Do you remember the “peak oil” scare? That was the claim, heard everywhere in the early 2000s, that nearly all the world’s discoverable oil had already been found, and we would shortly enter a time of inexorably declining production and rapidly escalating prices. This 2018 article in Forbes by Michael Lynch traces the “modern” version of the “peak oil” scare to a 1997 piece in the Oil & Gas Journal by a guy named Colin Campbell. Campbell argued that oil reserves were “rapidly depleting,” that there was “comparatively little left to find,” and that “the world’s economic and political stability, which relies on an abundant supply of cheap oil, is in serious jeopardy.”
Campbell was joined in ensuing years by a chorus of assenting voices. Among many others quoted by Lynch are Joe Romm of the Center for American Progress in 2009 (“I have blogged endlessly on the painfully obvious reality that we are at or near the peak”) and Rex Wehler of Greenpeace in 2012 (“Oil company cheerleaders proclaiming huge supplies of oil are dead wrong. Peak oil is as real as rain, and it is here now. Not 2050. Not 2020. Now.”)
And, of course, the usual: “[T]hose who disagreed were treated with derision.”
Then came the fracking revolution. By 2014 prices for oil (and gas as well) were plummeting. The “peak oil” scare quietly faded away, never to be mentioned again — although I haven’t noticed any of the promoters of the scare publicly admitting that they were wrong.
Oil production isn’t at a peak, and never was. But here’s something closely related that really is at or near a peak from which rapid decline should be expected: Oil-Hysteria. Oil-Hysteria is the delirium that holds that the production and use of oil (and for that matter other fossil fuels) for the benefit and happiness of humanity are grave sins and are destroying the planet. Lately that hysteria and delirium have reached a fevered pitch, untethered to reality and reminiscent of great stock market bubbles and tulip manias.
And thus today, after reviewing the evidence, the Manhattan Contrarian has announced the arrival of “Peak Oil-Hysteria.” It is here. Not 2050. Not 2030. Now.
The evidence is far too profuse to cover all of it in one blog post. But consider if you will a few data points:
- President Joe Biden came into office on a crusade against against the fossil fuel industry. Executive Orders issued in his first few days in office essentially did everything within the President’s power, absent new legislation, to restrict and hinder fossil fuel production. This included blocking new pipeline construction, ending fracking and drilling on federal lands, and ordering up various other regulations to make production more difficult and expensive. By August, with retail gas prices up about 30% since inauguration, Biden began urging OPEC members to increase production. On Saturday, at the G20 meeting in Rome — with retail gas prices up yet another 10% or so since August — Biden again urged major producing countries to ramp up supply. From Reuters, October 30: “U.S. President Joe Biden on Saturday urged major G20 energy producing countries [including Russia and Saudi Arabia] with spare capacity to boost production to ensure a stronger global economic recovery as part of a broad effort to pressure OPEC and its partners to increase oil supply.”
- While in Rome, Biden ridiculously conjured himself up a motorcade of some 85 of the biggest armored gas guzzlers ever known to man. Here is a picture of the extravaganza from the New York Post:
Do you think that Joe’s people rented all those specialized armored vehicles from Hertz? I haven’t been able to find confirmation, but I think it’s a completely safe bet that all of the vehicles got flown over from the U.S. on giant military transport planes. This has to be a Guinness Book of World Records occasion for carbon footprint for one guy’s trip to anywhere. On November 2 Senator John Barrasso sent a letter to Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm demanding details on Biden’s expenses and carbon impact for this trip to Rome and Glasgow. The letter notes the “tone of insincerity” on carbon emissions set by Biden’s ridiculously extravagant travel entourage. That’s an extremely gentle way of putting it.
- The opening of the COP26 climate conference in Glasgow was accompanied, as these things always are, by enormous backups of private jets trying to fly into the local airports. The Daily Mail noted a “huge traffic jam” of some 400 private aircraft.
- President Biden was photographed having fallen asleep at the conference listening to some functionary drone on.
- Lots of heads of state showed up, but not the most important ones. Xi Jinping of China — the largest consumer of fossil fuel energy — was a no show. So were Vladimir Putin of Russia and Mohammed bin Salman of Saudi Arabia — the two largest producers of fossil fuel energy other than the U.S. China made no new pledges about cutting emissions, and instead reiterated its supposed pledge to reach “net zero” emissions by 2060. The year 2060 is obviously calculated to be well after the demise of every current world leader, and thus sufficiently far away that China will never be held to account for its completely phony non-commitment. But India (third largest emitter of GHGs after China and the U.S.) whose leader Narendra Modi did at least show up, went even one better: India said it would reach “net zero” by 2070! Oh, but India did say that it would build a slew of solar and wind facilities, but only if Western countries chipped in $1 trillion to pay for them!
