After decades of inertia, the energy-reform proposal given general approval by the Mexican Senate late Tuesday goes even further than many had expected. The country’s rapidly changing energy relationship with its northern neighbor helps explain why. Mexico’s dismal decline in oil production, to 2.94 million barrels per day last year from 3.85 million in 2004, is the obvious impetus for trying to coax in more foreign money and expertise. But an even starker picture emerges when you look at Mexico’s overall energy trade in oil and gas with the U.S. Using trailing 12-month averages, Mexico’s exports of crude oil to the U.S. peaked at 1.63 million barrels per day in fall 2006. By August this year, that was down to less than 0.9 million barrels—a level last seen in the early 1990s. U.S. exports of crude oil are effectively prohibited, but that isn’t true for refined products such as […]