200 plus oil

[Dymanic]

That the oil is there waiting to be tapped is not the critical factor. It's a matter of the rate at which it can be extracted and what it costs to extract it. There is a reciprocal relationship between the two, as DavidS pointed out on page 2 of this thread:

How close we are [to peak oil] depends strongly on how much you're willing to pay. Seriously -- nobody's going to spend several billiion dollars to develop an oilfield under a mile and a half of ocean a hundred miles from land unless they're fairly confident the oil it will produce can be sold for enough money to make it worth doing.

He went on to ask:

Besides, does it really matter whether production truly hits a peak or simply gets outrun by demand?

Poke a hole into a previously untapped pocket of oil and the stuff literally comes gushing out -- at first. Keep drilling more holes and extracting more oil and the pressure starts to drop (plus, the stuff gets thicker toward the bottom). Once the point of diminishing returns is reached, there's no longer an advantage in drilling more holes, though you can continue to work the ones already in place. Eventually, even that ceases to be worthwhile, as the amount of energy it takes to extract what's left becomes greater than what you'd get out of it after refining. Somewhere in between, there's a point where the price being offered has to be very high in order to make continued effort profitable. That is when you start thinking about packing it in. Hubbert's insight was that the same relentless mathematics of this apply without regard for the size of the source being tapped (and ultimately to global production as a whole).

So I would ask: Does it really matter whether production peaks at the point where the average energy return reaches neutral or at the point where economies are no longer strong enough to provide the impetus to continue investing in more infrastructure?

 

[macdoc]

And, of course, since your source has magically doubled the necessary increase, we "really" only need two new Saudi Arabias built. Just build the infrastructure. The oil is there, waiting to be tapped.

Do honestly trust the reserve figures supplied by the oil nations given the incentive to lie.

Also carbon tax will put a fox in the fat profits henhouse shifting the cost regime.

There is lots of fossil.

Not much cheap fossil oil and that's the peak to be considered.

 

[drkitten]

Do honestly trust the reserve figures supplied by the oil nations given the incentive to lie.

Well, given that the oil nations have their own figures, and the oil COMPANIES have their own figures, and the UN has its own figures, all more or less independently derived, I think we can pull some fairly accurate consensus estimates out, yes.

Or we could simply, you know, make stuff up out of thin air with no basis in any sort of geology whatsoever. As the scaremongers Truth seems to like citing do.

It's one thing to have a wrong estimate -- and another thing entirely to completely and deliberately misrepresent the estimates in an attempt to sell more of whatever disaster-preparation product you're pushing, as rapidtrends.com demonstrably does.

To begin with, the latter is called "fraud" and is a crime. And the people who fall for such frauds are called "marks" and/or "chumps."

When they're not called "victims."

 

[Hindmost]

No, it doesn't. From the IEA (above):

World oil production, net of processing gains, is projected to rise from 82 mb/d in 2007 to 104 mb/d in 2030.

Last time I checked, 104-82 = 22, not 45.



So? All this means is that we've got to dig more wells. The oil is there (as the IEA report makes clear (from above):

The world’s endowment of oil is large enough to support the projected rise in output, but rising oilfield decline rates will push up investment needs. Proven reserves of close to 1.3 trillion barrels equal more than 40 years of output at current rates; remaining recoverable resources of conventional oil alone are almost twice as big.

And, of course, since your source has magically doubled the necessary increase, we "really" only need two new Saudi Arabias built. Just build the infrastructure. The oil is there, waiting to be tapped.

It is doubtful that "proven reserves" are actually proven. There is no accepted method for the world's oil nations to report their reserves. The US guidelines are to report only P90 reserves.

Drilling is not going to increase production from existing fields. The point of no return hits at the peak and most major fields on the planet have hit their peak. Even the Saudis are pumping sea water into some of their fields. Enhance recovery method may even accelerate the downside or even damage fields.

The recession has masked the issue of late. It will be extremely difficult to get production higher than 90 million barrels a day for any extended period and there is no way the fields we have on the planet are going to pump at the current rate 30 years from now. Look at north slope data to see the trends.

http://www.dieoff.org/page140.htm

glenn

 

[The Truth Hurts]

The oil is there "waiting to be tapped", only it is not about how much oil there is, it is all about the production rate and the price of the oil. Todays oil is not in giant liquid oil reserves but tied up in oil shale, tar sands or deep sea. These are all very costly and SLOW ways to obtain oil. It is the COST and the PRODUCTION RATE that matter to Peak Oilers, not the amount in the ground.