- According to today’s Wall Street Journal, Biden remarked that Russia and China had made a mistake by not showing up, and they would “cede influence” in climate discussions. OK, we already knew this guy was dumb. Russia and China may have their problems, but clearly their leaders are smart enough to realize that the right strategy is to sit back and let the West commit suicide.
- Biden himself was of course empty-handed at the conference, having failed to move his multi-trillion dollar spendapalooza in Congress. Even if it all gets passed it would never make a noticeable difference in world emissions. As an example, completely missing from Biden’s multi-trillions is anything towards India’s latest trillion dollar demand. And don’t even ask about Africa.
- So in the absence of anything even remotely meaningful, the Wall Street Journal reports today that the delegates turned their attention to something still more peripheral — methane emissions: “Global leaders at the Glasgow climate summit pledged Tuesday to sharply curtail methane emissions, with President Biden saying the U.S. would tighten regulations on oil and natural-gas production to reduce leaks of the potent greenhouse gas. The effort spotlighted growing concerns about the environmental harms of methane, a byproduct of drilling. . . .” Once more, it’s the attack of the journalist English majors, who have no idea that methane, which is the main component of natural gas, is not a “byproduct” of drilling, but rather the whole point.
- On October 24 Iran’s Fars new agency reported that China is buying on the order of 1 million barrels of oil per day from Iran.
- And suddenly, some members of Congress are finding it politically advantageous to get on the sane side of the climate craziness. If you haven’t watched it, check out Representative Byron Donalds of Florida at the Congressional hearing on October 28 called by Representative Carolyn Maloney (of Manhattan) to try to embarrass the CEOs of the oil majors. Excerpt: “Somebody needs to go and call Merrick Garland, tell him to get in here and watch the intimidation that came from this very panel today,” Donalds said. “Because this is not about defending big oil, or defending big anything. It’s about defending the ability of people in our country to be free: say what they want, think what they want, spend their money how they choose. And if we are not going to be any better than the Chinese, how do we ever expect to beat them on the world stage when we’re cutting our neck when it comes to energy production while they are burning more coal, burning more oil, they’re increasing their emissions and they’re not showing up in Scotland. . . . [T]hey’re interested in building an economy.”
Note that I’m not saying that the whole climate scam is going to collapse tomorrow. Just that the hysteria has reached a peak beyond which it has nowhere to go. From here it will have to be a long decline.
US crude oil production:
https://tradingeconomics.com/united-states/crude-oil-production#:~:text=Crude%20Oil%20Production%20in%20the%20United%20States%20averaged%207588.85%20BBL,1K%20in%20September%20of%202008.
In the medium term, production follows price. Price on the world market is function of both quantity supplied and quantity demanded. OPEC and Russia collude to adjust this in the medium term. The collapse in demand in the Q2-2020 collapsed prices as we all vividly remember. Rig counts across the US and especially the P-Basin contracted markedly last year and the demand evaporated relative to supply. A major realignment-consolidation in frackers and acquisitions occurred in 2020-2021. While the shale oil is still there to be recovered, the producers are still realigning today in the P-Basin. So it’s now at a slower pace as capital and hardware are more scarce, and with some due to supply chain problems everyone is facing from the curtailment of worldwide mining and manufacturing productivity for much of 2020.
The dominance factor OPEC on world oil markets lost after 2010 was the US frackers emergence and pushing up WTI-priced oil supplies. No longer could OPEC set benchmark prices with confidence due to the uncontrollable US fracker. Begining in 2016, although we still imported Middle East oil, we also began exporting. That because in December 2015, a Republican-controlled Congress effectively repealed the crude oil export ban, allowing the free export of U.S. crude oil worldwide. Thus the US acheived energy dominance in the final 2 years of the Trump Administration. The side effect of copious fracked natural gas was also quite detrimental to coal industry and to the renewable energy market players. But that’s another story in itself. A story that now makes the US a major player in the LNG world market.
The post-2010 fracking revolution and the fall in prices of both oil and natural gas of course pushed the concept of “peak oil” off the near-term radar for the climate scammers with their Marxist designs to impose on the Western democracies. SO their strategy shifted to the political front for regaining control once natural economic forces of expected scarcity due to depletion evaporated.
What emerged were scams that employed legions of legal cockroaches like #ExxonKnew and other politically-enabled attacks on Western production companies sprung-up and commenced in earnest by 2014 and continue to this day.
