Mexico – The Land of Opportunities?

mexico
Mexico - Image by schlaeger
mexico
Mexico – Image by schlaeger

Mexico is currently America’s second largest source of energy related imports, sending around 1,300 thousand barrels of crude oil per day to the United States. Only Canada supplies more crude oil to the USA. Mexico’s future looks pretty bright, too. The country has some large untapped natural gas reserves; enough that if the country developed them properly, it could become energy independent.

These untapped reserves benefit the country in other ways too. The growing energy infrastructure in the country is bolstering the economy, creating jobs for those with the right skills, and increasing demand for other tradespeople too. Extra infrastructure means extra construction projects, which in turn means jobs for skilled welders.

A Market of Opportunities

If you don’t want to move to Mexico to work there, you can still capitalize on their growing industries. Mexican construction sites are going to be looking for plasma cutters for sale, and stocking up on supplies and welding equipment. This is one market where demand is going to be increasing steadily over the next few years. Supplying welding equipment to Mexican companies could be a big opportunity.

Environmentally Conscious

Accessing these untapped natural resources is going to be difficult. Usually, to reach natural gas, companies use the process of hydraulic fracturing, which involves injecting water and chemicals deep underground, breaking up shale natural gas formations, but also polluting underground aquifers. This process is highly controversial, and it’s not clear whether Mexico will choose to go down that route.

The Mexican government has applied for a rather substantial loan from the Inter-American Development Bank. This loan, if it is approved, would be used to fund renewable energy related projects, including electricity generation, and projects that centre around reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

On the surface, those projects may not seem as interesting to international businesses, but ignoring them would be missing a big opportunity. The total value of the green initiatives would be somewhere around $210 million. That’s a big chunk of money, and a lot of that funding will be invested in creating vital infrastructure, which means that if you have plasma cutters for sale they will still be valuable.

Improving their way of Life

There’s still a huge number of Mexicans that are forced to live without drinking water of adequate quality. The gap between well-off Mexicans and poorer Mexicans is huge. If the Mexican government opts to go down the natural gas route, with all of the water pollution risks that it entails, then it could be a long time before the entire population of Mexico gets access to drinking water of acceptable quality.

If you’re looking for a niche to position yourself in, working with environmentally conscious Mexican energy projects could well be the right one. Not only for the positive publicity it would generate, but also for the fact that you would know that the projects your equipment is going to are ones that will make genuine improvements to the lives of tens of thousands of people.

This article was written by James Harper on behalf of Westermans International, who offer plasma cutters for sale and other welding equipment. James has a keen interest in world issues.