Insight and inspiration in turbulent times.
Today’s post goes into the global consumption of energy and provides a dataset in Excel for researchers on global primary energy consumption from 1830 to 2010. We are now burning 10 times as much energy as a century ago to provide the goods and services we consume. Energy consumption is still increasing rapidly
Video of a spirited debate on peak oil between John Hofmeister (Shell) and Ted Patzek (University of Texas and ASPO-USA).
Consider the latest news from the Middle East and North Africa, and one grasps why many U.S. oil and geopolitical analysts are cheering what they see as a prospect that the country will seriously trim its oil imports.
– Peter Tertzakian: Mr. Darcy’s earth shattering results
– Four Scenarios For The Future Of Energy
– Le pic de pétrole passé depuis 2005 ? Un expert (Jean Laherrère) nous répond
– Flawed views on peak oil rear their ugly heads again
– Ex-Shell CEO Hofmeister takes on Tad Patzek in debate on oil crisis (Feb 14 in Madison)
In the past month, three major peer-reviewed journals have published articles relating to limited world oil supply. This is significant, because articles in the mainstream press, such as Bloomberg in a recent article , seem to suggest that our oil problems are past. While the US oil supply situation may be a little better, the world supply situation is still very bad, and oil prices are still very high around the world.
– Former OPEC researcher on peak oil
– Science: Technology Is Turning U.S. Oil Around But Not the World’s
– Former deputy prime minister of Australia: ‘Peak everything’
– Peak oil moves to the mainstream
The shale gas phenomenon is so new, and the data so thin, that one wonders at the wisdom of making long-term export decisions with perhaps irreversible consequences. The last two energy manias lived and died without a wisp of a memory. This one, if it goes wrong, may not be so benign.
A weekly roundup of peak oil news, including:
-Oil and the global economy
-The Iranian confrontation
-The February oil market report
-Quote of the week
-Briefs
– My Decade of Being “Peak Oil Aware”
– Peak oil educator Richard Heinberg challenges “binary thinking”
– U.S. Oil Fields Stage “Great Revival,” But No Easing Gas Prices
– Robert Rapier: Peak Oil & Carbon Emissions (video)
‘Peak Oil Scare Fades as Shale, Deepwater Wells Gush Crude’ was the title of one of the lead articles in Bloomberg’s newly launched ‘Sustainability’ section this week. The report echoes a growing number of press reports announcing the end of the “myth” of peak oil. So what gives?
That conventional oil has peaked and will be in decline over the next decades is no longer controversial – so in that sense peak oil has been and gone, and the economic consequences are evident.
It is an article of faith that global trade will be an ever-growing presence in the world. Yet this belief rests on shaky foundations. Global trade depends on cheap, long-distance freight transportation. Freight costs will rise with climate change, the end of cheap oil, and policies to mitigate these two challenges.
… In addition to the corporate response, there is a second, more local, noncorporate response. This response is found in the Relocalization and Transition Towns movements now springing up in many developed countries. It is a bottom-up response that includes individuals and municipalities planning for a post-peak-oil future and altering their way of life.
A midweekly roundup of peak oil news, including:
-Developments this week
