Saudis lie, American dollars die

There is no way in hell Saudi Arabia will ever pump 15 million barrels of oil a day. I’ll eat my hat, slathered in Arabian cardamom, if they even get up to the 12.5 million barrels they claim upgrades that are now in the pipeline (pun intended) will produce:

Saudi Arabia increasing its production capacity to 12.5 million barrels a day in a $90 billion expansion plan that is scheduled for completion next year. Beyond that, Saudi oil minister Ali al-Naimi said that oil experts in the kingdom had identified additional opportunities to expand production, if needed, to 15 million barrels a day in future years.

I’m with folks like Matt Simmons. Much of the upgrade is needed just to keep KSA at 9.5 million barrels a day 5-10 years from now.

Specific to the U.S., KSA already, in the past year or two, has been sending more oil to China than to us, anyway.

The big key is if, at this summit or soon thereafter, the Saudis start listening to other countries more about pegging oil prices to other currencies besides just the dollar.