ABU DHABI, Oct 26 (AFP)
Most oil producers both inside and outside the OPEC cartel will oppose a production rise early next year in the face of �precarious� market conditions, a top Gulf oil official here said Tuesday.
�If the current precariousness is maintained until March, an OPEC rise in production should not be expected,� the official, who asked not to be named, told AFP on the sidelines of an oil conference.
He said oil producers have �still not made up for the losses we suffered� at the end of 1998 and in the early months of this year, when benchmark crude fell to below 10 dollars a barrel to their lowest level for 12 years.
The head of OPEC�s market analysis department, Javad Yarjani, on Monday said the OPEC basket of crudes had averaged just over 15 dollars a barrel this year, despite new highs in recent months.
Producers� main concern is the continuing high levels of oil reserves in industrialised nations, the Gulf oil official said, although �the Asian economic recovery is encouraging.�
OPEC estimates that global demand for crude will grow by one percent next year, not enough to justify a production increase, the official said, �especially if the production quota busting is confirmed.�
The specialist Middle East Economic Survey (MEES) last week reported that OPEC production was rising although compliance with the cartel�s output limits was still more than 90 percent.
�On the basis of the September figure, the OPEC ten still need to reduce output by a further 324,000 barrels per day (bpd) in order to attain full compliance with the current quota of 22.967 million bpd�, MEES said.
The Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries, as well as key non-OPEC producers, decided in March this year to shave 2.1 million bpd off their total production until March 2000.
Oil prices solidified again last week on hopes that global production cuts orchestrated by OPEC would last through next March and possibly beyond.
Brent North Sea crude prices on the International Petroleum Exchangetouched 22.50 dollars Friday for December delivery, while in New York light sweet crude prices edged higher to 22.61 dollars.
Bakhytzhan ZHUMALIEVA
ALMATY, Oct 26 (THE GLOBE)
No workers, no nuclear reactions. Soon the National Nuclear Centre (NNC) some twelve miles east of Almaty will be closed, as there is nobody to work, Yerken Husainov, the Akim of the village of Alatau, a former officer of NNC thinks the center will soon be closed as workers retire or leave because they have not been paid. Only devotees stay, but they are few. The institute has no young personnel.
Recently residents nearby, especially those with children, have worried as different incidents happen in the nuclear complex. In autumn 1998 all mass media published the information that in the National Nuclear Centre a barrel intended for shipment of radioactive liquid had been lost. In fact, it had been much earlier, but NNC noticed the loss by chance when it received an order and they had to switch on the reactor. It had not been operated for ten years.
Then they began to look for the missing barrel and found it at a wine plant. But the mass media did not mention that before the barrel was adjusted to the conveyor wine-makers decided to clean out a strange metallic coating. According to a pensioner of this enterprise, children were employed to do that. What radioactive dose they got, no one knows.
NNC did not take any measures to take back the barrel and identify the children. Next there was the news of an unauthorized purchase of materials to recharge a gamma-defectoscope, an instrument that uses radioactivity for finding breaks in metal structures. More recent events included people falling into ash and suffering serious burns. The consequences are still unknown as doctors have not treated such burns before. The ash dump was not fenced off and no one had posted no alarm signs.
The reactor located in the National Nuclear Centre is called the research nuclear centre VVR-K. It is over thirty years old. The standard technical life of service is 25 years. The reactor has outlived its projected life, but NNC workers consider it to have been stopped in 1988 and hence it theoretically has additional use.
Workers of the Centre treat it as a paralysed giant who requires care and attention. During ten dormant years it has been eating budget money giving no profit. It may produce isotopes, but the latter may be produced by accelerators, which are much cheaper. Moreover,
The medical sector is too poor to purchase radioisotopes (techneci-99 and iodine-131). The lack of demand first led to shutting down the reactor. The second reason is that its maintenance demands much more than the money allotted to NNC. If in 1998 420 million tenge was allotted to the entire Centre, in 1999 they received a half of this amount. For 9 months of 1999 the Centre has received only 40% of the amount.
The reactor requires its own security, a heat exchanger, water for pumping (30 thousand tenge per day is spent to water only), a dosimeter, ventilation system, electricity, and salary for attendants. Exhausted fuel cannot be reprocessed, as Kazakhstan possesses no reprocessing plants. Previously fuel was transported to Russian enterprises. Without money, Kazakhstan must dispose of the spent fuel by burial.
Although nuclear engineers say they would like to maintain the reactor, they admit that annual maintenance of the reactor cannot equal its benefits. The most difficult problem is the absence of the personnel. Centre specialists worked out a proposal to use reactor VVR-K as the nucleus of an educational-training centre to train students graduated from nuclear-power faculties of national universities. This proposal has been submitted to the government.
Serious students, however, are not much easier to find than skilled nuclear workers. The ranks of physics students have grown very thin.. Students prefer to follow the money�into business, management, law and banking. Kazakhstan has less than a doze serious students of physics. NNC present personnel are not optimistic about attracting new blood. Until the situation is resolved and the reactor successfully scrapped or maintained, it will worry its neighbours and residents of Almaty.
All Over the Globe is published by IPA House.
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