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Fatih Birol speaks on IEA Report, Financial Crisis, Coal, Depletion, etc. (YouTube)
Fatih Birol, Council of Foreign Relations
Fatih Birol, Chief Economist and Head, Economic Analysis Division, International Energy Agency
Presider: Edward L. Morse, Managing Director, Head of Economic Research, Louis Capital Markets
(Dec 1, 2008)
Also posted at The Oil Drum Thursday.
Congressman Buyer writes Obama: “America must take steps to prepare for peak oil”
Howey Politics Indiana
Buyer backs stimulus with energy
As President-elect Obama prepares an economic stimulus bill to address the current challenges facing the American people, U.S. Rep. Steve Buyer believes there is an opportunity to strengthen our country’s energy portfolio and bolster the American energy industry.
Congressman Steve Buyer today sent a letter to President-elect Obama asking him to include funding in the stimulus to invest in American-made energy and America’s energy infrastructure (Howey Politics Indiana). “America must take steps to prepare for peak oil – when the world’s supply of crude oil peaks in volume, invest in American-made energy, and improve our energy infrastructure. I communicated these concerns to President-elect Obama in my second letter to him outlining proposals to the economic stimulus package,” said Buyer.
“In prioritizing our country’s need for a secure and domestic energy supply, we will stimulate the economy of today while ensuring the prosperity of tomorrow. Today, America is 63 percent dependent on foreign sources of energy, and we grow more dependent by the year. We need to bridge ourselves to the renewable and alternative energy future in which we all want to live in.”
Buyer supports funds in the Economic Stimulus Package to bolster the economy through the development of American-made energy. America becoming more prominent in the energy business will create domestic jobs – not in foreign countries. By investing in biofuels, the economic stimulus can simultaneously diversify our energy supply while supporting the American farmer.
(9 January 2009)
Michael Klare: Oil 2009 – Be Careful What You Wish For
Michael T. Klare, TomDispatch
Only yesterday, it seems, we were bemoaning the high price of oil. Under the headline “Oil’s Rapid Rise Stirs Talk of $200 a Barrel This Year,” the July 7 issue of the Wall Street Journal warned that prices that high would put “extreme strains on large sectors of the U.S. economy.” Today, oil, at over $40 a barrel, costs less than one-third what it did in July, and some economists have predicted that it could fall as low as $25 a barrel in 2009.
Prices that low — and their equivalents at the gas pump — will no doubt be viewed as a godsend by many hard-hit American consumers, even if they ensure severe economic hardship in oil-producing countries like Nigeria, Russia, Iran, Kuwait, and Venezuela that depend on energy exports for a large share of their national income. Here, however, is a simple but crucial reality to keep in mind: No matter how much it costs, whether it’s rising or falling, oil has a profound impact on the world we inhabit — and this will be no less true in 2009 than in 2008.
The main reason? In good times and bad, oil will continue to supply the largest share of the world’s energy supply. For all the talk of alternatives, petroleum will remain the number one source of energy for at least the next several decades. According to December 2008 projections from the U.S. Department of Energy (DoE), petroleum products will still make up 38% of America’s total energy supply in 2015; natural gas and coal only 23% each. Oil’s overall share is expected to decline slightly as biofuels (and other alternatives) take on a larger percentage of the total, but even in 2030 — the furthest the DoE is currently willing to project — it will still remain the dominant fuel.
A similar pattern holds for the planet as a whole: Although biofuels and other renewable sources of energy are expected to play a growing role in the global energy equation, don’t expect oil to be anything but the world’s leading source of fuel for decades to come.
Keep your eye on the politics of oil and you’ll always know a lot about what’s actually happening on this planet. Low prices, as at present, are bad for producers, and so will hurt a number of countries that the U.S. government considers hostile, including Venezuela, Iran, and even that natural-gas-and-oil giant Russia.
(8 January 2009)
Also at Balitmore Chronicle and Common Dreams.
Oil Price Volatility and Economic Chaos
Ryan McGreal, Raise the Hammer
With a carbon tax, tougher energy efficiency regulations and incentives for innovation in energy production and conservation, we may not be too late to stay ahead of the coming permanent decline in oil production.
Ryan McGreal, the editor of Raise the Hammer, lives in Hamilton with his family and works as a process and service analyst, web application developer, writer, and journal editor.
(8 January 2009)
Long overview of the peak oil situation by from one of the early peak oil – related sites. -BA
