Guest essay by Eric Worrall
Mainstream media is waking up that despite billions invested in renewable energy, oil and coal use are surging.
Forget About Peak Oil – We Haven’t Even Reached Peak Coal Yet
David Blackmon
Senior Contributor Energy
Aug 2, 2021,09:18am EDTDespite all the heavy dissemination of narratives and talking points about a “climate emergency” and the “energy transition” during 2021, the ongoing economic recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic proves that the world still heavily relies on fossil fuels to provide its constantly growing energy needs. Indeed, as the pushers of Peak Oil demand theory try in vain to revive their own always-wrong narrative, it now appears that the world has yet to even meet the peak of demand for the least environmentally friendly fuel of all, coal.
This is especially true in China, India and much of Asia, where thousands of coal-fired power plants have seen record usage levels in the face of a major heat wave this summer. Bloomberg reported last week that China’s enormous demand for coal this summer has caused commodity prices to spike to the highest level seen in 2 months, briefly climbing above 900 yuan/ton (roughly $139.31 at current exchange rates) on Friday.
The global futures price for coal set a new record high in May as supplies ran low. Australian coal – China’s main international supplier – hit $150 per ton in July, the highest level seen since 2008. The demand is so high in China that it has even led to implementation of electricity rationing in some parts of the country as supplies run short.
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This spike in coal demand and usage is far from limited to Asia. The Wall Street Journal reported in early July that coal-fired power usage was also spiking in European countries like Germany and France, both of which spent years loudly boasting of their plans to eliminate coal from their energy profiles.
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In the meantime, the United States has been able to cut its own carbon emissions to levels not achieved since the early 1990s mainly by replacing retiring coal-fired power plants with power provided by natural gas. Thanks to the Shale revolution, which is enabled by hydraulic fracturing – “fracking” – the U.S. possesses such enormously abundant supplies of natural gas that it has been able to develop a robust business sector for the export of liquefied natural gas (LNG). The country now ranks among the three top exporters of LNG, along with Qatar and Australia.
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Read more: https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidblackmon/2021/08/02/forget-about-peak-oilwe-havent-even-reached-peak-coal-yet/
Just to add to the fun, talking about peak oil and peak coal as if they are different targets is fundamentally wrong.
As the NAZIs proved in WW2, when they lost access to good oil fields, you can run an economy on coal liquefaction technologies, well proven technologies for converting coal into oil.
The only holdup is liquefied coal is more expensive than conventional oil, it doesn’t become economical until oil prices exceed $100 ($145 / barrel according to one estimate I saw). Though China runs a significant volume of coal liquefaction plants, those plants are likely more for high value added chemical synthesis than fuel oil.
The threat of cheaper coal liquefaction technologies is likely the real reason OPEC tries to keep oil prices low. OPEC are terrified of “demand destruction”, the possibility that high oil prices will stimulate a switchover to EVs, or more investment in developing non-OPEC oil resources, but they are also concerned it will stimulate research into cutting the cost of coal liquefaction. A coal liquefaction research breakthrough could permanently cap OPEC’s conventional oil at an uncomfortably low price.
So the reality is, there is zero chance we shall see peak oil supply in our lifetime, or even our grandchildren’s lifetime, not only because there are vast reserves of oil, but because there are centuries worth of coal reserves just sitting in the ground waiting to be mined. We shall all have a plentiful supply of oil at an affordable price, for as long as we need it.
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“The only holdup is liquefied coal is more expensive than conventional oil, it doesn’t become economical until oil prices exceed $100 ($145 / barrel according to one estimate I saw).”
SASOL, long the world leader in this technology, first wrote that the process was break-even at $28 a bbl. I think $100 is a bit generous.
There is supposedly a new process developed in China that is more direct that the SASOL process, but there are big advantages to the original, one being that any hydrocarbon product can be made – like polypropylene which is in high demand.
In Alberta they have started this type of upgrading which could conceivably use any suitable input material, solid or liquid.
Thanks for the update Paul Ehrlich. As a world population we should have never lived to see all those planes fall out of the sky after Y2K flipped us into the apocalypse.
Keep on stirring that vat of fear Mark “Double, double toil and trouble; fire burn and caldron bubble…”
There’s a very simple reason for that, one that is apparently too complex for your mind to comprehend.
It’s basic economics. Spending money finding more reserves, when you already have 30 years worth of reserves in the bank makes no sense.
If you would take a look at all the data, you will find oil reserves have been pretty constant for as far back as they have been keeping records.
Either we have been on the verge of peak oil for the last 100 years, or you don’t know what you are talking about.
I see you are still incapable of dealing with the heart of any argument.
Who makes this kind of crap up? And who really believes it? The USGS was in part created to survey and forecast oil reserves. Since it’s inception it has warned that we’re going to run out of oil soon several times. Every deadline for peak oil they ever forecast has been wrong!
On the other hand, you are convinced that you are winning the debate here.
Sometimes all you need to win a debate, is to show that the other sides data doesn’t show what the other side claims.
Debates can also be won with logic, especially since yours have none.
Hey ingraham, were you the man on the grassy knoll?
Maybe his grandfather. That’s got to be at least 40 years before he was born.
Well, finally an otherwise blindered mainstream news organ has awakened to reality on the ground. We will not be curbing CO2 emissions this century, period.
