Backatcha Bandit
is not taking your calls
Heh. Yeah, I was touched by his honesty. 
Peak Oil (was "petroleum geologist explains US war policy")
- Thread starter Bernie_Gunther
- Start date
TrendLines Peak Oil URR Estimates 2007
Our current compilation of 19 URR Estimates by API (USA), BP (UK), Colin Campbell of ASPO (Ireland), CERA (USA), EIA (USA), ExxonMobil (USA), Samuel Foucher (Canada), MK Hubbert (USA), IEA (Int'l), IFP (France), IHS (France), Rembrandt Koppelaar (Netherlands), Jean Laherrère (France), OAPEC (Int'l), OGJ (USA), OPEC (Int'l), Saudi Aramco (Saudi Arabia), Total (France) & World Oil (USA).
http://www.trendlines.ca/urr.htm
Our current compilation of 19 URR Estimates by API (USA), BP (UK), Colin Campbell of ASPO (Ireland), CERA (USA), EIA (USA), ExxonMobil (USA), Samuel Foucher (Canada), MK Hubbert (USA), IEA (Int'l), IFP (France), IHS (France), Rembrandt Koppelaar (Netherlands), Jean Laherrère (France), OAPEC (Int'l), OGJ (USA), OPEC (Int'l), Saudi Aramco (Saudi Arabia), Total (France) & World Oil (USA).
http://www.trendlines.ca/urr.htm
Backatcha Bandit
is not taking your calls
Crispy said:
Go to the source:
http://www.eia.doe.gov/emeu/ipsr/t11d.xls
Which puts peak world production at May 2005 - 74.272 million b/d.
BP stats accept OPEC stated reserve figures despite their reserve hikes in the 1980's of around 300 Gbbls (without the extensive additional drilling at the time to confirm the presence of such substantial additional deposits). Even stranger, OPEC reserves have remained flat or have been slightly increased since despite the intervening 2 decades of high flowrates. This paper by a petroleum geologist makes a clear case for OPEC reserve values (and therefore BP stats) being seriously questionable: Lies, damned lies and BP Statistics.bigfish said:
Our current compilation of 19 URR Estimates by API (USA), BP (UK), Colin Campbell of ASPO (Ireland), CERA (USA), EIA (USA), ExxonMobil (USA), Samuel Foucher (Canada), MK Hubbert (USA), IEA (Int'l), IFP (France), IHS (France), Rembrandt Koppelaar (Netherlands), Jean Laherrère (France), OAPEC (Int'l), OGJ (USA), OPEC (Int'l), Saudi Aramco (Saudi Arabia), Total (France) & World Oil (USA).
http://www.trendlines.ca/urr.htm
Backatcha Bandit
is not taking your calls
bigfish said:
http://www.fcnp.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=223&Itemid=33
bigfish said:
http://www.ogj.com/articles/save_screen.cfm?ARTICLE_ID=259294
bigfish said:
Hmmm.
Crispy said:
EROEI.
http://www.eroei.com/articles/the_chain/what_is_eroei/
Backatcha Bandit
is not taking your calls
Backatcha Bandit
is not taking your calls
Well, I tend to see 'economics' as subsidiary to 'energy', as no matter how many pound coins I shovel into my fuel tank, I don't seem to get any further.Crispy said:
Crispy said:
Yes, but there are lots of other - not so new - giant discoveries which he (and you) appears blissfully unaware of:
http://www.aapg.org/explorer/2007/03mar/giant_fields.cfm
Backatcha Bandit
is not taking your calls
bigfish said:
Perhaps if you named some of them, we could see if they withstand the scrutiny afforded by a 10 second 'Google' that your last two examples, erm... didn't.
I took some time out to pick blackcurrants today. You may ask 'what does this have to do with global oil production?'...and the answer is 'quite a lot'.
With around 50kg of blackcurrants to pick and no commercial issues i.e. they are for my own consumption / jam-making I proceeded with the picking in the same order I always do - the easy to reach, large bunches of quality fruit first. No one taught me to pick in this order; I just naturally started using this method as a child. It takes about 1hr each to pick the first few buckets but there (fairly abruptly) comes a point where the berries become awkward to reach and in 1's and 2's rather than bunches; the 3rd to last and 2nd to last buckets take 2hrs + per bucket and the last bucket the best part of half a day.
