Word: bbl
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...U.S.S.R. plays a crucial role because its oil resources are so immense. During the past decade, the Soviet Union has become the world's largest petroleum producer (slightly more than 4 billion bbl. in 1977, v. 3.29 billion bbl. for second-place Saudi Arabia). At the same time, in a little-noticed development, Moscow has become the world's third largest oil exporter, behind only Saudi Arabia and Iran. In 1977 the Russians sold an estimated 1.2 billion bbl. to a thirsty world. Though 57% of their exported oil goes to Eastern Europe at prices...
Because the Kremlin treats reserves as state secrets, it is not easy to project production figures. According to the latest estimates by the U.S. Geological Survey, Soviet proven and estimated onshore reserves stand at an impressive 80 billion bbl. The main problem is that the most promising reserves are located in barren, inhospitable areas where drilling is extremely difficult. In the western Siberian fields, tall drilling rigs perch precariously on unstable peat that freezes rock hard in winter and heaves and shifts in summer...
...refuse to disclose precise data about reserves; because large parts of the country have not been thoroughly surveyed by oil geologists, the Chinese themselves probably have only imprecise figures. The lowest foreign estimate of Chinese reserves, a 1977 guess by the American Petroleum Institute, puts them at 20 billion bbl.; if those reserves were proven, China would rank ninth in the world. The CIA has a far higher estimate: 39 billion bbl. below dry land and perhaps that much offshore-a grand total that would place China neck and neck with the Soviet Union for second place, behind Saudi Arabia...
Even more slippery than Michigan's horse thieves, surely, are the Los Angeles truck drivers who swipe 55-gal. drums of used grease-about $25,000 worth each week-from local restaurants and drive-ins. The goo, worth $40 per bbl., is valuable because it is reprocessed into a food additive that causes cattle and poultry to gain weight. The thieves have oozed up across the nation, but most actively in Southern California, the fastness of fast food. Sometimes posing as legitimate grease collectors, they have cut chains placed on the outdoor grease barrels, smashed through protective iron gates...
This spring, oil hunters will begin probing the Baltimore Canyon, an ocean-floor site off Atlantic City, N.J. They hope to find 1.4 billion bbl. of oil and nearly 10 trillion cu. ft. of natural gas that may lie beneath the continental shelf. Most energy-hungry Americans hope the oilmen find what they are looking for. Anne Simon will be satisfied if they do not make what she considers a bad situation even worse. A veteran coast watcher, Simon has already written an impassioned plea for the preservation of Martha's Vineyard. In her newest book, she appeals just...