Several fundamental problems exist for the climate scammers on the supply side though. They can’t control Middle East oil sheiks or the Kremlin’s energy production plans that provide the funds that sustain their population and nation. Hence Sleepy Joe’s bleating to them to increase production because he knows he is politically unable to do that within US borders. The Kremlin and OPEC are both no doubt quite happy with the current price vector for world oil.
The one factor that not enough economists appreciate is that with energy dominance for the US came a resistance to economic recessions. Recessions are simply periodic, cyclical downturns in the US business cycle, and the Federal Reserve moved interest rates up and down accordingly in chasing the cycle to blunt the effects.
Prior to energy dominance, when the US economy expanded its oil demands increased, and this was met with more imports, not from domestic drilling. The Middle East obliged and we bought more oil from them. The rest of the world’s economies picked up typically further pushing up oil demand. As world oil prices accelerated, the drain of dollars from US economy to the shieks bank accounts increased, and this was anegative feedback on the money supply in the US. The shieks did buy new jets, but no longer exclusively Boeing jets. They built new palaces, but that meant the money drained away from the US.
After 2012 new-found US Energy dominance changed the fundamentals of that expansion-recession equation. The energy dollars no longer primarily went overseas to fund new palaces, but into the pockets of US frackers from North Dakota to South Texas. And they needed US business services, US workers, and US made hardware to frack. And frack they did. And employment (and the wages produced) skyrocketed in the energy sector from North Dakota to South Texas. No longer was the bulk of that money going overseas.
IOW, along with the fracking revolution and energy independence meant energy dollars stayed in the domestic economic system to keep it expanding. OPEC could no longer control the price game. Oil shieks ability to build new palaces and buy new jets for themselves were severely crimped. OPEC tried to push the US frackers out of business in 2014 by flooding the markets with more oil, but that only made the frackers leaner and more efficient because the domestic demand was still there and the oil didn’t have to travel across the oceans to get here.
The Climate scammers were having conniption fits watching all of this. Then they never saw Trump coming. That put them up to volume 11 and birthed multitudes of illicit, under-handed, conspiratorial schemes to get rid of him. Schemes we are still living with today.
It’s interesting to look at the energy flow charts produced by Lawrence Livermore National Labs.
The most striking detail is their use of the term “Rejected Energy” or simply waste heat.
Measured in Quads of BTU’s, US “Energy Services” for instance use a total of 30.6 while “Rejecting” 62.3.
Is there that much in-efficiency built into the system?
What I am afraid the clown show calling itself the Biden Administration might do is go full Nixon or Carter and institute price controls.
If anyone wants to ensure a shortage, do just that.
The JoeBama administration won’t institute price controls. The global corporatists who helped install these people and who now control Biden’s economic policies won’t allow it. Rising prices for everything, especially for energy, is part of the globalist plan for America.
Why would they want that, globalists don’t benefit from inflation.
The only people who benefit from inflation are those who owe a lot of money.
Hummmm, who owes a lot of money to the world???
The globalists:
1) need to maintain the USD as the world’s fiat currency. The alternative is either crypto or the Renminbi (Chinese yuan). Neither are acceptable to the globalists. They believe they can control the US Treasury and Federal reserve, whereas China and crytp are both uncontrollable and unstable.
2) need to keep financing US massive debt, hence we are coming into a period of Fiscal Dominance for the Federal Reserve. Fiscal dominance replaces Federal Reserve’s Monetary policy of adjusting interest rates to contain inflation, and that demands low interest rates and the continual printing of the US dollar with the Fed buying most of it and feeding the interest returns back to the treasury in a sleight of hand most Americans are unaware of.
3) the resulting inflation “inflates away” the debt problem, as you mention.
Governments have a lot of debt, however unless you are defining globalists as being a synonym for government, the globalists don’t benefit.
Most of the globalists either owe a fair amount of money, or are lending- through stocks, bonds, and various development projects. A continuing decline in overall productivity will put them in an even harder place.
None of them will go bankrupt- they have very good lawyers, but loss of significant amounts of capital will make their lives just too hard- they may see a need to sell a house, or drop one of the Executive planes, or maybe lose some in order to put it in safe longer term investment.
Pity the sad elites, they may lose a little money and have to put off a month long vacation.
That’s the ‘keyword’ me thinks; “elites”. And that’s why we see such ostentatious displays like ” Biden’s ridiculously extravagant travel entourage”, and all the jets gobbling up our supposedly scarce fossil fuels, and turning it into “pollution” that is supposedly going to cook the planet. Rather than using communication technology to blah blah blah about how to save the world from the CAWG monster.
