By Larry Kummer, from the Fabius Maximus website
Summary: The peak oil hysteria provides rich lessons for us today about learning from activists and the value of listening to our major professional institutions. Easy cynicism led people to believe outlandish forecasts, wasting valuable time and resources. Worse, we have had many such barrages by doomsters — aided by their clickbait-seeking enablers in the media — which have left us almost immune to warnings, no matter how well-founded. We can do better.
Where were you during the peak oil hysteria? It began in 2005 and died in 2013, marked by the opening and closing of The Oil Drum website. Despite their analysis and forecasts proving to be mostly wrong, most of their authors are still “experts” publishing elsewhere (see this bizarre example). That follows the pattern of modern American doomsters, such as those who in the 1970s predicted global catastrophes from pollution and famine. Perhaps the activists predicting a climate catastrophe will add their names to this list in the next decade.
It’s not just historical trivia. We must learn from these bouts of irrationality if we have any hope of regaining the ability to govern ourselves.
Maximum World Oil Production Forecasts
Memories have faded, but a decade ago the predictions of end of oil were hot news. Comment threads overflowed with people terrified of the future. Conferences were held and books sold trumpeting certain disaster as the lifeblood of our industrial civilization dried up. Many of the following names were highlighted in journalists’ Rolodexes as the go-to people for hot quotes. Then as now, the names least often consulted proved to have the more accurate forecasts.
- 2005 – Pickens, T. Boone (Oil & gas investor).
- 2007 – Bakhitari, A.M.S. Oil Executive ((Iranian National Oil Co. planner).
- 2007+ – Groppe, H. (Oil / gas expert & businessman).
- 2007 – Herrera, R. (Retired BP geologist).
- 2008+ – Westervelt, E.T. et al (US Army Corps of Engineers).
- 2009 – Deffeyes, K. (retired Princeton professor & retired Shell geologist).
- 2009 – Simmons, M.R. (Investment banker; see the posts about his work).
- 2010 – Goodstein, D. (Vice Provost, Cal Tech).
- 2010 – Wrobel, S. (Investment fund manager).
- 2010 – Bentley, R. (University energy analyst).
- 2010 – Campbell, C. (Retired oil company geologist; see the posts about his work).
- 2010 – Skrebowski, C. (Editor of Petroleum Review).
- 2011 – Meling, L.M. (Statoil oil company geologist).
- 2012 – Koppelaar, R.H.E.M. (Dutch oil analyst).
- 2012 – Pang Xiongqi (Petroleum Executive, China).
- 2015 – Husseini, S. (retired Saudi Aramco).
- 2020 – Laherrere, J. (Oil geologist , France).
- 2020+ – CERA Energy (consultants).
- 2020+ – Wood Mackenzie (consultants).
- 2025+ – Shell.
- 2030+ – EIA and IEA.
- No visible peak – Lynch, M.C. (Energy economist).
These predictions were made during 2003 – 2008 (collected by Robert Hirsh; most sources are listed here). Most were given with qualifying language expressing uncertainty about the dates. Some of these people, especially those associated with the Peak Oil movement, had given different dates — moving them out as time passed. Most of these are documented, but details of some have been lost over time.
The forecasts of major energy agencies’ look good a decade later. Much as with climate change, activists disparage (often contemptuously) analysis of the professional institutions — but in hindsight it is clear who we should have listened to.
Let’s look at these predictions in the context oil production history.
Forecasts of Oil Production made in 2008
The following table shows the actual production of crude oil and liquid fuels — and the IEA forecast for production in 2015 from their World Energy Outlook 2008, published as energy prices were on their way to a record high? Eight years later, how accurate was IEA’s forecast? It was eerily accurate — somewhat accidentally, as the IEA did not foresee the 2008-09 global recession and so over-estimated GDP growth.
The IEA and EIA use similar definitions for “liquid fuels”.
World Production vs. the WEO 2008 Forecast
(million barrels/day)
| Year | 2005 | 2006 | 2007 | 2008 | 2009 | 2010 | 2011 | 2012 | 2013 | 2014 | 2015 |
| Crude Oil | 73,864 | 73,478 | 73,164 | 74,062 | 72,871 | 74,653 | 74,734 | 76,160 | 76,248 | 77,833 | N/A |
| Liquid Fuels | 85,099 | 85,135 | 85,130 | 86,515 | 85,703 | 88,099 | 88,532 | 90,466 | 91,014 | 93,201 | 97,900* |
| WEO 2008 | 86,000 | 96,000 |
Historical data from the EIA website.
* The 2015 total is for Q3.
The bottom line: liquid fuel production increased by 15% during the decade after 2005, so that prices have plunged (exacerbated by the Saudi price war). Prices will remain under pressure unless OPEC reestablishes its control, production coming online from investments in the giant fields of Iran and Iraq, the spread of fracking to other nations, and new tech (e.g., hybrid and electric cars).
Also note the increasing difference between production of crude oil and all liquid fuels. The rise in crude oil and, more broadly, liquid fuels were driven by new sources whose potential was mostly ignored by the Peak Oil doomsters). Crude production rose from deepwater and fracking wells, plus mining bitumen (aka oil sands, which technically does not produce crude oil). Liquid fuels production rose from production of natural gas liquids, biodiesel, ethanol, and those converted from coal and gas. Most numbers you see for “world oil production” are for all liquid fuels.
While in 2008 the IEA accurately estimated liquid fuel production for 2015, they over-estimated demand. As a result, the WEO 2008 price forecast for 2015 was too high.
“The era of cheap oil is over … The average IEA crude oil import price, a proxy for international prices, is assumed in the Reference Scenario to average $100 per barrel in real year-2007 dollars over the period 2008-2015 and then to rise in a broadly linear manner to $122 in 2030.”
Conclusions
As many of us predicted during the peak oil hysteria, high oil prices had three great effects — all predictable…
- Increased efficiency of energy use — as consumers and businesses invested to increase the efficiency of the more expensive energy (and R&D produced more ways to do this).
- Increased production of oil (boosted by R&D making more “resources” into usable “reserves”. Today’s $30 oil shows that production growth has exceeded demand.
- New sources of liquid fuels — including both new hydrocarbon-based supplies (bitumen in Canada and Venezuela), new carbon-based fuels (e.g., coal to oil, although oil prices never rose to make this viable), and new carbohydrate-based supplies (e.g., ethanol from corn).
Only time will tell about the IEA’s forecast for 2030 of $122 oil (in 2007 dollars). But today’s oil glut gives us an opportunity to prepare alternative supplies in an inexpensive and orderly manner, not only reducing the risk of energy price shocks but also reducing pollution and the risk of unpleasant anthropogenic climate change. Let’s make use of the gift.
Equally important is that we learn from this experience with the peak oil movement. Activists and enthusiasts have terrible track records at long-range forecasting, despite their confidently loud predictions of doom — echoed by clickbait-seeking journalists . That does not imply that we should blindly trust major institutions (as the scandal about Flint’s water supply shows), but skepticism pays large dividends and allows more rational preparing for the future.
