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Energy Angst: Long-Term Oil Gloom Spreads In Houston
Llewellyn King, North Star Writers Group
Saudi Arabia has more oil, Amsterdam more tankers, New York more money, but Houston has the heart of the global oil industry. These days, it is not beating well. Study after study, executive after executive, and analyst after analyst is warning that there are rough times ahead for oil supply.
Here, oil news is analyzed, sorted and shelved. But in 37 years of writing about energy, in boom and bust, I have never found the kind of fatalism that now grips the oil patch.
The cause of the furrowed brows is simple: The global production and supply of oil, at between 85 and 86 million barrels a day, is straining the system.
…T he most gloomy predictions come from a loose agglomeration of economists and geologists who believe in the theory of “peak” oil.
… If you think the negatives are coming only from oil patch radicals, try Rex Tillerson, chairman of ExxonMobil.
… All of this makes Houston, well, a different place. It has not totally recovered from the collapse of Enron. Amid the prosperity, some of the old bombast has gone. Oil people used to love to ridicule Washington and pour scorn on New York. I find this a more subdued, tolerant, and even chastised Houston.
(19 November 2007)
Richard Heinberg outlines ways to reduce emissions and prepare for a world without oil
Alysoun Bonde, California Aggie (Davis)
Internationally known resource depletion theorist Richard Heinberg, gave a speech at the Universal Unitarian Church Friday on the need to radically change the way industrialized societies view themselves and the world in order to reduce carbon dioxide emissions.
Nearly 100 students and community members attended Heinberg’s lecture on global warming, oil scarcity, reducing carbon emissions, global equity and life in a post-carbon world.
Industrializing nations like India and China have rapidly increasing CO2 emissions, while industrialized countries like the United States pollute at a steady rate while preaching worldwide emissions reduction, Heinberg said.
Industrializing nations resent being told to reduce emissions that are a byproduct of their own increasing prosperity when the industrialized world was free to grow dirty for nearly two centuries. These poorer nations believe North America, Europe and Japan should have to reduce their emissions faster, Heinberg said.
…Heinberg urges all communities to prepare for life in a “post-carbon world.” He warns that steep declines in living standards for citizens of wealthy nations due to the depletion of energy sources are looming. The only way to avert massive social chaos is to prepare, he said.
Communities must think about alternatives to cars like electrified rail, walking and biking, Heinberg said. Re-localizing the food supply through community supported agriculture and personal gardens may also help the transition, he said.
“He suggests that change will come whether we want it to or not,” said Judy Moores, an event organizer. “But we can mitigate the worst effects if we begin to plan and work right now to live with limited supplies of oil-based energy and products.”
(19 November 2007)
Is the Decline of Base Production Accelerating?
Stuart Staniford, The Oil Drum
This analysis looks at how existing oil fields are apparently declining, and finds a trend suggesting those declines are worsening, though the reasons for this are not clear yet.
…I pretty much decided that whole style of bottom-up megaproject analysis was not very useful around that time after this look at Saudi megaprojects and production. But, we know far more than we did in November 2005 and it seems to me that there are now interesting insights to be had from looking at the megaprojects and the various decline rates they imply.
In particular, one of the biggest things we know now that we didn’t know then is that global oil production has been close to flat during that time, as prices have continued to go up and up.
(19 November 2007)
Recommended by Kevin Drum at Washington Monthly who calls it “hardcore peak oil wonkery” (I think this is a compliment). -BA
Estimating the World Production Decline Rates from the Megaproject Forecasts
Khebab, The Oil Drum
Oil production is highly pyramidal and almost half of the world production is coming from less than 0.03% of the total number of oilfields. Therefore, tracking large oil projects seems like a good approach and it is generally easy to gather good information about a few hundreds of important projects. The most notorious studies are from Chris Skrebowski (ODAC) that has tracked megaprojects since 2004.
(19 November 2007)
Contains calculus and equations: not for the mathematically faint-hearted. -BA
More Evidence We’ve Entered the End of Oil
Chuck Squatriglia, Wired
There is growing concern within the petroleum industry that we are approaching a limit to the amount of oil that can be pumped each day, and it might arrive before alternative fuels can be adopted on a large enough scale to avert severe energy shortages, the Wall Street Journal reports.
The story offers what the Journal calls “a significant twist” on the theory of peak oil while underscoring the urgent call to move beyond oil that the International Energy Agency made earlier this month in its annual World Energy Outlook. Taken together, they make a convincing argument that we’ve entered the end of oil and must move quickly, boldly and decisively to supplant oil as our primary source of energy.
No one, least of all the oil industry executives quoted by the Journal or the analysts who wrote the World Energy Outlook, is saying the wells will run dry in our lifetime, or even our children’s lifetimes. There’s still a lot of oil left to be pumped. But there is a growing belief that several factors are converging to create a practical limit to how much we can pull from the earth each day.
(19 November 2007)
More coverage of yesterday’s WSJ article.
Wall Street Journal Takes Peak Oil Seriously
FuturePundit
On the front page today the Wall Street Journal basically legitimized the coming of peak oil.
…The WSJ writers refer to peak oil theorists as “debased” and try to put distance between the supposedly more legitimate statements now coming from the titans of the oil industry and the predictions of supposed peak oil nuts. I think these writers are unfair in their treatment of the lower status and, in their eyes, less legitimate theorizing of petroleum geologists and physicists. How dare anyone but owners and top managers of capital get taken seriously? But the titans of industry were not long ago painting a far rosier energy picture (as were inept national and international energy information agencies) and I’m finding it hard to see them as the more legitimate experts on this topic. The sharpest peak oil theorists are looking a lot more accurate in their assessments than the CEOs of big oil companies.
It is becoming harder to label someone as a fringe kook for saying that Peak Oil is coming Real Soon Now. You can still tell us we are wrong. But I’m no longer fringe on this topic and that of course makes all the difference in the world. It creates a problem for me personally. How can I be cutting edge? Now I’ve got to find more topics to be fringe on since some of my major themes are heading into mainstream legitimacy and acceptance.
(19 November 2007)
Peak Oil – How Will You Ride the Slide?
Oilyboyd, YouTube
We’ve already burned through almost half the world’s supply of oil. How will we ride out the slide down the other side of Hubbert’s Curve?
(17 November 2007)
Peak oil cartoon showing the ride up Hubbert’s Peak.
Energy Bulletin and the Reality Report (audio)
Jason Bradford, Global Public Media
Bart Anderson of Energy Bulletin recaps recent news related to resource depletion, climate change and more. In the past several weeks, with the rising price of oil, Energy Bulletin’s readership has increased by over 40%.
Jason Bradford hosts The Reality Report, broadcast on KZYX&Z in Mendocino County, CA
(20 November 2007)
These talks are becoming more of a back-and-forth between Jason and me, which I think makes them more interesting. I am still working on links/excerpts for the topics we discuss (Unfinished Commitment #37). -BA
