TRANSPORTATION APPRAISAL OF GLOBAL OIL TRADE FLOWS

Among energy supply resources, crude oil has special importance as it supplies more than half of the world energy demands, today. In oil trade, transportation costs have significant effect on ultimate price like other commodities; therefore trade oartners often try to select the nearest demand and supply resources. In the research reported herein, global oil trade flows were investigated during 2003. Accessible and relevant oil trade data for 115 countries were gathered. The study databese consisted of 20 variables in four categories of trade, geographical, economical and political. Firstly, preliminary statistical analyses of the database showed that trade and geographic variables have maximum and minimum coefficients of variation, respectively. variables in the trade and geographical categories have more correlation than other pairs, among the four groups. Compared to other variables, ountry distances and gross domestic product showed higher correlation with national oil trade variables. Furthermore, simple modeling demonstrated that models in from of power had the best fit between oil trade variables, as dependent variables, and the others as independent variables. Moreover, multivariable oil trads models were developed and evaluated. Country distance, which is a geographic variable, was found as a significant factor in global oil trade. Gravity models were gross domestic product of exporters and importers, and country distances. Finally, linear programming optimized oil trade and the results were compared with observed dostribution. Comparison of observed and optimized distribution for the sea network showed possibility of imporvements up to one third in total transportation cost.

Keywords:

Global oil trade , distribution modeling , freight transportation , linear programming