For More Information
For a deep look at these issues see Exxon’s new report “The Outlook for Energy: A View to 2040“. Also see these…
- Important: Recovering lost knowledge about exhaustion of the Earth’s resources (such as Peak Oil).
- When will global oil production peak? Here is the answer!
- The three forms of Peak Oil (let’s hope for the benign form).
- Peak Oil Doomsters debunked, end of civilization called off!
- Prepare now, for oil prices will rise again.
To learn about the minerals that power our world, and will for many years more, I recommend reading the IEA report Resources to Reserves 2013. Here is a brief slidedeck of its contents. For a deeper look, see the IIASA’s Global Energy Assessment (a widely cited source document, including by the IPCC’s AR%). Here is a 113 page summary.
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This is another of those useless posts where you tell us we should learn from someone’s hysteria but don’t tell us what they said.
Poor Nick. He comments but seldom seems to read the post, and so gives consistently weird “rebuttals”.
This was about the predictions of peaking, which I listed. It was self-explanatory (with a link to the source for more info), at least to people who read the newspapers.
Editor,
You mainly listed a set of dates and names from a 2005 report of Hirsch et al. Their conclusion:
“Our analysis leads to the following conclusions and final thoughts.
1. World Oil Peaking is Going to Happen
World production of conventional oil will reach a maximum and decline thereafter. That maximum is called the peak. A number of competent forecasters project peaking within a decade; others contend it will occur later. Prediction of the peaking is extremely difficult because of geological complexities, measurement problems, pricing variations, demand elasticity, and political influences. Peaking will happen, but the timing is uncertain.”
Doesn’t sound so hysterical. But the key thing is, they are talking about conventional oil. That’s why it is important to quote what people actually say.
Nick,
You are advancing — from ignoring to misrepresenting what I said. A true troll.
“Their conclusion … Doesn’t sound so hysterical.”
As any child reading this would see, by “hysteria” I referred to the list of failed peak oil predictions — not to the Hirsch report listing them (which is, imo, among the best analysis done to date about energy policy).
Also making this clear I said “Note that the forecasts of major energy agencies’ look good a decade later.” The Hirsch report was done for the DoE.
“they are talking about conventional oil.”
False, They were referring to different definitions from “conventional oil” (a term whose meaning has changed over time, and is seldom used by energy experts these days) to liquid fuels. Which is why I showed the table of production of both over time (i.e., narrow and broad definitions) — both have risen.
The peak oil people most often referred to the peaking of liquid fuels, hence the severe economic effects they predicted when that peaked. Not to a scenario with ample liquid fuels but peaked conventional oil — which would have had far milder effects.
“Which is why I showed the table of production of both over time (i.e., narrow and broad definitions) — both have risen.”
No, you have listed “Crude Oil”. The EIA full title is ” Crude Oil including Lease Condensate” and they make an explicit note that it also includes Canada Tar Sands. That isn’t “narrow”.
” not to the Hirsch report listing them”
A subtle distinction. But that’s the problem. You don’t make clear who you are talking about or cite what they said.
Nick,
“No, you have listed “Crude Oil”. The EIA full title is ” Crude Oil including Lease Condensate” …. That isn’t “narrow”.”
Yes it is. The EIA does not collect information in any narrower form. The monthly report submitted by US oil producers, EIA-914, has them report “Crude Oil including Lease Condensate” (question 3.1). The EIA does not collect information on crude oil production without lease condensate, or on lease condensates as a separate category.
http://www.eia.gov/survey/form/eia_914/form.pdf
I don’t mind your criticism, misinformed as it usually is. What makes you a troll is that you seldom (ever?) acknowledge your errors, but come back confidently with still more ill-informed rebuttals.
Nick, I seldom agree with you. This is one of those times.
ristvan,
“but don’t tell us what they said.”
Since you are agreeing to something obviously false, I see why your long comment didn’t cite — or even pertain — to what I wrote.
It’s the long tradition of climate almarists to give bold rebuttals without any contact with the content. Interesting to see that you join Nick in this.
I’m off to work. I’ll leave you and Nick to chat about “cheap shots”. Listen to him; he’s an expert.
Wow, the trolls agree with each other.
Whoda thunk it.
MarkW,
I do not consider Rritvan a troll. He often makes insightful comments to my posts, although we often disagree.
I agree with you, his agreement with Nick Stokes’ typically trollish comments here is odd. Especially as he makes no specific criticisms of my post, just bold smears.
Perhaps he just had a bad day.
Those people predicting peak oil may have been wrong, but the money that a lot of people made and lost was vast and very real.
And it extended way beyond energy to commodities such as copper. People who knew, at the time, when the commodity supercycle ended did well…and those who failed to get the memo and continued to invest did not.
I put the start of the turnaround and reversal as the completion of the Three Gorges dam and the end of the build-out for the Beijing Olympiad.
Menicholas,
Thanks for the reminder! I’ve been in finance for 38 years, and seen people lose fortunes betting on commodity cycles — usually betting that the current move will continue. That works until it fails, usually hard.
The cure for high commodity prices is high prices is high prices. The cure for low prices is low prices. The long-term trends are difficult to see, nor do we know that they’ll continue.
Menicholas
Very true.
There are many who believe the current excessive production is a strategy to stop fracking, particularly in the United States. I am not so sure. The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia is in a fight for its political life against Iran, backed by Russia and China. Low oil prices reduce the ability of Saudi Arabia’s opponents to fund war.
Just a thought.
As some wag once noted: the world will never run out of oil – it’s just that .nobody will be able to afford the last barrel
Great line. 🙂
[Please use only one screen name. -mod.]
Nice line. 🙂
peak anything is usually promoted by those who have an interest in something running out quicker.
Or those who are trying to get rich by manipulating prices.
These are something to watch. The tone of certainty and all.
The End of Suburbia – 52 minute documentary on peak oil
and then Escape from Suburbia
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FbeC4AIIo7A
This is very tangentially related to this post, but I’m looking for some help. I’m arguing on FB against CAGW. Someone put up a graph of CMIP5 versus observations. It looks great and that the models have been correct.. But I think CMIP5 up until it was released 2011, 2012, 2013?) is a hindcast. Right? Does CMIP5 show any predictive value or does it show that we’re really good at fitting models to historical data? Can someone help me? Thanks.
WUWT search bar, just enter CMIP5.
Same goes for any other topic you are being challenged on.
Warning though, the answer is never simple.
Here’s a good one to start with:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/10/04/no-matter-how-the-cmip5-ipcc-ar5-models-are-presented-they-still-look-bad/
Thanks
Satellite and balloon observations or the heavily ” adjusted ” ground observations ? Big difference !
Peak Oil is just a rehash of Peak Coal, and just about as significant.