BTW - you have obviously done very little of your own investigation into the plausibility of peak oil drkitten because if you had any understanding about the oil situation you would not be using throw away lines such as "we only need two new Saudi Arabias" because you would understand how ridiculous it is to think we have any more oil wells like Gharwar which is approx 3 times bigger than the next biggest oil well, an absolute monster!

 

[drkitten]

The oil is there "waiting to be tapped", only it is not about how much oil there is, it is all about the production rate and the price of the oil. Todays oil is not in giant liquid oil reserves but tied up in oil shale, tar sands or deep sea. These are all very costly and SLOW ways to obtain oil. It is the COST and the PRODUCTION RATE that matter to Peak Oilers, not the amount in the ground.

And not the facts, either. Unfortunately.

The problem is, you're lying about it. You're saying that the oil isn't there at all. It is*). You're saying that the expected growth of oil use will trump the amount that can be developed. It won't(*). Now you say that it can't physically be pumped out of the ground fast enough. It can(*).

(*) at least, according to the IEA.

You and your fellow-travellers have been systematically misrepresenting what the IEA documents say.

So why should anyone believe your cost estimates, when you and your own sources already misrepresent all the other numbers coming out of the expertise?

Believe it or not, I'm a peak oiler myself.

The difference is, I'm an honest one.

 

[Dymanic]

It is doubtful that "proven reserves" are actually proven. There is no accepted method for the world's oil nations to report their reserves.

As was discussed much earlier in the thread, it's worse than that. There are fairly obvious reasons for oil producing nations to overestimate the size of their reserves. Saudi Arabia, the world's largest producer, treats it as a national secret. But honesty in reporting is not the only limiting factor; estimating oil reserves always involves a degree of uncertainty.

Even the Saudis are pumping sea water into some of their fields.

Also discussed earlier, that isn't a very reliable indicator by itself.

The recession has masked the issue of late.

It's done more than that. It has directly influenced the amount of oil being produced. Perhaps this means we can relax a little as far as the threat of economic collapse due to peak oil is concerned. In a similar sense, an arson threat might not be taken too seriously if the building is already on fire due to an electrical short.

 

[The Truth Hurts]

Perhaps this means we can relax a little as far as the threat of economic collapse due to peak oil is concerned. In a similar sense, an arson threat might not be taken too seriously if the building is already on fire due to an electrical short.

Unfortunately regardless of the recession/depression if we do pass peak of oil production as I am predicting the decline in global production will quickly overtake the demand destruction we have seen in the global economy. Especially if the decline rate is even half of what has been predicted by the IEA.

 

[The Truth Hurts]

When will the oil run out?
George Monbiot puts the question to Fatih Birol, chief economist of the International Energy Agency - and is both astonished and alarmed by the answer
The Guardian, Monday 15 December 2008

http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2008/dec/15/oil-peak-energy-iea

Includes video of the interview.

 

[The Truth Hurts]

No, it doesn't. From the IEA (above):

World oil production, net of processing gains, is projected to rise from 82 mb/d in 2007 to 104 mb/d in 2030.

Last time I checked, 104-82 = 22, not 45.

I was wondering why your argument made sense and then I realized that you had failed to understand that 45 million barrels per day are required to get to 104 mb/d from 82 mb/d because they have to make up for the fact that the majority of oil wells in the world are declining.

Let me know if you need further explanation.

 

[Hindmost]

As was discussed much earlier in the thread, it's worse than that. There are fairly obvious reasons for oil producing nations to overestimate the size of their reserves. Saudi Arabia, the world's largest producer, treats it as a national secret. But honesty in reporting is not the only limiting factor; estimating oil reserves always involves a degree of uncertainty.

Also discussed earlier, that isn't a very reliable indicator by itself.

It's done more than that. It has directly influenced the amount of oil being produced. Perhaps this means we can relax a little as far as the threat of economic collapse due to peak oil is concerned. In a similar sense, an arson threat might not be taken too seriously if the building is already on fire due to an electrical short.

sorry I missed some of the earlier posts...I have posted on this topic often and pulled the post trigger a bit to quickly.

glenn