Given that it's human nature and good time management to proceed as above think just how important it becomes for the oil industry to manage extraction given the huge commercial pressures. It should come as no surprise to find that it too extracts the high quality, largest, easiest to reach, cheapest deposits first - such deposits have been predominant since the oil industry's inception in 1859 (btw same trend is observed in the coal industry and any other extraction industry - 'no one saves the best for last'). In the past few years, however, a major change has been observed by those who follow the oil industry closely - deposits are becoming increasingly hard and much more expensive to reach; furthermore there is a steady trend towards heavy sour crude as opposed to light sweet crude. This paper explains why the industry is having to turn towards poorer quality crude: Light, Sweet Crude.
Bigfish in particular has drawn our attention to numerous reports of new discoveries, reserve upgrades etc....but many of these have one factor in common, namely that they are much more difficult to extract than the majority of prior discoveries. For example, the oil industry would not from choice exploit the Athabasca tar sands, consider extremely deepwater operations (such as Jack2), polar oil or undertake the political and economic risks of operating in W Africa, or risk nationalisation of assets in Russia etc. The situation is aptly summed up here by 'big oil' itself describing how 'the era of easy oil is over': Chevron.
My personal view is that regardless of increases in URR and inclusion of unconventional oil such as tar sands, shale oil etc with each year that passes it's going to get harder to offset the decline of mature conventional oilfields discovered decades ago. The operators of 3 of the 4 largest oilfields on the planet have confirmed they are in decline, namely Cantarell, Burgan and Daqing (output in Cantarell is, in fact, crashing). The 4th, and by far the largest oilfield, namely KSA's Ghawar is widely reported to be in decline by at least 8% pa but the operator, Saudi Aramco, maintains a secretive policy re reservoir data.
Again it's my opinion that the issue we face is not 'for how long we can accommodate demand growth of 2.5% pa' (recent IEA forecast) but whether we can even maintain existing flowrates. All the extra URR in the world is not going to fix the problem for industrial society unless the extra barrels can flow at requisite high rates - it's hardly realistic to pull in at a filling station and ask to 'fill up with reserves'...it's only flowrates which count. I'm not at all convinced that CERA, USGS and others constantly releasing upgraded forecasts of reserves understand this point (and if they do they may well be disregarding it as recipients of their data want to hear a 'business as usual' message). We will shortly find out which body of opinion is right....in the meantime the price of oil has been rising steadily for several months and is near to testing new highs; the market is probably the best indicator we have as to whether all this extra URR is actually resulting in additional product deliveries.
With around 50kg of blackcurrants to pick and no commercial issues i.e. they are for my own consumption / jam-making I proceeded with the picking in the same order I always do - the easy to reach, large bunches of quality fruit first. No one taught me to pick in this order; I just naturally started using this method as a child. It takes about 1hr each to pick the first few buckets but there (fairly abruptly) comes a point where the berries become awkward to reach and in 1's and 2's rather than bunches; the 3rd to last and 2nd to last buckets take 2hrs + per bucket and the last bucket the best part of half a day.
Given that it's human nature and good time management to proceed as above think just how important it becomes for the oil industry to manage extraction given the huge commercial pressures. It should come as no surprise to find that it too extracts the high quality, largest, easiest to reach, cheapest deposits first - such deposits have been predominant since the oil industry's inception in 1859 (btw same trend is observed in the coal industry and any other extraction industry - 'no one saves the best for last'). In the past few years, however, a major change has been observed by those who follow the oil industry closely - deposits are becoming increasingly hard and much more expensive to reach; furthermore there is a steady trend towards heavy sour crude as opposed to light sweet crude. This paper explains why the industry is having to turn towards poorer quality crude: Light, Sweet Crude.
Bigfish in particular has drawn our attention to numerous reports of new discoveries, reserve upgrades etc....but many of these have one factor in common, namely that they are much more difficult to extract than the majority of prior discoveries. For example, the oil industry would not from choice exploit the Athabasca tar sands, consider extremely deepwater operations (such as Jack2), polar oil or undertake the political and economic risks of operating in W Africa, or risk nationalisation of assets in Russia etc. The situation is aptly summed up here by 'big oil' itself describing how 'the era of easy oil is over': Chevron.
