What The Oil Drum meant

Over the last eight years, the predictions of the "moderates" in the peak oil debate came closest. We certainly don’t live in the pre-2004 world any more. Oil prices are high, and there seems little prospect that they will ever fall below $100/barrel for any sustained period. Furthermore, the situation remains very vulnerable to disruption.

Should the last few years have updated your idea of peak oil?

Nate Hagens draws my attention to this recent interview with Dennis Meadows, lead author of the famous Limits to Growth series of books. Meadows is very pessimistic. I was particularly interested in his views on oil production and peak oil, in which he states positively that peak oil is in the past (which is very arguable at best, given that oil production is still making new monthly highs), and also that "Oil production will be reduced approximately by half in the next 20 years, even with the exploitation of oil sands or shale oil."

An analysis of World Energy Outlook 2012

On 12 November the IEA’s World Energy Outlook report for 2012 (WEO-2012) was presented by the chief economist of that organisation, Dr Fatih Birol. When he did so there was one idea that the journalists in the audience latched on to – that by 2020 the USA would become the world’s largest oil producer. The USA would even produce more oil than Saudi Arabia!