That “noble mission” being undermined by such displays is of little importance to those who are actually in the “elites” club. It’s the “elitism” that really matters to them, and remaining in the “club”, since (come hell and/or high water, so to speak ; ) those in the club will be just fine . . (consider Hunter Brandon . . er, I mean Biden ; )
What we see as flaming hypocrisy, they see as the necessary maintenance of the illusion that the elites are sacrificing mightily, just by spending some time even bothering with the risks that “climate” or high prices and scarce energy pose to we who live down here below, in the cockroach world of bills and deadlines.
How dare you insult clowns !
They have a job, and do it well.
Was it Einstein who observed that there are only 2 known phenonema in the universe that are unlimited –
1. Infinity
2. The Stupidity Of Humans
And Einstein wasn’t sure about the former
I thought the first one was “The Universe”.
Isn’t infinity unlimited, by definition?
“Two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity; and I’m not sure about the universe.”
Not in the UK, we caved in to the watermelons in favour of higher energy prices
It’s time sensible people in the UK had a fracking revolution and revolted against the revolting greens
They were here at FloP26 so you’re money’s safe
Oil IS getting harder to find…We now search for it in the Arctic and under the oceans. Sooner or later, this makes other energy sources more attractive to produce….although it might be 50 or 100 years away….
Yes, of course, but there’s no need to panic and run around like headless chickens building unreliable solar and windmills
Mankind will find a way once we kick the habit of listening to Greens
Not to mention the amount of oil/gas uselessly wasted manufacturing said solar panels and windmills.
The whipsaw is amazing; couldn’t pay people to take it a year ago.
Now there again–we didn’t start to search for oil in the Arctic and under oceans because oil on land was running out; it was because it didn’t take long after oil was discovered on land to realize it formed and pooled in ocean basins–so go look there.
Read up on Panarctic Oils–it was formed in 1966. The King Christian Island blowout and the fire that took 3 months to extinguish occurred when I was a young geologist at a remote northern mine in 1971; the images were surreal, especially realizing where they came from. And I thought I was ‘remote’?
Considering all the oil that has been discovered in ocean basins since says that it was neither a dumb nor desperate idea.
As long the oil can be sold for more than the cost of extraction, then it makes sense to drill there. Where ever “there” is.
Drilling for oil is a lot like the procedure for gathering firewood for a campfire. No reasonable person gathers firewood from miles away when it is available within easy walking distance of camp. Only when you run out of wood that is easy to gather does one start going farther afield to keep the fire burning.
The US started drilling in seeps in Pennsylvania, and then wildcatting in Texas and Oklahoma. Then it started exploring seeps and obvious anticlines in California. It wasn’t until it started to become more difficult and time consuming to find oil that a new industry of seismic exploration and other geophysical techniques were developed to improve the success rate. We now depend on super computers to do detailed 3D seismic prospecting. That is the evidence that it is becoming more difficult to find oil! Extensive seismic surveys and deep-water platforms require extensive capitalization and are only affordable because oil is so valuable. We no longer live in the days of Spindletop.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spindletop
We first started drilling the arctic some 50 years ago.
Technology is decreasing the cost to drill, everywhere.
Rising energy costs also make these more difficult places economic to drill.
BTW, more like 150 to 200 years away.
What is 150 to 200 years away? Peak oil? Or running out? They’re very different measures.
Mr. Man: They are indeed different measures. “Running out” is a WAG but it could happen. When eco kooks tried to use it to scare us, it didn’t work because it seemed that when the price rose, people like bigoilbob went and found more of what was “running out.” “Peak oil” is a WAG that really never happens, but it helps them try to scare us in the here and now. It’s vague enough to be more useful.
There are tremendous reserves of both oil and coal. The problem is that they are increasingly hard to get at. Robot mining at dept might be possible. Gasification of peat/coal in situ has been tested and is feasible but expensive.
There also is a large amount of heat, water, and many miscellaneous chemicals and lavas pour out rift-bottom canyons under the oceans. Some experiments have tried to capture some of the energy but the problems are difficult due to the heat and the corrosion from various chemicals being leached out.
All would be viable energy sources in the future.
One bright spot in th future would be the direct mining and extraction from coal at depths.
Taking all hydrocarbon sources together, it’s hundreds of years.
From here it will have to be a long decline
Unless it s merely a Pause and peak stupidity stokes the fires of hysteria
“Note that I’m not saying that the whole climate scam is going to collapse tomorrow. Just that the hysteria has reached a peak beyond which it has nowhere to go. From here it will have to be a long decline.”
