Stratfor: The Geopolitics of Shale

The Geopolitics of Shale

December 19, 2012

By Robert D. Kaplan
Chief Geopolitical Analyst

According to the elite newspapers and journals of opinion, the future of foreign affairs mainly rests on ideas: the moral impetus for humanitarian intervention, the various theories governing exchange rates and debt rebalancing necessary to fix Europe, the rise of cosmopolitanism alongside the stubborn vibrancy of nationalism in East Asia and so on. In other words, the world of the future can be engineered and defined based on doctoral theses. And to a certain extent this may be true. As the 20th century showed us, ideologies -- whether communism, fascism or humanism -- matter and matter greatly.

But there is another truth: The reality of large, impersonal forces like geography and the environment that also help to determine the future of human events. Africa has historically been poor largely because of few good natural harbors and few navigable rivers from the interior to the coast. Russia is paranoid because its land mass is exposed to invasion with few natural barriers. The Persian Gulf sheikhdoms are fabulously wealthy not because of ideas but because of large energy deposits underground. You get the point. Intellectuals concentrate on what they can change, but we are helpless to change much of what happens.

Enter shale, a sedimentary rock within which natural gas can be trapped. Shale gas constitutes a new source of extractable energy for the post-industrial world. Countries that have considerable shale deposits will be better placed in the 21st century competition between states, and those without such deposits will be worse off. Ideas will matter little in this regard.

Stratfor, as it happens, has studied the issue in depth. Herein is my own analysis, influenced in part by Stratfor's research.

So let's look at who has shale and how that may change geopolitics. For the future will be heavily influenced by what lies underground.

The United States, it turns out, has vast deposits of shale gas: in Texas, Louisiana, North Dakota, Pennsylvania, Ohio, New York and elsewhere. America, regardless of many of the political choices it makes, is poised to be an energy giant of the 21st century. In particular, the Gulf Coast, centered on Texas and Louisiana, has embarked upon a shale gas and tight oil boom. That development will make the Caribbean an economic focal point of the Western Hemisphere, encouraged further by the 2014 widening of the Panama Canal. At the same time, cooperation between Texas and adjacent Mexico will intensify, as Mexico increasingly becomes a market for shale gas, with its own exploited shale basins near its northern border.

This is, in part, troubling news for Russia. Russia is currently the energy giant of Europe, exporting natural gas westward in great quantities, providing Moscow with political leverage all over Central and particularly Eastern Europe. However, Russia's reserves are often in parts of Siberia that are hard and expensive to exploit -- though Russia's extraction technology, once old, has been considerably modernized. And Russia for the moment may face relatively little competition in Europe. But what if in the future the United States were able to export shale gas to Europe at a competitive price?

The United States still has few capabilities to export shale gas to Europe. It would have to build new liquefaction facilities to do that; in other words, it would have to erect plants on the Gulf of Mexico that convert the gas into liquid so that it could be transported by ship across the Atlantic, where regasification facilities there would reconvert it back into gas. This is doable with capital investment, expertise and favorable legislation. Countries that build such facilities will have more energy options, to export or import, whatever the case may be. So imagine a future in which the United States exports liquefied shale gas to Europe, reducing the dependence that European countries have on Russian energy. The geopolitics of Europe could shift somewhat. Natural gas might become less of a political tool for Russia and more of a purely economic one (though even such a not-so-subtle shift would require significant exports of shale gas from North America to Europe).

Less dependence on Russia would allow the vision of a truly independent, culturally vibrant Central and Eastern Europe to fully prosper -- an ideal of the region's intellectuals for centuries, even as ideas in this case would have little to do with it.

This might especially be relevant to Poland. For Poland may have significant deposits of shale gas. Were Polish shale deposits to prove the largest in Europe (a very big "if"), Poland could become more of an energy producer in its own right, turning this flat country with no natural defenses to the east and west -- annihilated by both Germany and the Soviet Union in the 20th century -- into a pivot state or midlevel power in the 21st. The United States, in turn, somewhat liberated from Middle East oil because of its own energy sources (including natural gas finds), could focus on building up Poland as a friendly power, even as it loses substantial interest in Saudi Arabia. To be sure, the immense deposits of oil and natural gas in the Arabian Peninsula, Iraq and Iran will keep the Middle East a major energy exporter for decades. But the shale gas revolution will complicate the world's hydrocarbon supply and allocation, so that the Middle East may lose some of its primacy.