During the carbonaceous era on tiny Comet Halley, vast amounts of organic matter were preserved in the sediments of shallow inland seas. Today it is 1/3 kerogen, a.k.a. “oil shale”:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oil_shale#Extraterrestrial_oil_shale
Impossible, but true!
Two years ago we had our oil heater replaced by a new very efficient burner, our oil consumption was ( gratefully) cut over halve! I see technology in the coming years make the same if not better advances. To me all this talk is not relevant. i compare it to the advances in computer teck, astronomical and satellite advances, who would have seen those coming?
The Peak Oil story is still correct because the math has not changed. Yes, we can produce more oil by destroying capital for a while but that is a fool’s game that has to end. The bottom line is that light sweet crude production peaked a few years back. Yes, we did spend hundreds of billions of dollars to develop expensive tar sands and totally uneconomic shale; we invested in water drive systems that would produce more oil now but at a cost later on as some of the recoverable gets left behind.
The only way to see what is happening is to look at the balance sheets and cash flow statements of the marginal producers and they are toast. The SEC filings for the pure shale producers show negative cash flows even when prices were near a barrel. And given the heterogeneous nature of shale formations, the rapid depletion rates, and very small core areas where production is very profitable but limited, we are looking at a small amount of economic production that is dwarfed by the credit induced levels of uneconomic production that we see today.
If we look at the latest report from the Bakken we see that in November 2015 there were 10,314 operating wells producing 109 barrels per day of oil. That compares to the November 2012 report when there were 4,918 operating wells producing 136 barrels per day. All those new wells provide us with the greatest flow rates but even doubling the number of older wells was not sufficient to offset the production decline from existing wells. That seems very strange given the assumption of hyperbolic decline curves where production stabilizes and stays somewhat constant for many years in the future. The peak for aggregate Bakken production was July 2015 even though the number of wells had increased by around 3% (270) over the four months from July 2015 to November 2015.
The shale story was made possible by a credit induced bubble that was created by the Fed to mitigate the effects of the economic contraction created by the popping of the housing bubble, which was created by the credit bubble created by the Fed to mitigate the effects of the popping of the tech bubble, which was created by the Fed’s creation of a credit bubble to offset the damage done by the Asian Flu and the Russian bond crisis. The Fed permitted billions in negative cash flows to be papered over as massive amounts of capital were ‘invested’ into unproductive shale production.
Note that in 2012, WTI averaged $94.05 per barrel while Brent was near $111. Yet, a supposedly great producer like Continental managed to report negative cash flow of $1.86 billion. If the supposedly ‘best’ producer in the shale space was unable to generate positive cash flows when prices were $94 what do you think is happening at $30?
What has been remarkable was the honesty of the CEOs of the shale companies. Every presentation that I can remember hearing has made it clear that there were funding gaps that needed to be closed by new borrowing, selling assets, or issuing new shares. The managers doing the presentations were clear that their reported earnings depended on certain assumptions about the depreciation rates, the shape of the decline curves, and the ultimate recoveries that were based on calculated on the basis of those assumptions. Analysts were taken in by the very profitable wells in the core areas and assumed that the rest of the formations would yield similar results. But that is not how the geology works and the actual production data shows very different results.
Before I end this I have to mention the problem with aggregating the production data. What we use as consumers is not the oil but the products that are made from that oil. And how much product is made depends on the type of oil that is produced. A barrel of heavy oil, the production of which has increased substantially thanks to massive investments in capital, produces a lot more asphalt and a lot less gasoline and kerosene than a barrel of light sweet crude. We can actually produce more oil and get a lot less high-value product. If we want to see what is going on we need a breakdown of production by oil type and that won’t happen because it does not fit the narrative being told by the authorities and Wall Street.
What I find most harmful is the dislocation that the credit bubble has created. It has allowed politicians and investors to pursue fantasy with one betting on inefficient alternative energy schemes like solar and wind energy and the other on a scam like shale-oil. In the meantime, we have seen natural decline rates of around 4% per year in the conventional fields and an increase of capital destroying marginal producing assets. If we took the uneconomic marginal producers off-line, global production would fall by several million barrels that would more than offset the decline in demand due to the collapsing economic activity in the EU, US, and even the developing world. The problem is that the malinvestments have prevented rational research into realistic solutions to our production problems.
Even worse is the status of the US dollar, which was supported by a myth of energy independence that will never happen. Once investors in American treasuries figure out that the shale miracle was yet another scam we could see a very sudden increase in poverty as purchasing power declines and jobs in industries that should never have developed are shed. You can choose to believe the mythology but I prefer to look at the real world data.
By the way, it is easy to prove me wrong. All any of you have to do is to show that the SEC filing for primary producers show positive cash flows during the periods of high oil prices. While you are searching through the 10-Ks I suggest that you do a word search for the phrase ‘funding gap’.
+1
+100
Seeing as the number of words used is important on this thread is important, I will keep this short.
At peak oil, USD 150 per barrel Discovery channel did a detailed program on the oil sands development. They followed the building of two complete oil sands processing trains each 250,000 barrels per day capacity. One for Shell and one for Sun Oil ( I think). They expressed awe at the cost, USD 18 billion.
What they overlooked was at the then current oil price that was recovered in 66 days.
In the same way the BBC did a detailed report on the latest mega Saudi oilfield and waxed lyrical about its USD 10 billion cost. Looking at their cost figures this was repaid in 42 days and at an ongoing cost of USD 1.00 per barrel.
That is point one.
Next.’
there have been two technology breakthroughs, fracking and directional drilling. Oil shale is the subject of discussion but it has a very low oil density, that is yield per cubic metres of rock. Existing oilfields have a much higher yield even at forecast total production possible.
But if you apply those two technologies to existing proven and producing fields you unlock a massive global new supply of supply at virtually no cost. Apache demonstrated this in the Forties oilfield that they bought “dead” from BP.
So at current realistic Oil prices of USD 25, you dont spend billions on capital expenditure but you rework existing fields or just do nothing.
Its not rocket science.
The scam is not current prices but the stupid high prices humanity was forced to suffer. That the Saudis overspent their windfall profits concerns me not one iota.
Mr. Lensman,
You are confusing the various kinds of costs: capital, operating, overhead, and cost of capital.
Building the infrastructure to mine bitumen does not mean that it produces “a massive global new supply of supply at virtually no cost.” In fact the operating costs are roughly similar to other mines, plus the cost of running the refinery to turn bitumen into synthetic crude oil (among the costs is the considerable amount of energy required). Plus the ongoing cost for the equipment (mining equipment does not last forever).
Over a longer period of time, fields are exhausted and need to be replaced. Most of the available new fields require $80+ oil to be worth developing (including bitumen in Alberta, deepwater, arctic, etc). It’s not clear yet what price is needed to develop new tight rock fields (which are both oil and nat gas), but for most it is probably at least that of 2012-2014 (several times today’s prices) — since few companies were showing much free cash flow then — even with insanely low cost of capital.
