I recently stopped posting in AP because noone seemed to want to respectfully and intellectually debate/discuss topics of any relevance. I am sincerely hoping that Freediver is right in suggesting this group here. I was hoping to discuss peak oil and any opinions or predictions as to when it will occur. Possible supplements and what effect it will cause. There is a link....www.peakoil.com, very interesting, check it out and get back.

                                 signed,

                                              hoping for adult conversation.

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Take Action >> Tell Bush Enough is Enough!

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Here's the link

http://members.greenpeace.org/action/start.php?action_id=78&ref_source=newsletter20060131

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Peak oil will eventualy lead to mass unemployement. Less work, less oil needed.

Perhaps we should stop the war. That uses a lot of energy. Perhaps we should consume less, eat less meat, etc...

Perhaps I am cynical, but the Manhattan project was a giant operation. They brought together hundreds, or were it thousands of scientist to produce a atom bomb. When we could use such a combined effort (high investment cost) to solve the energy problem maybe we could do more than we thought we could.

Pyramids are also an example of what's possible when humans are commited to a goal.

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Jeffery, chew over this for a moment would ya...When peak oil hits, how high do you think the prices for gas will become? Do you not think that the oil manufacturers want AS MUCH oil as they can get for when this occurs? They stand to make an unforseen amount of money when this happens. How can you deny this?

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http://www.hubbertpeak.com/hubbert/

http://mysite.verizon.net/vze495hz/id9.html

http://www.peakoil.net/

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Do you think they want to leave their money sitting in the ground?

This is what they do, produce oil, are they going to stop because it will run out? No they are going to get as much as they can before that happens

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How could geologists or anyone else for that matter know where every drop of petroleum is within this planet?  Some good guesses maybe, but no estimate would be convincing enough to implement rationing, not when it is the political animal that will be doing the decision making.

Whether or not our petroleum supply is waning or not, is like arguing over which came first, the chicken or the egg.  It is what the CONSUMPTION of petroleum is doing to our air, water, and soil, that will prove more toxic and untenable, than the 'inconvenience' of higher prices, and 'alternative' fuel sources.  Now, whether or not we humans poison ourselves to death, PRIOR to 'running out' of petroleum.... Now, that is the question.  Perhaps this is our lame way of accomodating the massive human population reduction the planet so desperately needs...  greed, bigotry, arrogance, are all hallmarks of the destructive paradigm of take take take... 

Those that really believe, that the world's supply of petroleum is near it's end, are the true optimists... they think we will all be able to withdraw from the tit of petrol, before we expire from our own self-destructive means of power.

I tend to be more of a realist, albeit an idealist as well.  And I think there will be alot more years of 'big oil', and the sicknesses and wars that will be generated because of both it's power, and it's toxic nature.  I tried to hate 'oil', but I just can't, I value too many of the things petroleum has made possible.  It's the Beast that the petrol suppliers has become, that is really the effusive threat that we all face.  This Beast, has turned a miracle of science and technology, into a greedy, and soulless force for power.  I am not talking about one company, or this or that group of people, that's not where the evil lies.  It's the amalgam of corporate power and political power, that has hijacked our hopes for a better world for our children... and petroleum is just the means for the short-sighted and power-hungry to lay claim to arrogant and delusional victory, while the prognosis for long-term health and prosperity of humans and the planet become a dim and sorry hope.

sorry for the rant, but it seemed like the right thread for it.

OM Shanti

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Oil producers have wised up. More money is saved than ever before; more jobs are being created in the private sector; real estate and stock markets are booming; and governments are encouraging a diversification of their economies to move them away from oil's increasingly volatile cycles.

..Analysts following the oil policies of Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries members say the group is seeking to defend a minimum price of $55 a barrel and, if needed, would be willing to cut production to maintain prices above that level. That policy, never voiced officially by any OPEC representative, is meant to avoid a repeat of the 1998 price collapse, which nearly bankrupted producers.   (peakoil.com)

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I also would like to hear your explanation of why the price per gallon in real dollars ahsn't changed in 25 years.

