廉价石油繁荣了西方经济石油是当前世界上主要的动力资源,又是重要的工业原料,还是战略物资,一向被称为“黑金”,又称为“工业的血液”。它是现代工业国家不可须臾离开的东西。据统计,全世界每天需要近六千万桶(每七点三桶合一吨)原油,仅美国就日需一千八百万桶。然而,地球上石油资源的分布却不象空气那样均匀。大量消耗石油的西方工业国家偏偏蕴藏不多,而那些贫穷落后的非工业国家地下却存在着广阔的油海。据美国《油气杂志》统计,至一九七八年止,中东和北非的石油储量约占全世界储量的百分之六十六,苏美两国储量仅占百分之十五左右,西欧则只占百分之三。因此,消费大量石油的欧美及日本等工业国家每年都要大量进口石油。美国石油消费中仰赖进口的部分近来已占一半,西欧国家占三分之二以上,而日本更几乎全部靠进口。 Cheap Petroleum Boosted the Western Economy Petroleum is the main power resource in the world today. It is also an important industrial raw material or a strategic material. It has always been called “black gold,” also known as “industrial blood.” It is something that modern industrial nations can not leave. According to statistics, nearly 60 million barrels (one-seven-barrel and one-tonne) crude oil are required daily in the world, and the United States alone needs 18 million barrels per day. However, the distribution of oil resources on Earth is not as uniform as the air. The western industrial countries that consume a large amount of oil are rather limited in reserves. However, those poor and backward non-industrial countries have a vast oil field underground. According to the United States, “Oil and Gas Journal” statistics, as of 1978, the Middle East and North Africa’s oil reserves account for about sixty-six percent of the world’s reserves, the Soviet Union and the United States only about 15% of the reserves, Western Europe Only 3%. As a result, industrial countries such as Europe, the United States and Japan, which consume large amounts of oil, have to import large amounts of oil every year. Recently, the part of the United States that relies on imports has accounted for half of the oil consumption in the United States, more than two thirds of the Western European countries, and Japan has imported almost all of it.