Insight and inspiration in turbulent times.
US oil and gas reserves grew faster than at any time in the past 35 years according to figures released this week by the EIA. The numbers are for 2010 with the increase credited to fracking technology and high oil prices leading to more exploration and development. While the report will be used to provide further confirmation of a new era of energy abundance, there is growing evidence that the realities when it comes to actual production are not as rosy…
Conventional wisdom might suggest that as oil prices rise, developing countries would be less able to afford oil, leaving wealthier countries to bid against each other for increasingly higher-priced supplies. But that is not at all what happened over the past decade, and the trend may give developed countries a reason for concern.
When you go to the mountains, you go to the mountains. When it’s the desert, it’s the desert. When it’s the ocean, though, we generally say that we’re going “to the beach.” Land is our element, not the waters of our world, and that is an unmistakable advantage for any oil company that wants to drill in pristine waters.
At 78 pages of scholarly, somewhat jargon-laden prose, ‘Trade-Off: Financial System Supply-Chain Cross-Contagion’ by David Korowicz is not quick reading, nor is it light reading, but it is important reading.
-Analyst: Calif. shale oil field results disappoint
-Drought strains U.S. oil production
-Gas liquids bloodbath brings shale pain to oil market
-Big Oil and Gas industry writing down billions in U.S. shale gas assets
-EPA finds remaining water safe in famous fracking town
-Shale gas drilling depths argue against Pennsylvania’s Marcellus
-The Real Story Behind the Fracking Debate
-Saudis, Emirates push nuclear power plans
-No easy substitutes for fossil fuels
-BP Statistical Review 2012 Part 2 Australia proved oil reserves overreported by a factor of 2
As America’s corn and soybean crops wither in the current drought, it is time to reconsider our policy of mandating the conversion of a large percent of those crops into ethanol for our gas tanks. Even in a bountiful crop year, there is little sense in a food for fuel policy which takes nearly half of our corn crop for less than 10 percent of our gasoline supply. It can be sustained only by subsidies and mandates which increase prices for grains and the beef, poultry, and other products which depend on grain supplies.
A weekly roundup of peak oil news, including:
-Oil and the global economy
-Middle East
-The Eurozone
-Quote of the week
-Briefs
If Montana is a microcosm of the world, one message to glean is that we are not in the midst of a decades-long flood of oil supply in the United States, as many suggest. Instead, the red lights are blinking across the exuberant U.S. oil patch.
Plenty of ink has already been spilled by oil depletion experts exposing some of the wildly optimistic assumptions contained in Maugeri’s report. More damning is that the work is shot through with crass mistakes that render its forecast worthless. When I interviewed him, Mr Maugeri was forced to admit a mathematical howler that would disgrace the back of an envelope…
Lower oil and US gas prices saw Q2 profits down at most of the oil majors, though Exxon recorded another record quarterly profit of $15.9 billion due to asset sales…