Unfortunately, very wrong.
Just like “Peak Oil”, we have a long way to go before we hit Peak Climate Hysteria.
Just consider one point:
Children are getting indoctrinated from first grade on. First graders today will graduate from college 17 years from now and form a whole new generational cohort in absolute terror of Climate Change. In the meantime, the current generation of college students and young adults will keep the panic going.
Another point:
If we call the current situation BAU, (business as usual, to coin a phrase) we see huge political and financial power centers with a vested interest in keeping the alarm going as a new status quo. They benefit greatly and will not give it up.
This worries me too
They’ve just announced a Duke of Edinburgh type award for climate youth hysteria
Sounds familiar anyone?
My bet is that in the next decade the academic / bureaucratic / political / environmental operatives will twist their climate catastrophism into a call for Small Modular Reactors to be urgently rolled out everywhere, because the planet is already out of time, and fossil fuels are still too convenient and tempting.
“My bet is that in the next decade the academic … a call for Small Modular Reactors”
I will take that bet. You are on.
In my (not so) humble opinion, SMRs are going nowhere, and will go nowhere fast.
Why things could get really ugly on the nuclear front:
1a) We have a regulatory bureaucracy which dedicated itself to the elimination of nuclear power way back in the 1970s. Nothing has changed since. The bureaucrats in authority now perceive themselves to have a winning formula in their anti-nuclear stance and will ride it all the way to retirement. They perceive that to change is to risk their pensions. Therefor, not going to happen.
1b) A regulatory approval for *anything* is perceived as taking a risk. “What if I approve and something goes wrong? I could be (*gasp*) held accountable.” Again, not going to happen.
Things get ugly, part 2:
SMR proponents often assume that once a SMR is regulatory approved, that it can be manufactured in volume without further regulatory obstruction.
This may not be the case.
What happens if the NRC makes the regulatory determination that *each* SMR must undergo regulatory approval. Note that the cost of approval for a large plant is crushing. The same costs applied to a reactor with only 1% of the power output of the large reactor kills it outright.
A final thought:
Many regulatory agency workers see large regulatory projects as job security. They fully intend to ride this one project all the way to retirement. This could well be why approvals which once took years now take decades.
We will see how it goes in Ontario. Darlington has environmental approval and is now licensed to install an SMR. Looks like a serious plan.
OK, but we’ll have to meet at the Pearly Gates to settle our bet no matter who wins 😇
I’ll volunteer to hold the bet.
I’ll manage the escrow trust and provide reasonable disbursement to the named beneficiary ….
“What if I approve and something goes wrong? I could be (*gasp*) held accountable.”
I have never been able to understand that mindset from the regulators. They are seldom held accountable … someone needs to die first (and even then there is seldom accountability).
“Just consider one point:
Children are getting indoctrinated from first grade on. First graders today will graduate from college 17 years from now and form a whole new generational cohort in absolute terror of Climate Change.”
I think the whole scam will be over by that time.
Late Teens and Twenties always hold the previous generation and their ideas in contempt. I see no reason to suppose that The Greta who are currently saying “It’s all your fault” will be not subjected to the same blame for ruining their children’s lives. My only regret is I’ll have to watch from The Pearly Gates along with TonyL and Mr
For many decades running, every child in the communist countries was indoctrinated and fed a diet of pure communist propaganda every single day of their lives.
And what was the result?
By the 1980’s, no one in those countries believed a single word they were told.
They were not indoctrinated communists, they were prisoners who paid no attention to the lies they were told, and every one who could escape from the bullshit, did so.
Think about the bullshit you were fed in school.
Did you scream at the lying liars that were lying at you?
Mostly not.
Mostly kids just say there and listened at least a little, and then ignored it.
Kids might regurgitate some of the bullshit if prompted, and there were of course some kids who took it to heart and preached that nonsense to everyone, but mostly as soon as it was possible or convenient, the lies and bullshit was shrugged off like a itchy sweater on a warming day.
They can tell all the lies in the world all day long, every single day, but in he end what we can see and hear and glean from our own senses and experience will trump every single word anyone ever said to us.
We do not have a world or a country full of Gretas.
We have a few loudmouths who never shut up, spouting nonsense.
They can say it as many times as they want, but bullshit will keep being bullshit nonetheless.
Repeating a lie never made it true, not even if a whole bunch of people say it every damn day.
“For many decades running, every child in the communist countries was indoctrinated and fed a diet of pure communist propaganda every single day of their lives.
And what was the result?
By the 1980’s, no one in those countries believed a single word they were told.”