No i dont. If it costs ten billion to build a new oilfield with all its infrastructure and process facilities. That is the capital expenditure. If they then produce at 1.5 million barrels per day, the maths is very simple.
How they depreciate it and otherwise does not change the basic calculation.
And i am not talking about new, I am talking about existing proven fields with all facilities in place.
Mr. Lensman,
In your example, what is the operating cost per Barrel?
How long does the equipment last (depreciation period)?
What is the cost of capital for the project?
I have said in both cases what the capital cost is and that is what i wrote off in the required periods. Its just simple maths.
Operating costs, take usd 100,000 per day, at 1,5 million barrels per day that is only seven cents per barrel. How long does steel pipe last? How much maintenance does a gas separator need? or an oil tank?
For your peace of mind, i built two offshore production systems, on time and on budget and both operated way beyond their design specification.
Lensman,
Estimates for the operating costs for the process of mining and refining Alberta’s bitumen into synthetic crude were $25 to $30 per barrel in 2008.
‘As many of us predicted during the peak oil hysteria, high oil prices had three great effects — all predictable… “.
==============================
None of the author’s predictions are mentioned in Peaking of World Oil Production: Recent Forecasts (Hirsch 2007) where Larry Kummer is acknowledged as a contributor:
http://www.netl.doe.gov/energy-analyses/pubs/Peaking%20of%20World%20Oil%20Production%20-%20Recent%20Forecasts%20-%20NETL%20Re.pdf
In fact the author, presumably with Mr Kummer’s concurrence, was advocating “taking decisive action well before the [enormity of the] problem is obvious”.
This vapid post is just another attempt to attract traffic to the Fabius Maximus website.
Chris,
It sounds like you are calling me a liar. Let’s examine your claims. They are all quite specious.
(1) “None of the author’s predictions are mentioned in Peaking of World Oil Production: Recent Forecasts (Hirsch 2007)”
Why would they be mentioned in that report, which was a list of oil production forecasts? I suggest you look in Hirsch’s 2005 “Mitigations” report. It does not discusses how price boosts supply, since it focuses on the post-peak world. It does discuss the other two predictions: improved efficiency and alt liquid fuels.
(2) I wrote extensively about these three effects in 2008 — during the peak of the peak oil hysteria (as oil prices hit all-time record highs).
I suggest starting with “Peak Oil Doomsters debunked, end of civilization called off” from May 2008; it discusses the role of efficiency and new fuels in the post-peak world. Here’s one of many posts describing the development of new liquid fuels: “A snapshot of our engines of innovation, as they develop new energy sources“, May 2008.
Also see this about prices driving efficiency from “More good news about Peak Oil, on the demand side“, Jan 2008:
To learn why high prices affect mineral production (for the foreseeable future, but not forever) see “Recovering lost knowledge about exhaustion of the Earth’s resources (such as Peak Oil)” from Jan 2011 — about the inverse relationship of ore quality and quantity. Higher prices allows exploitation of the larger supply of lower-quality ore.
There are many others, but this should give you someplace to start.
(3) “{I} was advocating “taking decisive action well before the [enormity of the] problem is obvious”.”
My posts all worked a consistent theme: the major energy institutions forecast peaking several decades from now. The Hirsch report showed that preparation will take 20 years on a crash basis. If we start now, efficiently and gradually, we can make an easy transition to a post-oil world — one with less pollution.
Persistent slower global GDP growth after the 2008 crash (which almost nobody predicted) has pushed out the time of peaking — and contributed to the crash in prices (more supply, but less than anticipated demand) — but that also makes us less able to pay for the necessary investments to prepare.
So nothing has changed the wisdom of my view imo. Certainly not yet another swing of commodity prices, one that will end with higher energy prices (as with every cycle since US production peak in ~1972.
(4) “In fact the author, presumably with Mr Kummer’s concurrence,”
That’s a bizarrely false claim. I did some research for Hirsch, hence the mention. I was not a co-author — so there was no “concurrence” of me with the text..
Chris,
Follow-up note: when discussing these three predictions I was making commonplace observations. They were nothing special or unique. Hence I described them as “As many of us predicted … all predictable.”
“It sounds like you are calling me a liar …”.
=====================================
Certainly not Larry, simply as you say “memories have faded, but a decade ago the predictions of end of oil were hot news”.
I guess an investment advisor must develop an aptitude for Delphic prognostications.
Two of the major hoaxes presented by globalists today are mutually exclusive.
If the Peak Oil hoax were true, then it would cancel out the Global Warming hoax because there wouldn’t be enough of the stuff to cause runaway warming.
I dunno. The world uses 36 billion barrels of oil a year, but does not find 36 billion in reserves to replace it. Doesn’t that suggest a peak?
rokshox
That’s not exactly right. Each year of discovery can be a variation on previous years given the time needed to find and explore new fields. In 2004 they found about 80 billion new barrels, some 60 billion in 2010 and about 10 billion in 2014, according to energy info. It jumps around.
However, huge fields like the oil sands (in various countries) have hundreds of years worth now, so the annual discovery rate is not as useful as the current reserves/resources info.
Mike geo,
+1. Nicely said.
Malthusians have always been wrong. The carrying capacity of the Earth is mind-bogglingly higher than they claim.
It’s their Luddite mindset that endangers health by endangering the engines of prosperity, Liberty and free-market Capitalism.
Very poor and biased article.
Peak oil is not about there being more oil left, or about there being new technologies to get it. Ultimately its about EROEI – that it takes too much energy to extract it (compared to some other source of fuel).
And that is the issue. WE dont use oil in power stations because its too expensive. We use gas. Peak oil for electricity generation has come and gone, as has peak oil for many many regions where oil is drilled. It hasn’t happened globally yet, but in a finite world, it is against common sense to say that it never will.
This article of the cornucopian persuasion reminds me of:
http://vps.templar.co.uk/Cartoons%20and%20Politics/Okay.png
Yes, we are okay so far…
Things that have peaked and declined
Slavery – we didn’t run out of slaves
Wood burning – we didn’t run out of wood
Ice age – we didn’t run out of ice
Horse drawn transport – we didn’t run out of horses
The Mayan civilisation – we didn’t run out of Mayans (to sacrifice)
The Roman Empire – we didn’t run out of Romans
The Islamic Caliphate. We didn’t run out of Muslims
The stone age. We didn’t run out of flints..
What is the issue with all these things is that at a given point a rising cost-benefit curve exceeds the cost-benefit of something else.
It has only been the massive use of government legislation that has basically piled cost on – say – nuclear, and piled negative cost on renewables, that has disguised the fundamental issue that in the case of power generation, ex of regulatory burdens nuclear power is probably the cheapest and most reliable way to generate power.
Gail Tverberg, who you pour ridicule upon, may not be right, but she makes a good case that today’s debt crisis and what amounts to the cessation of Western growth over the last 15 years or so is in fact linked to the rising cost of energy – the very energy that allowed us to expand from a rural economy to a post industrial one.
Evidence of the past is no guarantee of the future. I am not dead yet. That does not mean I never will be.