I answered....

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US oil peaked in 1972 -- geologists were only off by 6 months.. assuming that the capacity to predict has either remained the same or improved, predictions that we are likely to run out of oil within the next decade should be taken seriously.

from my understanding -- the only way a huge profit can be made is by the abrupt transition to a new energy source.  it would not benefit investors if it were developed over the long term.  therefore it would behoove oil companies to stick with drilling for oil until it peaks and then using their capital to create and control the next energy supply.  this goes along with a predominent mentality in america that "technology will always save us".  we were resourceful when it came to employing oil, why shouldn't we be equally or more so successful when 150 years later we turn to a new energy source? 

http://dieoff.org/page140.htm

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"All this when Arthur R. Green, lecturer for the American Association of Petroleum Geologists and former chief geoscientist of ExxonMobil, says world oil production is nearing its peak. "

-- Charles Burch, retired senior staffer at Conoco

Oil Companies Discover Sustainability July 30 2005.  

so  

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I am reposting this because you never commented on it. Do you believe these sources to be invalid?

There are 317 days until WOCAP (World oil production company) Peak Oil Date,There are 682 days until ASPO (association for the study of peak oil and gas)Peak Oil DateThere are 9083 days until USGS (United  States Geological Survey)Peak Oil Date.

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I have to agree with Jeffrey here.

Peak oil means all the easy oil will be gone.  There will still be oil to find, and produce, albeit more expensively (sour crude, found in sand and bedrock, as opposed to "sweet" easily extracted crude).  At that time, alternative sources will be more feasible because the "cost-gap" will be narrowed considerably.

You want to invest in oil?  Find a company that has already converted their production capacity to handle sour crude.  Jeffrey, back me up here...isn't Valero an attractive investment these days?

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Amanda, welcome to the group.

Peak oil is not going to be such a disaster. It means we will be about half way through our oil reserves. Oil will keep being produced afterwards, although hopefully renewables will replace it. We will not run out of oil. The price will just keep going up until we find an alternative source. Given how wasteful we are with oil at the moment, I don't think this will be a major long term adjustment.

The comapnies that extract and transport the oil (what we usually think of as oil companies) will make roughly the same amount of profit per unit of oil produced regardless of the price, provided the market remains competitive. The people that own the oil reserves will make a lot more money as the price goes up.

Jeffrey, do you know of any geological societies that claim that we are not near peak oil production? Repeatedly claiming that they do not without giving any examples just wastes everybodies time.

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From what I could tell it shows peak occurring in 20 years time, with only a 5% chance of it occurring  in 40 years.

Why does it show such a sharp drop in oil production after peak oil? Does most of the available oil cost about the same to extract?

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More prosperity means a greater use of fuel – there can be no doubt about that.  At present, the prosperity gap between the poor of this world and the rich is very wide indeed, and this is clearly shown in their respective fuel consumption.  Let us define as “rich” all populations in countries with an average fuel consumption – in 1966 – of more than one metric ton of coal equivalent (abbr. c.e.) per head, and as “poor” all those below this level.  On these definitions we cam draw i[ the table below (using United Nation figures throughout).

 The average fuel consumption per head of the “poor” is only .32 tons – roughly 1/14 of that of the “rich” and there are very many “poor” people in the world. – on these definitions – nearly 7/10 of the world population.  If the “poor” suddenly used as much fuel as the “rich”, world fuel consumption would treble right away.

 Table 1 (1966)

Rich(%)            Poor (%)                      World (%)

Populations (millions)

1060 (31)         2284 (69)                     3344 (100)

Fuel consumption (million tons c.e.)

                                    4788 (87)         721 (13)                       5509 (100)

Fuel consumption per head (tons c.e.)

