PEAK OIL: Going Mainstream

[JihadJane]

'Peak oil: We are asleep at the wheel

Revelations that the Saudis have overstated their oil reserves are a timely reminder of the huge threat to the global economy'

John Vidal's report on US diplomatic cables from Saudi Arabia raises the spectre of premature peak oil: an unexpected decline in global oil production in an oil-dependent world.

The US government is among many administrations that routinely reassure the public that supplies of oil can go on growing far into the future. But in private, top diplomats have been telling Washington that they hold deep concerns about supplies from the world's number one supplier. This is an issue that has far-reaching consequences for an oil-importing nation like the UK, and for the global economy.

 

[stilicho]

AMEN

It will be once the price of fuel multiplies by a factor of ten. Fuel costs are merely another economic input. I predict a rather dramatic increase in demand for alternate transportation modes once fuel prices rise as may be expected.

Not that anyone reads any of JihadJane's links any more but the last one explained that Egypt's revolution was caused in part by Peak Oil and that it was predictable but not really:

The interesting part is that these facts have been in plain view for decades, building into economic and social pressures that were suddenly unleashed in a wave of social and political unrest.

Here I thought it was simply a matter of applying the Bush Doctrine to other authoritarian regimes throughout the Middle East.

 

[stilicho]

The US government is among many administrations that routinely reassure the public that supplies of oil can go on growing far into the future.

Cite?

Most Western governments (we're talking Europe and North America) have been diligently working on alternate and unconventional energy for over a decade now. Contrary to your false claims, the US Dept of Energy has a poster-sized Peak Oil document sitting right here on its own website:

http://fossil.energy.gov/programs/reserves/npr/publications/Peak_Oil_-_the_Tipping_Point_final.pdf

 

[Hindmost]

Cite?

Most Western governments (we're talking Europe and North America) have been diligently working on alternate and unconventional energy for over a decade now. Contrary to your false claims, the US Dept of Energy has a poster-sized Peak Oil document sitting right here on its own website:

http://fossil.energy.gov/programs/reserves/npr/publications/Peak_Oil_-_the_Tipping_Point_final.pdf

Unfortunately, this has only been true in the past few years--at least in the US...prior predictions assumed continued increased production. When oil prices hit 140 USD per barrel...then it started to hit the front page a bit more.

glenn

http://www.fypower.org/pdf/DOE_EnergyOutlook_2007.pdf (pg 39)


In the IEO2007 reference case, world consumption of petroleum and other liquid fuels4 grows from 83 million barrels oil equivalent per day in 2004 to 97 million in 2015 and 118 million in 2030. The demand for liquids increases strongly in the projections, despite world oil prices that remain above $49 per barrel5 throughout the period. Much of the overall increase in liquids consumption is projected for the nations of non-OECD Asia, where strong economic growth is expected. To meet the increase in liquids consumption in the IEO2007 reference case, liquids production is projected to increase by 14 million barrels per day from 2004 to 2015 and by an additional 20 million barrels per day from 2015 to 2030.

 

[stilicho]

Unfortunately, this has only been true in the past few years--at least in the US...prior predictions assumed continued increased production. When oil prices hit 140 USD per barrel...then it started to hit the front page a bit more.

glenn

http://www.fypower.org/pdf/DOE_EnergyOutlook_2007.pdf (pg 39)


In the IEO2007 reference case, world consumption of petroleum and other liquid fuels4 grows from 83 million barrels oil equivalent per day in 2004 to 97 million in 2015 and 118 million in 2030. The demand for liquids increases strongly in the projections, despite world oil prices that remain above $49 per barrel5 throughout the period. Much of the overall increase in liquids consumption is projected for the nations of non-OECD Asia, where strong economic growth is expected. To meet the increase in liquids consumption in the IEO2007 reference case, liquids production is projected to increase by 14 million barrels per day from 2004 to 2015 and by an additional 20 million barrels per day from 2015 to 2030.