Leo
“Peak oil is not about there being more oil left, or about there being new technologies to get it. ”
It’s nice that you have an opinion what “peak oil” means. I was benchmarking what well-known experts were saying during the peak oil days. This was not intended as the next Britannica entry on the oil industry, just a look at one facet of it.
Larry Kummer is trying to HIDE THE DECLINE in crude oil reserves.
Lol, sounds like a warmist hiding the decline in global temperature.
Its not an ‘opinion’. Peak oil is when global production starts to decline permanently, for whatever reason.
Leo,
Yes, that is correct. Unlike your previous incorrect statement that “Ultimately its about EROEI.”
There are many factors which might force a peak in oil production. The balance of geology & technology yielding an uneconomic EROEI is one possible cause. Or, as Robert Hirsch explained in a 2007 presentation, production might peak due to political decisions by producers. It might peak because superior substitutes are created. It might peak due to political decisions by consumers, such as regulations limiting CO2 emissions.
Energy dynamics are complex, with their interplay of geology, technology, politics, and economics.
Has no one heard of Synthetic oil?
If you have a late model car you’ll find your engine is already full of synthesized oil.
Don’t hold you breath waiting for it to run out, or become super expensive, it’s price-competitive right now, has been for years.
Unmentionable,
Synthetic Oil — made by the Fischer-Tropsch process usually from natural gas, CO, and CO2 — is in most ways better for your car than conventional motor oil. It is, however, more expensive.
Natural gas is much cheaper than oil per BTU in the US. If the F-T process was more efficient then this gas to liquid (GTL) process would replace crude very quickly! But it is not, so natural gas has not replaced oil on a large scale.
When oil was spiking over $100/b there was talk of large-scale use of GTL. Natural gas is expensive to transport except by pipe (not always feasible), so GTL would allow much more nat gas to be sold. — by converting it to an easily shipped liquid. But oil prices collapsed before GTL could get rolled out on a large scale.
Note: coal can also be converted to oil using F-T. The NAZI’s did so on a modest scale during WWII.
TO: Editor of the Fabius Maximus website February 16, 2016 at 6:03 pm
Thank you “Ed”, I’m reasonably well read on most of those processes, and others related.
I think the bottom line to highlight, is that there are multiple paths available to mitigate the “peak sludge”, sorry, I meant the peak oil boogie-man.
Maybe you could consider condensing some of those paths, to illustrate how they mitigate various doom scenarios, and the alleged debt-cycle collapse havoc to come (yet to transition, no to end of world lol), and post them back in here also when done, including economic change making new economic technical pathways viable, and how they interact.
I intend to give your links a proper read, haven’t digested them, only grazed through so far.
At a baseline I’d say the only prior possible hydrocarbons ‘problem’ we’ve faced, until recently that is, was the inability to provide sufficient heavy lubricants and for engines and grease, if oil production declined fast, but synthetics and present copious long-chain feed stock has negated all that, as well.
As for actual energy release, so many (economic and technical) options exist, we’re spoilt for choice, actually. Coal to liquid, Coal to Gas, and nat-gas driving auto engines, all INEVITABLY viable, depending on demand level and price level.
We’re good for both mechanical lubricant and energy for a very long time, I’d say it’ll turn out to be an indefinite supply of both from here. And that’s before you also take into account that electric vehicles will be taking over, the newer hydrogen battery technology is already well past lithium technology, that are presently used in hybrid drive trains.
Electric engines don’t use lubricant past production point. NONE!
If your batteries are energy-dense enough and rechargeable fast enough, then say goodbye to inefficient reciprocating combustion engines, and their issues as well. Suddenly the entire picture is transformed. Frankly, it’s an intriguing time we’re in, the options and possibilities are much more impressive now, than in 1916.
Given the relative situation, it’s appropriate to be confident of our technologies, present and future, from here.
Thank you for posting here.
Unmentionable,
I don’t see believe the energy situation is unusually complex to describe. It’s just impossible to predict. Note the comments here show that it’s not well understood, with much of people’s knowledge consisting of myths. That is the real problem
There is an inverse relationship between ore quality and quantity. So we’ll never “run out” of hydrocarbons. Once the world if fully explored (i.e., no new discoveries) than prices will rise as we tap ever lower quality resources. This trend is offset by improving tech, which lowers the cost of production.
For details see: Recovering lost knowledge about exhaustion of the Earth’s resources (such as Peak Oil).
This takes place in a larger context: the speed of this process (i.e., burning through Earth’s resources) depends on the rate of economic growth and the development of new tech to boost efficiency and provide new sources of energy. Price shows the interplay at any moment of these factors, and influences how they develop.
Over shorter time horizons we will have the usual boom-bust commodity price cycles, driven by the interplay of demand changes and capital investment cycles — plus efforts to create cartels.
Looking far ahead, our descendants (in 2100? 2150?) will regard the burning of coal and oil like we regard the burning of cow as for fuel. The goal is to get there with a minimum of trouble.
All this is easy to describe this but impossible to make reliable predictions. Given the importance of energy, imo it is prudent to prepare for future problems rather than trust to luck. We could easily have a decade of recession in the 2020s. Cheap energy afterwards would not erase that suffering.
In my 80 posts about this I try to help people see through specific myths. As we see in the comments here, people love their misinformation — and tend to react by closing their eyes and screaming. Just as we see in the climate wars.
If you have any specific questions, I can provide cites to more information.
I think that you are just trying to generate interest by misrepresenting what was said and what the real argument is. Peak Oil is about peak daily production and nothing else. It is not about how much oil is in the ground because that has not changed. It actually isn’t even about reported reserves because those have more to do with accounting rules than they do with discovery. The increased reserves that many of the naive optimists try to use to divert attention from what really matters are mostly a fiction. Most of the ‘new’ oil that was reported was not new at all. It was found many decades ago but due to reporting requirements was never reported properly. If we move the reserve charts back to the time that those reserves were discovered we will find that there is a serious problem with the discovery process.
If we look at the figure in the link below we see a huge jump in reported reserves for the Middle East during the 1980s. That was not due to drilling or new recoveries. It was done with the stroke of the pen as OPEC members decided to ration production based on reported reserves. Two of the countries that reported a large increase in reserves were Iran and Iraq. They certainly were not drilling at the time because they were busy fighting each other in a war.
Worse are the SEC rules that allow producers to assume that the formation between productive wells contains as much oil as the areas where the wells are. But we know that is not to be true. Shale is not homogeneous and porosity, permeability, and organic content varies greatly. While it is possible to make a profit in shale, that is only true for the tiny core areas that are close to being tapped out. The massive write-downs of resources and reserves should be coming in the next few years as the curtains are pulled on the shale myth and most of the players wind up in bankruptcy.