                                    4.52                 .32                               1.65

 But this cannot happen as everything takes time.  And in time both the “rich” and the “poor” are growing in desires and numbers.  So let us make an exploratory calculation.  If the “rich” populations grow at the rate of 1.25% and the “poor” at the rate of 2.5% per year, world population will grow to about 6900 million by A.D. 2000 – a figure not very different from the most authoritative forecasts  Of at the same time the fuel consumption per head of the “rich” populations grows by 2.5% while that of the “poor” grows by 4.5% a year, the following figures will emerge for the year A.D. 2000.

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Table 2 (A.D. 2000)

Rich(%)            Poor (%)                      World (%)

Populations (millions)

1617 (23)         5292 (77)                     6909 (100)

Fuel Consumption (million tons c.e.)

                                    15588 (67)       7568 (33)                     23156 (100)

Fuel consumption per head (tons c.e.)

                                    9.64                 1.43                             3.35

The total result on world fuel consumption would be a growth from 5.5 milliard tons c.e. in 1966 to 23.3 milliard tons in the year 2000 – an increase by a factor of more than four, half of which would be attributable to population increase and half to increased fuel consumption per head.

This half and half split is interested enough.  But the split between the “rich” and the “poor” is even more interesting.  Of the total increase in world fuel consumption from 5.5 milliard to 23.3 milliard tons c.e., i.e. an increase by 17.7 milliard tons, the “rich” would account for nearly 2/3 and the “poor” for only a little over 1/3.  Over the whole 34 year period, the world would use 425 milliard tons of coal equivalent, with the “rich” using 321 milliards or 75% and the “poor” 104 milliards. 

E. F. Schumacher “Peace and Permanence”.  Small is Beautiful.  Harper Perennial. New York.  pp. 25-27 © 1973

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So is it like 6% of the earth's population is using up over half the available natural resources and the rest of the people on the planet want the same standard of living and if they somehow got it like tomorrow we'd burn up the freak'n planet in a few weeks?

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What assumptions do they make about the uptake of renewables? That would be hard to predict.

Sarvo: yes.

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http://www.oilcrisis.com/summary.htm

Figure 1
This graph depicts world oil production to date.
The vertical line indicates the probable midpoint of
depletion as identified by Campbell.
(Refer to future scenarios as estimated by Campbell and others.)

Figure 2
Graph showing Production (Mbd) against Time (Years), based on Campbell’s data.

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Hate to be the Cynic, but from all I have read and can find, we have already passed the peak of oil production.  There have been no major finds since the 1970s. The area in the mid-east has already used over half of what was found. The emphasis for geologists now is to get as much of the remaining oil out as fast as possible. No new oil producing areas are being located. Just looking for better ways to find how to get the little that remains most economicaly.

How much oil is there in the world?
In 1996 there were 1,047,200 million barrels of proven crude oil reserves, of which 76.6 per cent was in OPEC Member Countries.
(from OPEC Annual Statistical Bulletin: 1996).
http://www.opec.org/faqs.htm

How much oil do the top oil producers produce a day?
Amount of oil produced per day:

• Saudi Arabia* - 8.1 million barrels per day;
  *Including share of production from the Neutral Zone
• Former Soviet Union - 6.9 million barrels per day;
• United States - 6.5 million barrels per day;
• I.R. Iran - 3.6 million barrels per day;
• China - 3.2 million barrels per day.