That is similar to today in the United States where only about 10 percent believe what the Leftwing Media tells them. About 90 percent say the Leftwing Media twists their stories for partisan political purposes.
It’s just like the boy crying wolf all the time: Eventually folks figure out there is no wolf and stop listening to the boy.
The same applies to Human-caused Climate Change. That’s why it always ends up at the bottom of the priority list in polls.
Mr. McGinley: Indeed. Anyone who truly thinks for him or herself should be able to see this.
You forgot to mention that China’s response to Biden’s preaching was just short of wearing a Let’s Go Brandon t-shirt and ending with the chant.
Fossil fuels have lifted more people out of darkness, ignorance and squalor than any substance known to man.
And marxism in all its facets (communism,critical (race) theory,wokeism,agw)has casted them down again.
Especially the mental way.
SxyxS,
That should be Critical RACISM Theory, as it claims that present, and future, racism and discrimination are the cure for racism and other sins from the past!
I don’t understand why so many people keep calling what to me is simply ‘materialist’ gangsterism; Marxism. I get that many modern materialist gangsters use Marxist style tactics involving the rhetorical generation of various groupings/classifications of people that are pitted against each other and all that, but that didn’t start with Marx.
And the “Marxist” goal of a classless society that (magically) revolves around a great big coalition of fair/sound minded humans who (for unknown reasons) see themselves as mutually supportive equals or some such thing, is about as far from what “Globalists” seek as one can get, it seems to me. I’m quite sure they seek good old “elitism” (with themselves in the elite ; )
I hate to be a pest, but I can see as plain as day that “on materialism”, there is only one logical goal for a human animal (or any other kind) to seek; To experience a maximum of mostly pleasant times, and a minimum of mostly unpleasant times, while one can experience anything at all. If you think there’s a (logical) alternative “on materialism”, I’m all ears, but I think you’re kidding yourself.
(Which is not to say that I think all materialists are actually just operating on that “get while the gettin’s good” sort of mentality. I don’t, because I’m not a materialist myself.)
“any” other “substance”
Sorry a particular crotchet of mine.
‘Peak Oil’ traces to the late 60’s, not to the late 90’s; people writing articles ought to understand there was a world before they were born and read some history before they speak and prove something they might not want to demonstrate. It’s been thoroughly discussed on this forum before.
There is one regular and repeated feature however–every peak-oil-hysteria session has always been followed by a major price jump. Anyone want to take bets?
It goes back before the 1960’s as well. I remember reading about someone back in the 1910’s who was declaring that every place that had oil, had already been drilled.
I believe “peak oil” prophesies began to appear only a few years after the first U.S. oil drilling in 1859.
The claim is that drilling oil wells in China began more than 1500 years ago.
I believe that there was an article in Science many years ago about the Chinese capturing methane from coal mines using bamboo pipes a very long time ago.
Peak Oil goes back to the 1880s or there-about. Since then there have been about half-dozen peak oil “crisis”. They have all been wrong. It began when the land based oil wells began drying up in Texas and surrounding states and were then capped. Ironically they began filling again through seepage and some of them were re-opened in the last decades to once again supply oil when the price was right. Oil is getting more difficult to find because drilling needs to be deeper for extraction purposes. Oil drilling technology has developed horizontal drilling and extraction which is used when the price of oil makes it profitable.
mikee: Yes, makes one think that one or two “peak oil” scares coulda been started by someone who expected to find oil, so as to drive the price up when he brings in the well. Good thing our oil producers were too ethical to do such a sneaky thing, just for money!
We know one thing, Biden has really stupid people setting his policies and writing his speeches. OK that is two among many.
The question is which kind of stupid people are setting the policies. Are they the kind of stupid that beleives the policies will work as advertised, or the stupid that hate American exceptionalism and know the policies will have the effect of bringing the U.S. down closer to world average?
Ted: In the Brandon admin, the answer is “yes.”
I think this peak oil idea has fed into the global warming area to assist in the push to rid ourselves of a life enhancing energy source.
What about peak coal-hysteria, peak NG hysteria, peak methane hysteria, and for that matter, peak carbon hysteria? I think they may have reached peak nuclear plant hysteria after Fukushima.
People are even hysterical about germs. Make everytning sterile! Yeah, that’s the ticket.
“Global leaders at the Glasgow climate summit pledged Tuesday to sharply curtail methane emissions, with President Biden saying the U.S. would tighten regulations on oil and natural-gas production to reduce leaks of the potent greenhouse gas. The effort spotlighted growing concerns about the environmental harms of methane, a byproduct of drilling. . . .”
