{"id":12243,"date":"2015-09-14T06:25:00","date_gmt":"2015-09-14T11:25:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=12243"},"modified":"2015-09-14T06:25:00","modified_gmt":"2015-09-14T11:25:00","slug":"syria-peak-oil-weakened-governments-finances-ahead-of-arab-spring-in-2011","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=12243","title":{"rendered":"Syria peak oil weakened government\u2019s finances ahead of Arab Spring in 2011"},"content":{"rendered":"<h3 class=\"entry-title\"><a href=\"http:\/\/crudeoilpeak.info\/syria-peak-oil-weakened-governments-finances-ahead-of-arab-spring-in-2011\" rel=\"bookmark\">Syria peak oil weakened government\u2019s finances ahead of Arab Spring in 2011<\/a><\/h3>\n<div class=\"entry-content clearfix\">\n<p>While the attention of the world is on the refugee crisis we need to look at the causes of this mass exodus.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/crudeoilpeak.info\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/09\/Hungary_refugees_walking.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-7285\" title=\"Hungary_refugees_walking\" src=\"http:\/\/crudeoilpeak.info\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/09\/Hungary_refugees_walking.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"600\" height=\"413\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p align=\"center\">Fig 1: Refugees walking on Hungarian motorway towards Austria in Sep 2015<\/p>\n<p>In May 2013 the Guardian had an article \u201cPeak oil, climate change and pipeline geopolitics driving Syrian conflict\u201d\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/environment\/earth-insight\/2013\/may\/13\/1\">http:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/environment\/earth-insight\/2013\/may\/13\/1<\/a><\/p>\n<p>In March 2015, a group of researchers led by climatologist Colin Kelley (University of California) published a study in the\u00a0<em>Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences with the title \u201cClimate change in the Fertile Crescent and implications of the recent Syrian drought\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>\u201cBetween 2006 and 2009, the people of Syria suffered during the most severe drought that country has experienced since the beginning of its instrumental record. As water became scarce, crops failed and cattle died on a huge scale. As many as 1.5 million Syrians, out of a population of just over 20 million, moved from the countryside to the outskirts of already overflowing cities\u201d<\/em><br \/>\n<a href=\"http:\/\/www.historicalclimatology.com\/blog\/is-climate-change-behind-the-syrian-civil-war\">http:\/\/www.historicalclimatology.com\/blog\/is-climate-change-behind-the-syrian-civil-war<\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/crudeoilpeak.info\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/09\/Sand_tornado_Syria_Sept2014.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-7286\" title=\"Sand_tornado_Syria_Sept2014\" src=\"http:\/\/crudeoilpeak.info\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/09\/Sand_tornado_Syria_Sept2014.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"600\" height=\"400\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p align=\"center\">Fig 2: Sand tornado in Syria in September 2014<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/news.nationalgeographic.com\/news\/2015\/03\/150302-syria-war-climate-change-drought\/\">http:\/\/news.nationalgeographic.com\/news\/2015\/03\/150302-syria-war-climate-change-drought\/<\/a><\/p>\n<p>In this article we analyse to which extent peak oil contributed to a fiscal deterioration so that the Syrian government was forced to introduce unpopular policies (tax increases, removal of fuel subsidies, increasing cost of cement etc) which contributed to the unrest.<\/p>\n<h4><strong>Oil production, exports and consumption<\/strong><\/h4>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/crudeoilpeak.info\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/09\/Syria_EIA_Crude_Production_Exports_Consumption_1980_2014.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-7288\" title=\"Syria_EIA_Crude_Production_Exports_Consumption_1980_2014\" src=\"http:\/\/crudeoilpeak.info\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/09\/Syria_EIA_Crude_Production_Exports_Consumption_1980_2014.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"576\" height=\"525\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p align=\"center\">Fig 3: Syria oil production, exports and consumption<\/p>\n<p>We see several tipping points<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>1996: peak production<\/li>\n<li>2001: Crude oil exports start to drop sharply, albeit cushioned by rising oil prices<\/li>\n<li>2006: Petroleum imports begin to increase at higher rate<\/li>\n<li>2008: Increasing petroleum consumption approaches level of declining oil production<\/li>\n<li>2011 Arab spring reaches Syria in March<\/li>\n<li>2011 International oil companies suspend operations<\/li>\n<li>oil embargo\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.sanctionswiki.org\/Syria\">http:\/\/www.sanctionswiki.org\/Syria<\/a><\/li>\n<li>2012: Oil production falls precipitously as government loses control over Eastern oil fields.<\/li>\n<li>2014: Oil production has completely collapsed<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&#8230;click on the above link to read the rest of the article&#8230;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Syria peak oil weakened government\u2019s finances ahead of Arab Spring in 2011 While the attention of the world is on the refugee crisis we need to look at the causes of this mass exodus. Fig 1: Refugees walking on Hungarian motorway towards Austria in Sep 2015 In May 2013 the Guardian had an article \u201cPeak [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,5,6],"tags":[6292,617,9030,8804,776,6917],"class_list":["post-12243","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-energy-2","category-geopolitics","category-liberty","tag-crude-oil-peak","tag-peak-oil","tag-pipeline-geopolitics","tag-refugee-crisis","tag-syria","tag-the-guardian"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12243","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=12243"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12243\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12244,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12243\/revisions\/12244"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=12243"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=12243"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=12243"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}