Peak Oil is about one thing. Peak Production. Not just of barrels but of total petroleum products. The most recent data muddies the waters because it includes natural gas plant liquids (NGPL) together with the production of crude, which is an aggregate number that is made up of several different grades of oil, each with a different yield of high-value petroleum products. The numbers are not very clear and nobody seems interested in presenting a clear picture, mostly because the Western oil companies can no longer replace reserves and because the data shows that the production of economic light sweet crude peaked more than a decade in our past. I suggest that you will seem more credible if you deal with the specific points being brought up. You might want to start by showing us how we can continue to produce al of that shale and tar sands oil at a loss for much longer. Note that I have not even mentioned that many of the marginal fields even in countries like Saudi Arabia are unable to generate a profit even at $50 oil.
How many shale gas and oil companies do you expect to go bankrupt in the next six quarters? And how many of the drillers. Surely the Editor of the Fabius Maximus website should be able to answer such a question.
************************************
[Reply: Please identify to whom your replies are directed. -mod]
Editor of the Fabius Maximus website February 17, 2016 at 6:38 am
Thanks again ‘Ed’, familiar with the issues you replied with, geology being profession, but thanks again, appreciated. Agree re potential for stagnation and relative depressions, declines, in many states, due govt refusal all over western world to close broke bank’s and write down bad loans and stop pouring public taxes and retirement funds into crooked pockets. Another story. How the doomers like to conflate that with peak oil non-issue is quite devious and misanthropic of them (oh dear, that word again). Cheers.
Vangel,
(1) It would be helpful to tell us to whom you are speaking, or give a quote. There are 358 comment here. Who are you arguing with? For example…
Leo said: ‘Peak oil is when global production starts to decline permanently, for whatever reason.”
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2016/02/15/lessons-from-the-hysteria-about-peak-oil-2005-2013/#comment-2147791
I replied: “Yes, that is correct.”
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2016/02/15/lessons-from-the-hysteria-about-peak-oil-2005-2013/#comment-2146774
You said: ” Peak Oil is about peak daily production and nothing else.”
(2) A small correction to your comment.
“The most recent data muddies the waters because it includes natural gas plant liquids (NGPL) together with the production of crude,”
The EIA does not include NGPL as “crude oil”. It is included with “Liquid Fuels”. See the table I provide, or click through to the EIA website and see the notes.
“… to a post industrial one.”
Dream on Leo, Gail Taverberg is not only not right, she’s beyond wrong. If you’re defending her you’re in a world of delusion, or a fellow traveler with that ideological slime she pours into her posts.
I don’t know where you lot get the nerve to still want to be taken seriously when you go on about a “post-industrial earth” coming this century. It’s not coming this century, or any other. Sorry, you were badly misled. Please be more careful.
De-Industrialization is and will continue to be another epic no-show.
Take that devil-device you’re reading this on and destroy it, right now, for the greater good. And don’t ever buy another! Do away with all modern technology, every bit of it. Anything with plastic, get rid of it, ban it completely from you life. Avoid touching plastic ever again, as a rule. It’s made out of evil oil. Do it for the children! No driving in cars either, not even taxis. No combustion engines at all, no watch, no evil solar panel industrial technology and demon batteries! And no more evil telephones or radios.
That might snap you out of la-la land long enough to notice that your lifestyle really blows.
But you wont do that, because when all is said and done, Leo, guys like you are really just boutique pretenders, acting-out a crock of warped ideology, as overwrought boutique prophets of doom (Like Miss Taverberg) and typically calling people who reject the thoroughly unrealistic doom message, as “cornucopian”.
You must get a lot of that.
You have completely misunderstood the point .
But I cant be bothered to try and make it again
Appreciate it.
EROEI
?zoom=2
It doesn’t matter how much energy it takes to extract, refine and transport fossil fuels. EROEI (Energy Returned on Energy Invested) is even dopier than AGW and Peak Oil. I don’t spend energy to fill my tank. I don’t give energy back to the gas & electric companies in exchange for them being nice enough to heat and light my home. My company doesn’t drill for oil & gas to make energy.
I spend money to fill my tank. My company drills wells for oil & gas to make money. My gas & electric bills are paid for with money. My pay check, ExxonMobil & Shell credit card statements and checks to the gas & electric companies aren’t denominated in joules, kilowatts or btu – They are denominated in $.
I don’t give a rat’s @ur momisugly$$ if 1 barrel of amoeba farts uses less energy to produce than 1 barrel of crude oil… Because the barrel of amoeba farts costs $1,100 and can’t be produced in sufficient quantities to be waiting for me at the Exxon or Shell station when I need it.
If oil companies (or any businesses) used EROEI to guide their investment decisions, they would go out of business (unless the gov’t was footing the bill).
And, for that matter, most fossil fuels actually have better EROEI than most alternative sources do.
Oil, natural gas and coal are concentrated biofuels. They represent thousands to millions of years of condensed solar energy.
First of all EROEI reflects the point at which its not worth extracting oil for use as an energy source at any price.
And what it costs represents how much human activity is involved in it.,
They are different things., In general one is not an exact analogue of the other, but they tend to have some relationship.
“And, for that matter, most fossil fuels actually have better EROEI than most alternative sources do.”
A massively under-appreciated fact, thanks for putting it in those straight, easy to understand terms.
What’s the EROEI on synthetic grease, synthetic oil, syn-gas or synthetic gasoline?
It’s completely irrelevant, if its both economic and the feed-stocks are virtually unlimited, which it is, and they are – and the technology and processes are mature, proven, and already industrialized and reliable – which they are.
The peak oil plus EROEI ideology, like the hysteria of pending ‘post-industrialization’, are all rendered irrelevant.
It really just amounts to obnoxious trolling of humanity by some very dull people.
David:
You may find this POV useful in the EROEI discussions.
We use oil for transportation fuels because it works very well for that purpose. Oil is just the feed stock.
EVERY refinery has negative EROEI, yet we refine oil to fuels. EROEI is simply irrelevent to the topic of FUEL production. The form of the fuel matters, a lot.
Long after lift cost exceeds oil BTUs we will be lifting oil to make convenient energy dense fuels, right up to the point wher some other synthetic path becomes more efficient.
Right now we have wells in California with electric pumps lifting oil. Some of that electricity from nuclear plants. Since there is a functionally infinite supply of uranium from sea water at acceptable prices, we never run out of energy to do the lifting, so EROEI is a red herring. What matters is cost of nuclear (or wind or solar) electricity to do the lift vs cost of alternative paths to transportation fuels.
The FORM of the energy matters more than the energy in it for transportation fuels. That is the lesson of the negative EROEI refineries.
https://chiefio.wordpress.com/2009/05/29/ulum-ultra-large-uranium-miner-ship/
As long as oil gives cheaper transport fuels than the alternative paths, it will be lifted, even at negative EROEI via using electric lift pumps. Effectively turning nuclear energy into motor fuel.
“Wood burning – we didn’t run out of wood”
Actually, that happened several times in human history in several places. One of the causes of the Roman Empire is contributed to running out of wood locally. Taking too much energy and time to import it. It happened in England when they ran out of oak trees for ship building. Easter Island another example.