Gas production was found to be mostly “hydrogen sulfide (H2S) in brackish marsh, dimethyl sulfide in saltmarsh…carbonyl sulfide in freshwater marsh. ….Emission of total reduced sulfur gases decreased with decrease in salinity and distance inland from the coast.”
DeLaune, R. D. 2002. Flux of reduced sulfur gases along a salinity gradient in Louisiana coastal marshes. Estuarine Coastal Shelf Sci. 54(6):1003-1011. https://doi.org/10.1006/ecss.2001.0871
Ah, whew; we’re nowhere near the catastrophe of having reached Peak Sulfur yet then…
I doubt that the effort will be very successful. Lost methane is lost potential profit. If preventing leaks or eliminating flaring was practical it would be done today. In most cases it doesn’t make economic sense to chase a few PPB. If fines or taxes are imposed to try to force compliance, it will just be passed on to consumers by the producers. The added costs will erode discretionary spending and decrease the standard of living. Those who are in power seem to lack the ability to see the big picture.
“are grave sins and are destroying the planet” The basis of their religious hysteria, which deep down is rooted in the removal of “God” from society at large. Bash out the foundations of a society and there is trouble. We are living through it right now. Believing in religion, any religion, is not the point, plenty of humans have happily lived their lives just giving one mouth service. It is the underpinnings from it which have made most of current human society a, mostly, moralistic and law abiding bunch. The left has been smashing away at it for many years, and now they are using “climate” and this flu out of China to take another attempt at bringing it all down. Sh*ts gonna get real ugly, chi’drens.
The pious will preach humility, self sacrifice and abstinence endlessly right up to the point they are called upon to lead by example. Then they will find all the reasons their previous teachings need “adjustment”. The followers will revolt as soon as following leads to personal discomfort.
Power over people is fought for.
“Peak Oil-Hysteria”
Peak has been eclipsed by worthlessness
“About half of the world’s fossil fuel assets will be worthless by 2036 under a net zero transition, according to research. Countries that are slow to decarbonise will suffer but early movers will profit; the study finds that renewables and freed-up investment will more than make up for the losses to the global economy.
It highlights the risk of producing far more oil and gas than required for future demand, which is estimated to leave $11tn-$14tn (£8.1tn-£10.3tn) in so-called stranded assets – infrastructure, property and investments where the value has fallen so steeply they must be written off.”
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/ng-interactive/2021/nov/04/fossil-fuel-assets-worthless-2036-net-zero-transition
I’ll have a pint of what the Guardian folk are drinking.
I think you’d get a pint of Kool Aid if you wanted what the Guardianistas drink.
So in the absence of anything even remotely meaningful, the Wall Street Journal reports today that the delegates turned their attention to something still more peripheral — methane emissions
the hysteria has reached a peak beyond which it has nowhere to go. From here it will have to be a long decline.
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Yes methane and the Global Warming Potential numbers which has to be one of the best examples of misdirection ever created.
An eventual decline has to happen, but only the very young are likely to witness the event. The “Climate Change Industry” long ago attained “To Big to Fail” status.
It is the 1% super rich that are responsible for the increase in emissions.
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-59157836
The John Kerry’s and Trudeau’s of the world are the cause of the problem. The rest of us have not increased emissions for 30 years. Get rid of the rich, problem solved.
That joker Democrat Senator (cited in the essay) wanted Net Zero Legislation to take to Glasgow. The $3.7 Trillion version of the “Giveaway-the-Country” Legislation wouldn’t even be a good down-payment on the devastating $50-100 Trillion required to build a whole new energy production and distribution infrastructure…let alone refitting 95% of all houses and buildings to run on electricity alone and Buy an entire new fleet of vehicles for Ground transportation and INVENTING a whole new Aviation Fuel made from wind, sunshine, or atomic nuclei (driving up Aviation Fuel costs over 300%…if possible).
Better estimate is $90 Trillion (not including $10 Trillion to help get Africa to Net Zero…and all for NOTHING. Complete sham and the Shamsters know it else they’d be reporting serious numbers and a plan that could work. NOTHING even CLOSE to that is happening.
Leftists are not happy unless they are hysterical about something bad coming in the future …
that never shows up.
How else could one explain 64 consecutive years of predictinga coming global warming crisis, beginning with oceanographer Roger Revelle in 1957.
Leftists loved scary stories as children, and still love them as adults.
If you are happy and optimistic about the future, you are unlikely to be a leftist.
Due Diligence:
We LOVE global warming here in Michigan USA.