We're not talking about what hits the news. We're talking about what the professionals at the US Dept of Energy, among others, have known about and have been addressing now for more than a decade.

I think we're saying the same thing.

 

[Hindmost]

We're not talking about what hits the news. We're talking about what the professionals at the US Dept of Energy, among others, have known about and have been addressing now for more than a decade.

I think we're saying the same thing.

The quote I put up was from the DOE...however, I did pick it up from an unusual website. If you go over to the EIA site and look at past reports on oil and gas production projections, there is a lack of any analysis related to peak oil. After 2007-2008, the tone changed. In the US, it was just business as usual until the big oil price spike...

http://www.eia.doe.gov/forecasts/aeo/index.cfm

You can review the past reports...scroll to bottom and there is a pick list.

glenn

 

[stilicho]

The quote I put up was from the DOE...however, I did pick it up from an unusual website. If you go over to the EIA site and look at past reports on oil and gas production projections, there is a lack of any analysis related to peak oil. After 2007-2008, the tone changed. In the US, it was just business as usual until the big oil price spike...

http://www.eia.doe.gov/forecasts/aeo/index.cfm

You can review the past reports...scroll to bottom and there is a pick list.

glenn

I'd have to go back to the library. That site is incomplete. There were provisions for alternative fuels dating back to the studies compiled prior to the Energy Policy Act of 1992. It could be that the magical incantation "Peak Oil" wasn't employed by that agency but it certainly wasn't unknown to the geologists and other professionals working for the government. I knew about it from undergraduate geography classes many years ago.

I think we're quibbling here, don't you? JihadJane is arguing something quite different and that is that the government "routinely reassures the public that supplies of oil can go on growing far into the future". There's plenty of evidence that is not the case.

 

[Hindmost]

I'd have to go back to the library. That site is incomplete. There were provisions for alternative fuels dating back to the studies compiled prior to the Energy Policy Act of 1992. It could be that the magical incantation "Peak Oil" wasn't employed by that agency but it certainly wasn't unknown to the geologists and other professionals working for the government. I knew about it from undergraduate geography classes many years ago.

I think we're quibbling here, don't you? JihadJane is arguing something quite different and that is that the government "routinely reassures the public that supplies of oil can go on growing far into the future". There's plenty of evidence that is not the case.

I don't mean to be quibbling..I agree that professionals have known about it for a long time. I have followed energy issues from my time in school in the 70s and have seen the issue get worse from then. The US hasn't had a comprehensive policy on energy ever. Every time an attempt to start any type of sustainable policy is initiated, oil prices drop and we go back to complacency. Plus, there a significant numbers of legislators that think peak oil will not happen or is in the distant future and the free (subsidized) market will take care of it. They are either naive, delusional or just of low intelligence.

The EIA is DOE's site to provide energy statistic and projections. Some of the older reports had projections of future oil production of 130 Millon barrels/day just a few years ago (IIRC).

glenn

 

[stilicho]

I don't mean to be quibbling...

Plus, there a significant numbers of legislators that think peak oil will not happen or is in the distant future and the free (subsidized) market will take care of it. They are either naive, delusional or just of low intelligence.

....

There's an easier reason and that is that professionals are not very well organised and have trouble communicating their ideas in a convincing manner.

Informed professionals have also often allowed their ideas to be hijacked by unpalatable interest groups who aren't even major stakeholders. The way to go is to inform in an understandable and appealing manner. The best example, so far, is the recycling rage. Recycling was unthinkable only fifty years ago but it's now a part of the popular parlance. Its propagandists worked on the principles of ease of entry and few compromises in personal choice.

Energy policy simply has a while to catch up in offering such a painless solution.

 

[JihadJane]

' Higher oil prices are a danger to economic recovery'

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/jontalton/2014390219_biztaltoncol06.html

 

[AlBell]

' Higher oil prices are a danger to economic recovery

Does anyone capable of posting here not already know that? Other than you, maybe.