It turns out that Australia also has large new natural gas deposits that, with liquefaction facilities, could turn it into a principal energy exporter to East Asia, assuming Australia significantly lowers its cost of production (which may prove very hard to do). Because Australia is already starting to emerge as the most dependable military ally of the United States in the Anglosphere, the alliance of these two great energy producers of the future could further cement Western influence in Asia. The United States and Australia would divide up the world: after a fashion, of course. Indeed, if unconventional natural gas exploitation has anything to do with it, the so-called post-American world would be anything but.

The geopolitical emergence of Canada -- again, the result of natural gas and oil -- could amplify this trend. Canada has immense natural gas deposits in Alberta, which could possibly be transported by future pipelines to British Columbia, where, with liquefaction facilities, it could then be exported to East Asia. Meanwhile, eastern Canada could be the beneficiary of new shale gas deposits that reach across the border into the northeastern United States. Thus, new energy discoveries would bind the two North American countries closer, even as North America and Australia become more powerful on the world scene.

China also has significant deposits of shale gas in its interior provinces. Because Beijing is burdened by relatively few regulations, the regime could acquire the land and build the infrastructure necessary for its exploitation. This would ease somewhat China's energy crunch and aid Beijing's strategy to compensate for the decline of its coastal-oriented economic model by spurring development inland.

The countries that might conceivably suffer on account of a shale gas revolution would be landlocked, politically unstable oil producers such as Chad, Sudan and South Sudan, whose hydrocarbons could become relatively less valuable as these other energy sources come online. China, especially, might in the future lose interest in the energy deposits in such low-end, high-risk countries if shale gas became plentiful in its own interior.

In general, the coming of shale gas will magnify the importance of geography. Which countries have shale underground and which don't will help determine power relationships. And because shale gas can be transported across oceans in liquid form, states with coastlines will have the advantage. The world will be smaller because of unconventional gas extraction technology, but that only increases the preciousness of geography, rather than decreases it.

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Read more: The Geopolitics of Shale | Stratfor 

My PERSONAL Thoughts About September 11, 2001

As I sit here at my computer to type my very personal feelings about 9/11, my emotions well up and explode to the surface, tears streaming down my face, a pile of tissue collecting by my side.

No, I didn't personally know anyone who died in the attacks of September 11, 2001.  I don't even know anyone who personally...and I mean really personally, knows anyone who died from the attacks that day.  But, I was personally affected clear across the country, in the state of Utah.

"The angels are always near to those who are grieving, to whisper to them that their loved ones are safe in the hand of God."

~Quoted in The Angels' Little Instruction Book by Eileen Elias Freeman, 1994

I remember, with children only ages 1 and 4, being glued to my TV, in shock and unable to turn it off or turn my eyes away.  My heart dropped as the events took place.  As I saw people jumping from the towers in desperation, I could not believe what I was seeing.  I could not imagine the choice they made, being so desperate that they would rather jump to their death than being stuck in the towers as they burnt to the ground.

As the rest of the day continued and more terrorist events took place, I could not imagine that it was real.  We see violence in movies and it seemed that the two were interwoven into one.  "Is this real?  Could this be happening on U.S. soil?", I thought.  "How can I protect my two babies?  What comes next?"

At the time, we were living near the airport in the Salt Lake City area.  Daily, planes were so low as they were landing that we could sometimes see the landing gear.


I remember distinctly on September 11, 2001 that the noise of the airplanes slowed and then stopped to a near stand still.  The silence was deafening.

How strange that day and the following days, weeks, and months became.  I struggled to understand how this could happen and struggled to grasp on to any sort of new reality.


"Unable are the loved to die.
For love is immortality."
~ Emily Dickinson

Extremely empathetic, I struggled with the shock I had from what I had viewed on the television and what I felt for those who lost loved ones and those who were the first responders following the planes going down.  What they saw must likely never leave their minds, their dreams.  That they must have had to make a choice to let some leave this earth while they worked on others who had a better opportunity of survival causes me heart wrenching grief on their behalf.

Because of 9/11, spouses lost soul mates.  Because of 9/11, children, some not yet born, lost parents.  Because of 9/11, parents lost children.  Because of 9/11, the country lost its innocence.

I remember the love that was expressed across the aisle between politicians, which was beautiful to see expressed so openly.  I long for them to remember those days and work together to bring our country back to the prayerfully united power that we once were.  Please remember.  Why don't they remember?!

