Definition
Oil reserves denote the amount of crude oil that can be technically recovered at a cost that is financially feasible at the present price of oil. Hence reserves will change with the price, unlike oil resources, which include all oil that can be technically recovered at any price. Reserves may be for a well, for a reservoir, for a field, for a nation, or for the world. Different classifications of reserves are related to their degree of certainty.
Oil Reserves
What is ‘Oil Reserves’
An estimate of the amount of crude oil located in a particular economic region. Oil reserves must have the potential of being extracted under current technological constraints. For example, if oil pools are located at unattainable depths, they would not be considered part of the nation’s reserves.
Reserves are calculated based on a proven/probably basis.
Explaining ‘Oil Reserves’
Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Iran, Iraq, Venezuela, Russia, Mexico and Canada are some of the world leaders in oil reserves. Canada has over 150 billion barrels of oil reserves, a large portion of which is concentrated in the Alberta oil sands. If the rate of technological improvement exceeds the rate of extraction, national oil reserves will increase.
Further Reading
- Oil and gas reserves: Communication with the financial sector – ora.ox.ac.uk [PDF]
- Oil prices and the stock prices of alternative energy companies – www.sciencedirect.com [PDF]
- Agency costs of free cash flow, corporate finance, and takeovers – www.jstor.org [PDF]
- Oil in parallax: Scarcity, markets, and the financialization of accumulation – www.sciencedirect.com [PDF]
- Discretionary disclosure of reserves by oil and gas companies: an economic analysis – onlinelibrary.wiley.com [PDF]
- Risk factors in stock returns of Canadian oil and gas companies – www.sciencedirect.com [PDF]
- Oil price dynamics, macro-finance interactions and the role of financial speculation – www.sciencedirect.com [PDF]
- Proved or probable oil reserves: does it matter? An empirical study on Canadian oil and gas companies – search.proquest.com [PDF]
- Gulf cooperation council oil exporters and the future of the dollar – www.tandfonline.com [PDF]
- Corruption, reconstruction and oil governance in Iraq – www.tandfonline.com [PDF]
