Fundamental petroleum fiscal considerations

摘要

Around 95 per cent of governments use fiscal systems based on division of profits, regardless of whether or not they use R/Ts or PSCs. Revenue-sharing systems have been tried and abandoned. If designed properly, the advantages of progressive mechanisms (like R-factors and ROR mechanisms) outweigh the risks, which can be significantly mitigated with more modern designs. When oil prices increased five-fold from 2002 through 2010, government take percentages in most countries fell because most systems were regressive, especially with respect to oil prices. The exceptions to this generality were systems with R-factors or ROR features, together with a few systems which included specific mechanisms designed for variations in product prices (such mechanisms are often called 'windfall profit taxes'). Governments and lOCs continually learn from the unintended consequences of new, untested contract provisions. Because of this, true goldplating is rare; even where it once had the potential to exist, most problems have been, or are being, 'designed out'. Most countries believe they are better off with existing, fairly highly evolved, industry best practices, rather than trying to establish a new framework based on what is essentially a failed system. The revenue-sharing foundation is weak.