The “OK, so far” is exactly what the CEO of the Deutsches Bank sent to their employees last week. They are the largest bank in the EU and are sitting on some 25% of non-performing or under performing loans.
Our biggest threat to our way of life isnt peak oil, it’s peak credit. Socialist government borrowing is going to come to an abrupt end. Have a look at Venezuela today. Notice it’s deliberately being kept out of the news.
Regarding your comment “ex of regulatory burdens nuclear power is probably the cheapest most reliable way to generate power”
Well… not quite. Nuclear is inexpensive source of base load power, but, it can’t handle the swings associated with daily load variation. So, from a practical point of view, nuclear is only good from producing power up to the daily low at max. The rest is made up from fossil assets.
Adding to this problem, is the fact that you can’t simply shut down all the fossil plants at the daily system low – for technical and economic reasons. Specifically, the cycling would destroy the plant equipment and, to pay for the plant, the fossil pant has to be operated at least 80% capacity factor until fully depreciated.
Solving that problem is one of the reasons nuclear technologies like the small modular reactor are being perused. But that technology is 20-30 years away.
Nuclear is inexpensive source of base load power, but, it can’t handle the swings associated with daily load variation.
Actually, it largely can.
Especially if designed for it.
http://www.templar.co.uk/downloads/0203_Pouret_Nuttall.pdf
Its not currently economic. Operated at low capacity factors the high capital cost of nuclear power renders it pretty expensive in load following mode, but technically it can, and France at least does.
France is in fact a good example, where nearly all the baseload and a lot more is covered by nuclear, with some load following,. and then they use a lot of hydro for peaks and most of the load following and some pumped storage, with a very little thermal fossil plant to cover extreme demand.
The decision to not have dispatchable nuclear is not a technical one, its an economic one. At about 70% capacity factor gas becomes cheaper.
Oh, for Pete’s sake. If you have baseload nuclear power, it can be used to synthesize hydrocarbon fuels from water and any carbonaceous feedstock. These fuels can be used for the powerplants needed for the diurnal load variation. There is no better battery, joule per kilogram, than a long-chain hydrocarbon. Nothing new need be invented.
Leo Smith,
Regarding your statement “Actually, it largely can” – in reference to nuclear’s capability to load follow.
Your U.K. literature source points to a theoretical capacity for nuclear to load follow.
I originally pointed out the theoretical capacity for nuclear to load follow using the Small Modular Reactor design – other designs are possible. But… as I said, actual load-following nuclear capacity is roughly 20-30 years away.
To quote Yogi Berra (also attributed to Albert Einstein).
“In theory here is no difference between theory and practice. In practice there is”.
Leo,
“Gail Tverberg … may not be right, but she makes a good case that today’s debt crisis and what amounts to the cessation of Western growth over the last 15 years or so is in fact linked to the rising cost of energy ”
Only if you know little about economics. She was wrong about oil consumption, and her economics are just making stuff up. To give one of many examples, in her oft-quoted July 2014 post she says…
“The reason why the price of oil has stayed as high as it has in the last several years is because of the effects of quantitative easing and ultra low interest rates. If it weren’t for these, oil prices would fall, because consumers would need to pay much more for goods bought on credit, leaving less for the purchase of oil products. … Because of the expectation that Quantitative Easing will end by October 2014 and the pressure to tighten credit conditions, my expectation is that the affordable price of oil will start dropping in late 2014,”
That is almost entirely wrong. To mention just a few things …
Neither the start or end of QE3 had much effect on Treasury interest rates, and no visible effect on the rates charged to consumers (the riskless rate plus a credit spread). Determining the “tightness” of lenders’ is complex (there’s no single metric), but there is little evidence of tightening in consumer credit since QE3 was phased out.
The bottom line: the rate of growth of consumer credit increased as QE3 was phased out (Sept 2013 to October 2014) — and remained stable (and rapid) after QE3 ended. Outstanding consumer credit grew at 6.1% in 2012, 6.0% in 2013, 7.0% in 2014, and 6.9% in 2015.
http://www.federalreserve.gov/releases/g19/current/default.htm
So her prediction about credit was wrong. Prices fell for other reasons – fairly obvious ones to people not wearing “peak oil” blinders.
Also, there is little evidence that the price of oil has much effect on inflation (it’s “always and everywhere a monetary phenomenon”, more or less), let alone for “goods bought on credit”.
Thought this was interesting too: https://aeon.co/opinions/doing-more-with-less-the-economic-lesson-of-peak-paper
Când ştii că eşti acasă?
// event.2parale.ro/events/click?ad_type=product_store&aff_code=036a3f65e&campaign_unique=ca8f8ce30&unique=070afad5f
2016-02-16 0:37 GMT+02:00 Watts Up With That? :
> Guest Blogger posted: “By Larry Kummer, from the Fabius Maximus website > Summary: The peak oil hysteria provides rich lessons for us today about > learning from activists and the value of listening to our major > professional institutions. Easy cynicism led people to believe outl” >
We had best hope that ristvan @ur momisugly 4:38 is off by a couple of orders of magnitude. Not taking any position here, but merely pointing out the math. 18 billion bbls of reserves, if fully extracted would provide the USA, at it’s current consumption of 18 million bbls per day, with 1000 days of supply- something less than three years. What’s wrong with this picture?
Just look at the long long history of such estimates. We always seem to have had no more than about twenty years worth of oil in the world, despite increasing production and depletion of existing reserves.
Menicholas:
Yes. Oil producers pay for more reserves to be found when they have less reserves than their planning horizon. Oil producers don’t pay for more oil to be found when they have sufficient reserves to fulfill their needs within their planning horizon.
Richard
We had “peak flint” and the end of the Stone Age, but not because we ran out of stones.
We had the Bronze Age which ended but not because we ran out of tin and copper.
We had the Iron Age which ended but not because we ran out of iron ore.
We are now in the Steel, Oil, Neodymium, Aluminium, Silicon (take your pick) Age and when this epoch ends it will not be because we run out of the stuff, but because something better has come along.
Exactly. OIl/gas up at $200 a barrel would not be competitive with nuclear: at $600 synthetic fuel made with nuclear power becomes competitive (wet finger estimates).
Oil is already uncompetitive with coal and gas in power stations.
And oil is uncompetitive with gas for making “petro” chemicals. Oh, and they were first made from coal… Eastman Chemical still does use coal. There are also folks making chemicals from garbage. I doubt we will ever run out of garbage.
The notion that we need to save the oil to make plastics is just daft and ignorant of chemistry and history both.
Peak oil has passed in terms of energy put in to energy got out.
We just have more finds and more types of oil. We have kept exploration up and up to keep the rate of oil production up.
We are not running out, not for another 100 years and as it runs out the price goes up and up so, maybe twice that time actually.
And that’s without massive new finds, of which there are some I am pretty sure.
