghazi. But I bet I’ll get more clues than I would sitting in my office in London or Buxton. Either way, it’ll be material for a book I’m trying to write. And, I’m pretty sure, it will be an adventure.

This is dangerous and short-sighted. In countries like the US and UK, fuel costs are within spitting distance of the records set in 2008, when a big wave of demand destruction spread across the West.

Inflation in China, which prompted two interest-rate rises in Q4 last year, is worrying the government. Another effort to dampen growth can’t be far off. The Fed may end quantitative easing if the US economy picks up, as data on Friday is expected to show it has. That will strengthen the dollar and drive down oil prices.

And the premium Brent (about $98/b) is enjoying to WTI (about $88/b) means we’re in for some kind of correction, soon. Expect a flattening of the contango and a dip in prices back under $80/b, if not lower. And expect the IEA to revise its demand outlooks back down again. Demand destruction, part 2, is on its way.

Update: Saudi oil minister Ali Naimi said today he’s worried about speculators again. No doubt. It’s 2008 all over again.

Update 2: I’ll be interviewing Opec’s Sec-General Abdallah El-Badri next week. Nice guy, always a good interview, always insightful, and with a lot on his plate at the minute.

(“My”, by the way, is always a bit of a stretch for an author of an Economist piece, at least in my experience. In this instance, brilliant editors Patrick Lane and Oliver Morton, and Ottawa correspondent Madelaine Drohan, among others, were all heavily involved, too.)

One of the questions I’ve been getting is about the use of “tar sands” versus “oil sands”.

I think it’s a silly question. Yes, I know some Albertans, especially those working in the oil industry, don’t like the term (“It’s not tar!” or “It’s a loaded term!” are common cries). And, being more accustomed to “oil sands” when I write for others, I can sort of see the point. No question, “tar” sounds a tad filthier than oil — which I think sounds a bit dirty anyway.

But, really. People should get over themselves. The stuff looks more like tar than oil. The easiest way for tar-sands boosters to lose the battle over what they’re called is … to get upset about what they’re called. The best way for them to win it is to make “tar sands” a neutral term by using it themselves.

And think of the journalist’s plight. In a story about oil, it’s already difficult to find synonyms to prevent tedious repetition. “Oil”, “crude”, “petroleum” (all of which mean slightly different things, too), and so on. In a 3,000 word story about the tar sands, that “tar” lightens the load a little.

The other complaints about the piece so far have been from people saying that it’s unfair. That’s from both greens and oil execs. So we must have got something right.

The United States now ships coal to China via Canada, but coal companies are scouting for new loading ports in Washington State. New mines are being planned for the Rockies and the Pacific Northwest. Indeed, some of the world’s more environmentally progressive regions are nascent epicenters of the new coal export trade, creating political tensions between business and environmental goals. … As a result, not only are the pollutants that developed countries have tried to reduce finding their way into the atmosphere anyway, but ships chugging halfway around the globe are spewing still more.

But it ignored the elephant in the room: natural gas. 

Coal is cheap and abundant. So China and other developing countries that prioritise the short-term goal of rapid economic growth over the long-term need to control greenhouse gas emissions will continue to buy the black stuff. If Australia, Canada and the US were to stop exporting coal to China on environmental grounds, Indonesia and other exporters would fill the gap.

Development of nuclear capacity in China is one solution — but as bold as the country’s ambitions are, by 2020 nuclear capacity will account for only about 10% of the total in 2008 and about 5% of forecast capacity. For the record, of China’s 800 GW of installed capacity right now about 600 GW comes from conventional thermal generation, the vast majority of which is coal.  (A useful source for this kind of data is here.)

So what’s the solution? Putting a price on carbon won’t really work. First, China is unlikely to agree with any strategy to constrain its consumption of a fuel it sees as critical to economic growth (and, let’s be generous, critical to its ambition to alleviate poverty). Second, as long as everyone keeps buying cheap Chinese goods, it will have enough cash to overcome pricier carbon coal.

The idealist’s green answer is for the US, Canada and other exporters to substitute coal exports to China with exports of the wonderful renewable technologies they’ve all developed. That’s essentially the argument of people like Thomas Friedman, and it’s a good one. Except that we’ve stumbled repeatedly at the first hurdle: finding scaleable green alternatives and proving their worth in our own economies. (NB, coal is still the US’s most important source of electricity.)

That leaves the only viable option: natural gas. The “unconventional glut”, as The Economist described it in my piece from several months ago, offers the best opportunity — now — to control emissions. It’s abundant in ways we never expected, it’s cheap, and it emits half as much carbon as coal when burnt.

Exports of liquefied natural gas from the West coast of North America and from Australia, the two places cited by the NYT for their burgeoning coal-to-China exports, must happen quickly. China’s keen. That’s why its state-owned companies are crawling over shale-gas reserves in North America and coal-bed methane (CBM) projects in Australia.

Yet in both the US and Australia, there is mounting environmental opposition, respectively, to shale-gas and CBM development.

Preventing production of cheap natural gas and stopping the construction of export infrastructure helps one very interested group: the coal industry. Not all environmentalists are opposed to natural gas. The Sierra Club has recognised its potential. But shale-gas drilling has, for many other greens, become their cause du jour.

It’s an unholy alliance between greens who should know better and coal lobbyists who understand all too well the threat new natural gas production brings to their dirty business. Green animosity to drillers is understandable on one level (few people trust the oil and gas industry, especially after Deepwater Horizon). But on the strategic front it makes as much sense as green opposition to nuclear power — which is to say, if you are interested in mitigating climate change, it’s a dumb and damaging position.

We should be doing everything we can to support gasification of China’s economy, not least by promoting rapid expansion of LNG exports. The alternative is more coal — and we know where that will lead.

Nasty stuff

I’m a bird lover. In fact, I’m just about to go for a daily lunch-time break in Derbyshire’s Goyt Valley to look for some birds. But the campaigning against the oil sands of Canada on the grounds that the toxic tailings lakes are killing birds is getting silly. There are plenty of serious threats to birds: vicious, murdering predators (aka “domestic cats”) are one. So are skyscrapers, windmills, cars and — above all — the destruction of habitats and the spread of pesticides.

Two major incidents in the oil sands in the past two years have killed about 2,000 birds. The industry says the oil sands kill 65 birds a year. Some people say — probably with good reason — that the figure could be much higher, around 2,000 a year.

But consider:

• In the UK alone 55 million birds are killed by cats each year.*
• Buildings murder more than half a billion birds in the US each year.
• Cars and pesticides kill 80 million and 67 million birds in the US each year, according to Treehugger.
• And windmills annihilate about 30,000. (The last three stats come from the same link as above.)

There are plenty of reasons to complain about the oil sands. And any unnatural bird death should be lamented. But let’s get some perspective.

*LEND A HAND ON THE LAND! Please join me in my daily battle to keep cats out of bird habitats, such as my back garden.