 

[bobc]

' Higher oil prices are a danger to economic recovery'

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/jontalton/2014390219_biztaltoncol06.html

Jon Talton displays the short sightedness and ignorance of many of these "experts".

Actually, if oil production has peaked then low oil prices would be a danger to future economic development. High prices are the market signal that a resource is in short supply, and is the means by which a scarce resource is rationed. High prices also encourage development of alternatives.

Artificially reducing prices may be a short-term way to boost consumption, but over the long term completely misguided. High oil prices are part of the answer, not part of the problem.

 

[JihadJane]

'US military warns oil output may dip causing massive shortages by 2015':


The energy crisis outlined in a Joint Operating Environment report from the US Joint Forces Command, comes as the price of petrol in Britain reaches record levels and the cost of crude is predicted to soon top $100 a barrel.

"By 2012, surplus oil production capacity could entirely disappear, and as early as 2015, the shortfall in output could reach nearly 10 million barrels per day," says the report, which has a foreword by a senior commander, General James N Mattis.

It adds: "While it is difficult to predict precisely what economic, political, and strategic effects such a shortfall might produce, it surely would reduce the prospects for growth in both the developing and developed worlds. Such an economic slowdown would exacerbate other unresolved tensions, push fragile and failing states further down the path toward collapse, and perhaps have serious economic impact on both China and India."

 

[JihadJane]

'Saudi Arabia did not make up for Libyan oil'

 

[JihadJane]

'Cheap energy no more, IEA says'


The global energy sector will have to kick into high gear to meet soaring demand, the IEA said as it warned of the end of cheap energy.

The International Energy Agency warned that it won't be easy to reverse the rise in energy prices because it's getting harder to access and exploit conventional resources.

"The age of cheap energy is over," said IEA Executive Director Nobuo Tanaka in a statement from Luxembourg

 

[JihadJane]

'UK ministers ignored 'peak oil' warnings, report shows
Report reveals threat of civil unrest from energy shortages, which has been played down as 'alarmist' by ministers'

***The government was warned by its own civil servants two years ago that there could be "significant negative economic consequences" to the UK posed by near-term "peak oil" energy shortages.

Ministers were told it was impossible to know exactly when production might fail to meet supply but when it did there could be global consequences, including "civil unrest".

Yet ministers consistently played down the threat with the contemporaneous Wicks review into energy security effectively dismissing peak oil as alarmist and irrelevant.***

 

[UndercoverElephant]

Yes, it's going mainstream. Still plenty of people out there in denial but the centre of gravity is shifting. Soon it will be those who don't believe in Peak Oil who are the minority.

 

[The Don]

'UK ministers ignored 'peak oil' warnings, report showshttp://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2011/jun/15/peak-oil-warning

The article linked warns that there COULD be negative consequences of peak oil but that there is no forecast of when peak oil will occur.

So in essence the government is being asked to assign resource to prepare for an undefined threat at an unknown point in the future.

 

[UndercoverElephant]

The article linked warns that there COULD be negative consequences of peak oil but that there is no forecast of when peak oil will occur.

So in essence the government is being asked to assign resource to prepare for an undefined threat at an unknown point in the future.

http://www.businessgreen.com/bg/news/2072738/exclusive-government-develop-oil-shock-response-plan

Specifically, Huhne agreed that DECC and ITPOES would work together on peak oil threat assessment and contingency planning.

Details on the collaboration are yet to be agreed, but the group is expected to be tasked with modeling some of the impacts that could result if, as growing number of experts fear, global oil supplies peak within the next five years.

Members of the taskforce said they would also explore steps that would need to be taken now to protect the UK economy "if we knew that the oil price would soar to $250 in 2014".

 

[JihadJane]

The article linked warns that there COULD be negative consequences of peak oil but that there is no forecast of when peak oil will occur.

So in essence the government is being asked to assign resource to prepare for an undefined threat at an unknown point in the future.

The article also points out that a US Military Joint Forces Command review in 2010 predicted surplus oil production could disappear as early as next year.