Much discussion in the energy industry is about price. After price, the conversation turns to supply and demand. From there, it sort of fizzles out down various trails lacking guided explanation only to return, once more, to price.
This is for good reason. As with other commodities, price is universally binding throughout the industry. There is no equivalent of Apple’s iPhone: no such superior oil or gas or kilojoule product exists because they are commodities. But when the conversation begins and ends with price, much is left undecided and unclear. What underlying decisions led to today’s supply and demand context? How did capital markets play into this? How did varied institutional environments affect firm level investment decisions? Only discussing price is like going on a road trip and waking up to discover you slept for its duration. How did we get here?
Oil & Company is meant to talk about how the energy industry got here. Specifically, how the industry is organized, what strategies are employed by firms, and, most generally, what is the underlying context within which price, supply and demand are determined?
I called this Oil & Company not because its sole focus is oil – it is not – but because of oil’s singular impact on and influence in the energy sector. As new sources of energy become increasingly dominant, the comparison is always relative to oil and related fossil fuels. As such, even in criticism, there is oil and everyone else. Thus, Oil & Company.