Every government knows this, will not speak about it, but they are negotiating fruitlessly with Asian and African countries who are determined to emerge from poverty, and understand the only viable route for this is through abundant FF energy. Kerry and Biden have both let slip that if this isn’t stopped, there is no point to cutting their own CO2 emissions!
If this isn’t enough, governments have come to realize that the hardest nut to crack is decarbonizing transport – ocean, air and highway. This is the reason they vigorously tackled what was thought to be the easy one, the electric grid!
Numerous tech issues have stalled the electrical grid transformation, most notably in the most advanced users (Germany, Texas, California …). There is no way to transform the the transport sector to electric in less than 70 yrs, even when, before 2030, they all agree to accept nuclear to replace ruinables. Adequate technology for electric vehicles hasn’t been developed yet and the most ambitious nuclear construction plan required would take us into the next century. Economically, cooler heads will go with natural gas and coal, with a retirement plan to replace them gradually with nuclear.
Tried reading the whole string
Mr Ingraham has defeated me
So I’ll make him honorary Griff
I’ve come to conclusion that ingraham isn’t serious. Nobody could be so stupid on so many subjects. He’s just some gadfly who gets pleasure out of seeing how much consternation he can raise.
And add the comment that the alberta oilsands are just fine, the only issues they face are political eco insanity.
No matter the price of oil, we just keep pumping the same amount with incremental increases
We will ALWAYS need heavy oil, just has too many uses for it.
At current rates of extraction we have 400 years supply minimum
If we had used nuclear/electric to extract it from the beginning instead of burning gas we would all be further ahead.
I hope Jane Fonda lives long enough to figure out just how badly she has damaged the earths environment and humanity
It would be fitting for her epitaph.
80% of what is left in the oilsands to be recovered is in situ, thermally extracted.
Burning large volumes of natural gas to create steam for this purpose.
There is no better shovel ready application for small modular reactors than these inSitu projects, creating steam to directly inject in the ground.
Or at most, use the steam to generate electricity and then use that electricity to heat the pay zone.
Instantly eliminate 80% of the CO2 footprint of the oilsands which then has the added benefit of exploding limitless climate scientologists heads.
Easy
The uranium comes from the shield in Saskatchewan a short hop away
Endless power endless oil, for our purposes today
And watch out for PEAK URANIUM in the next couple million years…..maybe more with uranium mining on the moon and Mars.
And Peak Natural Gas is hundreds of years in the future.
From his comments I have become convinced that this Ingraham guy is not posting in good faith.
I spent 35 years in the oil and gas business and I have no idea what you are talking about. I assume by heavy oil in Canada you mean tar sands. While it is expensive and low margin oil it is not useless. Plus it adds significant high paying jobs and taxes. EOR in the middle east is still in its infancy but I was involved in several large EOR projects in the region. Injecting natural gas with zero market/low value to enhance oil recovery or CO2 for enhanced oil recovery and carbon sequestration is again not useless. In the fields I worked, we increase oil recovery from the low teens to 50% through a combination of water injection and miscible gas injection, adding billions in recoverable reserves. All while eliminating the flaring of trillions of cubic feet of natural gas. Hardly useless. Every basin the world eventually reaches peak oil and the GOM has seemed to be there 3 times during my career, then technology (and price) changed things. First it was 3D seismic, then it was horizontal/directional drilling and then it was deep water drilling technology. And things continue to evolve and expand what is possible to exploit. As far as Venezuela, it has declined because of socialist political policies imposed by the Venezuelan government not lack of reserves. PDVSA has been gutted of technical skills and starved of investment plus many US companies have scaled back or left altogether which further reduces investment and ultimately production.
Is liquified coal less polluting than oil/gasoline? Or do the emission from creating liquified coal negate any reduced emissions from burning it?
No no no. Global oil reserves aren’t calculated on how much oil is in the earth, but on how much can be economically acquired. If the price goes up because of high demand or scarcity, there is more oil available to pump.
Why would you inefficiently convert the coal into oil only to further refine it and finally put it through a combustion engine with maybe 30% efficiency on a good day.
Better to burn it efficiently in a high efficiency generator and use the electricity in EVs and/or electric trams/trains for transport.
Falsehoods and sophistry utterly fail to prove or even claim peak oil has ever occurred.
Saudi Arabia, Al Rub Akali
Peak coal will occur closer to 2321. Xi Jinping declared China would not buy anymore Australian coal. Then the CCP’s chief-clown discovered China needs Australian coal supplied to survive, far more than we need to trade with the CCP’s version of China. Same occurred with WA lobsters. As it turned out the Chinese people like our lobsters a lot more than they like Xi Jinping’s unrealistic bloviating diktat, so the Chinese importers just used the usual blackmarket anti-sanction busting approaches and kept importing live Australian lobsters anyway.
But now the ultra-idiot heading up the CCP now realizes China must have Australian resources to survive … so you can guess what his next incredibly dumb move will be.
The problem with the CCP is they don’t understand the limits of their power, and that their authority completely ends outside the Chinese mainland’s 12 nautical mile maritime littoral border limit and internationally recognized EEZ limit.
One day China will have a real government, with no ‘great firewall’ promoting such magnificent CCP ignorance of how the world around them actually works.
I highly recommend this book
The moral case for fossil fuels
It beautifully debunks the peak oil myth and how fossil fuels will not be replaced for a very long time, maybe not for several hundred years as it is cheap, plentiful and reliable.