(from OPEC Annual Statistical Bulletin: 1996).
http://www.opec.org/faqs.htm

Which countries use the most oil and gas?
The top oil user is the USA (17 million barrels per day) and top gas user is the former Soviet Union (23,000 billion cubic feet per year)
http://www.lib.kth.se/~lg/envsite.htm

How much oil does the world consume each day?
The total world consumption of crude oil in 1996 was 71.7 million barrels per day (there are 42 US gallons in a barrel, or 159 litres). OPEC estimates that total world oil consumption could reach around 100 million barrels per day by the year 2020.
(From OPEC Annual Statistical Bulletin: 1996, OWEM Scenarios Report: 1998.)
http://www.opec.org/faqs.htm

There are some newer stats, that I lost track of, if I find them I will post them. But the outcome looks the same. At best we can expect the known world reserves to be depleted in about 20 years. The mid east reserves to be depleted in 10 to 15 years, which is going to force production in the currently environmentaly protected areas.  Current production areas, without new drilling, will be depleted in 5 to 10 years.

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Will oil remain the most important source of energy?
Yes, OPEC forecasts that oil demand will continue to grow strongly and oil will remain the world's single most important source of energy for the foreseeable future. OPEC forecasts that oil's share of the worldwide energy market will fall from almost 40 per cent in 1995 to less than 37 per cent in 2020. But oil will still be the world's single largest source of energy. The reduction in oil's market share is largely due to the stronger growth enjoyed by other forms of energy, particularly gas. The amount of oil demanded worldwide is actually expected to rise, from around 70 million barrels per day in 1995 to about 100 million barrels per day in 2020.
http://www.opec.org/faqs.htm

Advocates of a production peak coming soon offer several pieces of evidence:

• Total world oil production reached 68 million barrels per day in 2003, according to a count by the Oil and Gas Journal. That's not much above the 66.7 million barrels per day. in 2001. Oil reserves estimated at 1.266 trillion are up only a bit from 1.213 trillion a year earlier.

• Production has peaked for more than 50 oil-producing nations, including the US (1970) and Britain (1999). China, second to the US in the consumption of oil, was a net exporter of oil until five years ago.

• The Department of Energy predicts world demand will reach 119 million b.p.d. in 2025, with huge increases in China, India, and other developing nations.

• In 2002, the world used four times as much oil as was newly found.

• The rate of discovery of worldwide oil reserves, after declining for 40 years, has slowed to a trickle. In 2000, there were 16 large discoveries of oil, eight in 2001, three in 2002, and none last year, notes James Meyer, director of the Oil Depletion Analysis Centre in London.

• All the giant fields, such as those in the Middle East, have already been discovered, some experts say. These giants are relatively easy to find. The last major oil field, Cantarell, off Mexico's shore, was discovered in 1976.

"The oil companies are drilling fewer and fewer wells," says Colin Campbell, founder of the Association for the Study of Peak Oil, a network of scientists, professors, and government experts. "There are fewer worthwhile prospects to test."

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Now comes an additional problem. It takes a lot of energy to pump oil out of a ground. Yes initialy there is a free ride. About 25 to 33% of a pools reserves will come out from natural gas pressure, but after that it needs to be pumped. With the depth of todays wells that is a massive unertaking. You got to remember that the depths of todays wells are measured in miles, not feet. I do not know the average depth but I know that the depth of the deepest well in Oklahomas Anadarko basin that was drilled in the 1970s was over 5 miles deep. It is now depleted.

You have to burn a lot of gasoline to move a barrel of oil 5 miles. Keep in mind you only get a little over 1 gallon of gasoline from every barrel of oil. about 50% of that barrel is going to be paraffin and asphalt. The remaining liquid will be heavy hydrocarbons usefull for making plastics and such. Only about one gallon can be converted to fuel usage. so you can reach a point were it takes more oil to pump it out then what you get.

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In case people here aren't in the Energy group, Phil posted this link:

World Crude Production Has Peaked: Pickens reuters.com World crude oil production has topped out at 85 million barrels per day even as demand keeps climbing, helping to drive a stunning surge in prices, billionaire oil investor T. Boone Pickens said on Tuesday.

http://www.care2.com/news/member/342040137/784298

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sorry for butting in but I just watched a very interesting video on the oil crisis and thought you might be interested seeing as it is right up your street.
Here it is:

It seems there is a lot more to this than just peak oil......

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