For all the talk of the arctic, and Antarctica, and Greenland, if big reserves are found they WILL be drilled, end of story. Civilisation is built on oil and there is nothing to replace it. Biofuels HA Solar HA wind and tide HA.
Can’t make toothpaste or fertiliser with biofuel, cant make types and plastics, and the billion other pretro chemical products.
Green militants are mentally ill, no oil no cities.
The only way solar could work, is to shove everyone into huge cities designed to run on solar, literally the only way as things stand. I hear the UN are planning just that
Again with the mistake of understanding what peak oil means. It DOES NOT mean we run out of oil. It means world production will start to slow at some point, and never recover. It doesnt have to be a geological reason for slowing the world’s oil production. It could be economic reasons, or geopolitical reasons. It could also be because of net energy returned drops significantly. That slowing of production will force a slowing of consumption. But some will be able to out bid others for that lower production of oil, that in turn means someone who needs that oil will have to do without. Those who will have the hardest time trying to out bid others will be those who are most in debt.
Virtually all organic chemicals can be made starting from synthesis gas (CO and H2) regardless of its source, whether it be natural gas or biomass. Now we could argue whether there is enough biomass certainly.
Also coal and garbage are currently being used too.
There are tons of “waste” biomass per person per year. There is way more than needed for plastics and other synthetics. A couple of examples:
Roughly 10% of US gasoline is ethanol from corn. Turn that into plastics instead, you get a few gallons of plastic per person per week. We don’t need anywhere near that much… There is greater mass in the stalks and husks and cobs, but we don’t need it either. BTW, there are folks making bioplastics today from corn.
Henry Ford with George Washington Carver made plastic parts for cars out of soybeans decades ago. We throw out tons of “waste vegetable oil” every year since it is cheaper to use natural gas as feed stock. Still, if desired, we can grow plastics via corn, soy, or even trees. (Rayon is made from cellulose, as is your ‘viscous sponge’ at the kitchen sink… )
Look at the piles of “yard waste” hauled away from suburban homes. No way we can use that much plastic, so we dump it in landfills to rot, or compost it.
There is no feedstock limit. Only a cheapest cost choice.
Moreover, I’d like to see the US military running on solar, that would be hilarious.
Larry Kummer:
You title your essay Lessons from the hysteria about peak oil (2005-2013).
“Hysteria”? No, that is pure hyperbole.
A few self-agrandising ‘experts’ self-publicised by publishing twaddle about ‘peak oil’, and a few ‘useful idiots’ responded by posting rubbish on the web. Meanwhile, the public ignored ‘peak oil’ while the oil industry glanced at the evidence for ‘peak oil’ and decided it was not worth bothering about.
Eugenics, ‘acid rain’, and anthropogenic (i.e. man-made) global warming (AGW) did cause hysteria. Only AGW remains a problem and it, too, is fading away.
Richard
Richard,
““Hysteria”? No, that is pure hyperbole. ”
Not correct. Presentations at conferences at the American Society for Study of Peak Oil (ASPO) routinely predicted decades of depression and hyperinflation — plus “resource wars” — following peak oil — coming quite soon. And those were the more professional of the peak oil community.
Apocalyptic predictions were commonplace. Here are a few of the thousands available from a brief google search.
Olduvai theory
“The Olduvai theory claims that exponential growth of energy production ended in 1979, that energy use per capita will show no growth through 2008, and that after 2008 energy growth will become sharply negative, culminating, after a Malthusian catastrophe, in a world population of 2 billion circa 2050.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Olduvai_theory
Matt Savinar‘s Life After the Oil Crash — “wholly shatter an oil-dependent economy and reduce its citizenry to poverty. …”
http://www.lifeaftertheoilcrash.net/Index.html
Peak Oil explains the lack of UFOs, Salon (6 May 2008) — Civilizations all die.
http://www.salon.com/tech/htww/2008/05/06/peak_oil_and_ufos/index.html
Richards Courtney,
My reply has not appeared, so I’ll reenter — taking a different perspective.
““Hysteria”? No, that is pure hyperbole. ”
Not so. Apocalyptic predictions were common in the peak oil community. Which was the subject of this article. It was more than “a few” people. The Oil Drum and ASPO has large followings, and were quoted as expert sources in the major media — which gave lavish coverage to the doomsters.
This had an affect on the general public: “Gallup surveys conducted in 2007 and 2008, for example, indicated at the time that 53% (2007) and 62% (2008) of Americans believed that the United States would face a severe energy shortage in the next 5 years and that 43% (2007) and 47% (2008) of Americans worried “a great deal” about the availability and affordability of energy”
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3154229/
As I said, the major climate agencies (and, as you note, the oil companies) provided sober analysis throughout this period. The contrast between the two is the relevant point of my post.
Richards Courtney,
To learn more about the Peak Oil movement — the large number of people who were extremely worried about what they saw as an imminent doom — I recommend reading Peak Oil: Apocalyptic Environmentalism and Libertarian Political Culture by Matthew Schneider-Mayerson (University of Chicago Press, 2015). He is an assistant professor at Yale-NUS (a joint project of Yale and the National University of Singapore).
The interviews with these deluded people are quite sad. Some of them restructured their lives to prepare for the End.
Editor of the Fabius Maximus website:
I repeat, a few self-agrandising ‘experts’ self-publicised by publishing twaddle about ‘peak oil’, and a few ‘useful idiots’ responded by posting rubbish on the web. Meanwhile, the public ignored ‘peak oil’ while the oil industry glanced at the evidence for ‘peak oil’ and decided it was not worth bothering about.
But you stand by your assertion of ‘peak oil’ “hysteria” which you support by
(a) you cite that an Assistant Professor wrote a book (yawn)
and
(b) several people were worried such that you say
There are always people worried that ‘The End Is Nigh’. This is a report of five different reasons why the world will end this year. The minority who fear such things are hysterical and always exist, but their fears mean nothing.
I see no evidence that society has been hysterical about ‘peak oil’.
Richard
Courtney,
OK, so you’re indifferent to the evidence about the peak oil conferences, the websites, the books– and the public opinion polls that showed their influence. Esp got to love your “so an assistant professor wrote a book” (it’s called “research”).
“I see no evidence that society has been hysterical about ‘peak oil’.”
I never said that society became hysterical. In fact I said the opposite by pointing to the sober analysis by the “major energy agencies”. This was about a hysterical minority that for several years had a disproportionate influence in the US — an all-too-common phenomenon in recent US history.
Kummer:
You say
There was a “hysterical minority” that “had a disproportionate influence in the US”?
But you admit that minority had NO “influence in the US”: the “major energy agencies” rejected the minority’s attempt to generate a scare. The most the minority achieved was to raise awareness of a need for energy security.
As I pointed out, there are always insignificant minorities who are hysterical about something, and – as illustration – I linked to five different reasons why the world will end this year. They affect nothing and – as supporters of ‘peak oil’ demonstrate in this thread – they don’t understand the issues which cause their panic.
Richard