As for the memorials, there should not be fighting over something that should be a beautiful memorial of days that were so tragic for so many of our nation.  What causes the divide to start again after something so traumatic that rippled throughout our country, causing us to become united, as we should be, so prayerful, as our country started out to be and was meant to be governed.

I prayed for those who lost loved ones, prayed so hard that they would find some sort of comfort.  I prayed that they would be taken care of and that they would find the strength to go on.  What amazing strength they must have found!  I wanted to help, but was in Utah with two babies and didn't have a clue of how I could be of any use.  I just wanted to travel to the homes of all of those affected by September 11, 2001 and hug them and let them know that someone, even across the country, felt love for them, sincere love.  I wouldn't be able to imagine the grief and shock they were going through, but I could offer love and still do offer extreme love and still wish I could go to each of them and give them a hug.  They still need our love and support to go on.


Each September 11th, I cry over the events that took place that day.  I watch the full coverage of the names being read.  I pause for the moments of silence.  Tears roll down my face, tissue after tissue I wipe my face and freely cry and mourn for those who still live but not for those who are now in our Heavenly Father's care.  I am sure those that were lost on 9/11 are watching over their loved ones with care and comfort.

I feel deep pain as I know the nation is not even close to the same as we once were.  Vengeance began.  Harsh words threw a black curtain over the sorrow, grief and love that was bringing our country together.  Love became hate.  Hate became revenge.  Revenge lost the care for those who lost their loved ones and became the country's mantra.

Also being unveiled were stories that our country caused the events as a false flag.  This false flag was said to be the catalyst to take us into the Middle-East to fight and justify that fight.  As I thought about that mentality, I couldn't wrap my mind around the theories that came forward, such as the other towers collapsing in New York that were not that close in proximity to the twin towers, that a missile that hit the Pentagon instead of an airplane, or the fact that there were hardly any remnants of the plane that went down in Pennsylvania so it couldn't be a plane.  Could our country be capable of those attacks?



False flags have happened throughout history, but to put our own population, so many of them, in death's path is such evil.  I read the whole report that the 9/11 Commission put together and saw holes in their theories.  I saw that they were not fully disclosing information.

To this day, I still wonder about our country's leaders and whether they caused the 9/11 attacks.  This thought and the months that followed the attacks caused me to have open, watchful eyes to our country and its leadership.  I no longer have trust that our government has our best interest at heart.  What has happened to our country?  I keep finding more things that reinforce my distrust.  I mourn the innocence that I once had and the security it used to bring to my mind and my daily activities.  I mourn the simplicity that once moved my life through each day.  I mourn 9/11 for so many reasons.

Since 9/11,  personal stories from survivors have emerged and have been shared.  I have watched intently and cried in knowing that they must feel such pain and that the pain will never leave them.  I have appreciated the stories being shared, however, because it personalizes the day when so many were lost and spoken of in multitudes and not in the one or in the one family.  It must be so hard to share those stories, but on the other hand, it must be so wonderful to share positive stories about the loved ones they lost, often sharing the beauty of their lives in conjunction with the end of their lives on 9/11.  I thank them for those stories and their bravery in sharing them.

Of course, Obama gave a speech today, mentioning Bin Laden being killed, as a not-so-subtle point toward his campaign.  It is so frustrating that the killing of Bin Laden, planned so long prior to Obama being president, is being used in that way.  It should be a victory that is shared across the aisle and with those presidents past.  Instead, the problems are still blamed on Bush and Obama takes these victories and uses them as his own, throwing them in the faces of the U.S. citizens in his high-chinned speeches.  He must not realize that there will always be another Bin Laden, with a different name but with the same goals.

Today we mourn the loss of those who died on 9/11 and because of the cleanup thereafter.  The towers that were not supposed to fall are gone.  The impenetrable walls of The Pentagon being penetrated.  The plane going down in Pennsylvania being dearly smoking dust.  Today we remember those who were heroes as first responders who saved so many and gave their complete selves to a job that no one else could do.  Today we remember that our country once was united in love and compassion.  Today we feel pain, love, support, empathy, sympathy, and more.  If we can remember in the correct light the unity that happened to our country on a very horrifying day, that being September 11, 2012, maybe our country can come back together, resolving issues that seem petty in comparison to what happened on 9/11.

Remembering 9/11.

"Friends can help each other. A true friend is someone who lets you have total freedom to be yourself - and especially to feel. Or, not feel. Whatever you happen to be feeling at the moment is fine with them. That's what real love amounts to - letting a person be what he really is." ~ Jim Morrison