Fossil Fuels

Is the Global Oil Tank Half-Full, Is It Half-Empty…or Are We Running on Fumes?

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In his article in the New York Times September 24, “Oil Industry Sets a Brisk Pace of New Discoveries”, staff reporter Jad Mouawad cites oil discoveries totaling ten billion barrels for the first half of 2009. The Tiber field in the Gulf of Mexico alone accounts for four to six billion barrels of crude that may eventually find its way into the world oil system. Indeed, this year has seen discovery results that could end up being the best since 2000. But, the article notes, the new oil was expensive to find, it will be expensive to extract, and both exploration and production are only possible because of high levels of investment and sophisticated, expensive new technologies.

Common environments, Diggers, and Climate Campers

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Thoughts on the relationship between food issues, rural movements, and Climate Camps. To be more specific: this post mainly compares the distinct focuses and limitations of the Diggers’ movement toward agricultural autonomy, and the Climate Campers’ rallies and interventions against coal plants, airport expansion projects, and other commercially-driven operations.

The Himalayan Gas Tango

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Through September 2009, the government of India has issued a variety of statements designed to quell India’s long-lived China bogey. It has done so to contain what it calls panic and scare-mongering about alleged incursions over the India-China border by units of the People’s Liberation Army. The ‘incidents’ (as the Indian media like to call the events) have all occurred over India’s north-western border with China, in the mountainous Jammu and Kashmir state.

Peak Oil Not a Problem According to NY Times; Scientific American – Our Response on the Financial Aspects

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Recently, we have had two new articles aiming to put to rest people’s fears about peak oil. One is from the New York Times: Oil Industry Sets a Brisk Pace of New Discoveries It talks about the many discoveries this year, and how, if they continue at the pace they have in the first half, they will be the best since 2000. The other is from the October Scientific American, called Squeezing More Oil from the Ground…Its premise seems to be that there are a lot of promising areas that we have not yet explored. When you put this together with advances in drilling and the promises of secondary and tertiary recovery, there is a good chance that oil production will not peak for many years.

The Aftermath of the Great Recession, Part II

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The outlook for consumption growth in the over-leveraged United States is bleak. Economists Menzie Chinn and Jeffrey Frieden discussed the origins of the financial crisis, the debt situation in the U.S. and the global outlook in Reflections on the Causes and Consequences of the Debt Crisis of 2008. This text broadly describes the origin of the crisis.

San Francisco’s Peak Oil Task Force Report: Excellent, But Lacking

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Now the Task Force’s final Report, completed last March, is being formally considered by the Supervisors on Thursday, Sept. 24, at 1 pm in the Legislative Chamber in City Hall. In this critique I point to positive, progressive initiatives in the Report, some weak areas in it, and above all the essence of understanding peak oil and its implications — significantly lacking in San Francisco and beyond.