My personal view is that regardless of increases in URR and inclusion of unconventional oil such as tar sands, shale oil etc with each year that passes it's going to get harder to offset the decline of mature conventional oilfields discovered decades ago. The operators of 3 of the 4 largest oilfields on the planet have confirmed they are in decline, namely Cantarell, Burgan and Daqing (output in Cantarell is, in fact, crashing). The 4th, and by far the largest oilfield, namely KSA's Ghawar is widely reported to be in decline by at least 8% pa but the operator, Saudi Aramco, maintains a secretive policy re reservoir data.
Again it's my opinion that the issue we face is not 'for how long we can accommodate demand growth of 2.5% pa' (recent IEA forecast) but whether we can even maintain existing flowrates. All the extra URR in the world is not going to fix the problem for industrial society unless the extra barrels can flow at requisite high rates - it's hardly realistic to pull in at a filling station and ask to 'fill up with reserves'...it's only flowrates which count. I'm not at all convinced that CERA, USGS and others constantly releasing upgraded forecasts of reserves understand this point (and if they do they may well be disregarding it as recipients of their data want to hear a 'business as usual' message). We will shortly find out which body of opinion is right....in the meantime the price of oil has been rising steadily for several months and is near to testing new highs; the market is probably the best indicator we have as to whether all this extra URR is actually resulting in additional product deliveries.
Crispy
The following psytrance is baṉned: All
good post zceb. flowrates, flowrates, flowrates. I remember seeing a graph that very clearly shows a correlation between global GDP and barrels/day oil pumping. Without a supply to match demand, the continuous growth required by modern economics cannot proceed. We are, bar some sort of miracle, headed for a crash.
Earlier this year two books were published, The Last Oil Shock by David Strahan and The Battle for Barrels by Duncan Clarke. Both books address the question of future oil supplies but came to dramatically differing conclusions; Strahan arguing global oil production will soon peak and go into terminal decline, Clarke highlighting complexities concerning the evaluation of how much oil remains, historical mistakes in production forecasting and suggesting a more abundant view of our energy future.
In August David Strahan wrote an open letter to Duncan Clarke. It can be read here.
In September Clarke responded with a letter of his own, read his reply here.
In August David Strahan wrote an open letter to Duncan Clarke. It can be read here.
In September Clarke responded with a letter of his own, read his reply here.
We'd certainly be fucked for a few years if the worst predictions of peak oil are correct, but it wouldn't be the end of the world.Crispy said:
Mind you, once nuclear fusion is commercially operational, with any luck somewhere around the middle of this century, we'll have all the power we need for the rest of eternity, with neglible CO2 emissions given a linked decent hydrogen fuel cell distribution system for transport.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/science/article2373748.ece
Look on the bright side, eh?
The article even says that:Fruitloop said:
but there are lots of really interesting things happening. Getting fusion to work is very, very hard but when it does it'll be a pretty major part of the solution.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fusion_power
The guy working on this says this won't solve the greenhouse gas problem we have in the coming decades, nor a short-term energy crisis but it's not a bad thing to be working on for the future.
Everyone's been talking about the ITER, but in fact the HIPER which the article refers to is a different set of technologies, making the chances of a solution higher.
The best thing about potential fusion reactors is that they don't involve chain reactions, so the possibility of a catastrophic nuclear accident is many orders of magnitude lower than for fission reactors.
There's also very low overlap with nuclear weapons technology, so it's the sort of thing that could be leased out to a lot of countries without major worries that it'd be used for making weapons.
The best thing about potential fusion reactors is that they don't involve chain reactions, so the possibility of a catastrophic nuclear accident is many orders of magnitude lower than for fission reactors.
There's also very low overlap with nuclear weapons technology, so it's the sort of thing that could be leased out to a lot of countries without major worries that it'd be used for making weapons.
We often look on the bright side at The Oil Drum.bigfish said:
See these recent articles on Electric Cars, Concentrating Solar Power, Fusion and Implications of Peak Oil for Climate Change.
slaar said:
Well, it may well be the case. My only problem with it is when still-hypothetical technologies are used as an excuse for business as usual. I reckon we should count technological chickens once they actually are hatched, and in the meantime plan for a sustainable future with technologies that are definitely going to be available.
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