Last winter was cold, and we were disappointed.
I suspect this winter will also be cold.
Please package your own global warming,
and send it to us !
This just in, weather report for everywhere:
Increasing darkness after sunset, with cooling, and then becoming increasingly light by dawn with a warming trend setting in. The long range call is for temperatures to become bitterly cold as Winter approaches, especially in the northern sections, with some milder periods, although areas to the south and far west may have extended periods of mild weather throughout the forecast period. Winterlike conditions will be followed by gradual warming by Spring. Probability of intermittent storminess near 100%.
So it was Methane that caused all the warming. Won’t be long and CO2 as the cause will fade into the background, Methane will be found to have a far bigger warming effect then ever thought and all that needs doing is stop it leaking into the atmosphere. CO2 will be found to have a beneficial effect that has been underestimated and will assist in making sure that we can feed the planet.
Very controllable on paper and it should not take too much reprogramming of the believers.
Now the politicians realize that we can’t do without fossil fuel to keep ourselves warm the blame needs to be shifted and as they can’t yet tell the sheeple that it all had nothing to do with CO2 we need a new hydrocarbon scapegoat. Scientists will soon be told that there is only funding for writing articles about the massive warming effect of Methane and how it needs to be stopped from leaking into the atmosphere.
Methane capture and storage will replace CO2 capture which is wonderful as it will create a whole new industry and it can be used again. Burning it is fine just no leaks please.
Europe can’t get too harsh on Russia about pumping gas to avoid a very cold winter of discontent for them. The US is asking other countries to pump more so that their own internal environmental pledges can be kept.
The costs have to be kept down.
And now it is Methane my dear, who would have thought that a gas at such miniscule concentrations could do all that.
Stop the leaks but keep pumping. In a year or so we will hear that the policies are working as there is now 25% less Methane released into the atmosphere and we can keep the planet from warming more than 1.8 degr. C as per pledges made in Glasgow. Hurray that was simple. No more COP’s needed as we are all tired of the endless drivel and we stopped the leak.
“Stop the leak” will replace “Green new Deal” and the back slapping and paying each other can continue.
If they try to ban baked beans there will be a revolution.
(as distinct from a movement, which is what is already being provided)
I remember in the late 1960s or early 1970s that Time Magazine ran a cover picture and title declaring there would be no oil by 1980.
Here’s an Update:
From the article: “Do you think that Joe’s people rented all those specialized armored vehicles from Hertz? I haven’t been able to find confirmation, but I think it’s a completely safe bet that all of the vehicles got flown over from the U.S. on giant military transport planes.”
It was said the other day that the Biden motorcade usually consists of about 40 vehicles.
The 85-car motorcade Biden was using in Italy had extra vehicles in it for the locals.
I don’t know for sure, but would bet that the U.S. cars were all flown in from the United States.
Back in the good old days we learnt about peak oil, which was almost upon us, while at secondary school in England.
but that was 48 years ago !
the graph hasn`t changed much
There is no shortage of hysteria, mainly due to lack of education.
The lack of education is due to institutional education, not doing any education- instead
the focus is daycare and brainwashing.
It’s only after leaving these prisons of so called education, that any kind of education could
begin.
So, have no shortage of hysteria, because we spend trillions of dollars generating hysteria.
This is not a modern thing, it has been ongoing, but one could claim the industrial method of education has been fueled by public concern about the general lack of education- which is widely evident. Or the generation of hysteria has been supercharged within the last few decades, due to dumbness pumping more funds at the enormous stupidity of wasting the lives of children.
The children are taught that Earth is getting too hot, and we are in the coldest 2 million years of the 34 million year ice age.
No one knows how much warming of done by rising CO2 levels.
What is know, we have left what is called The Little Ice Age- a coldest period within many thousands of years, and for some reason we want the average global which about 15 C, return to temperatures of 13 to 14 C has were the temperature of Little Ice Age.
Everyone knows “alternative energy” is a scam. And we no where near peak oil.
But it seems to me China is getting closer to peak coal. And China is not desperate to depend on any “alternative energy” unless you want call nuclear energy as an alternative energy {which it actually, is}.
Same old story like a broken record droning on year after year, decade after decade and now in its third century. The same story comes every few years since the early of the 1860s when “Peak Oil” was declared at the start of the Pennsylvania Oil Rush.
Something that isn’t understood, or at least appreciated, is that the predictions of Peak Oil were based on the then known methods of extraction. The development of horizontal drilling with hydraulic fracturing was a technological innovation almost as profound as solving the barriers to controlled thermonuclear fusion. It is a new game! But, that doesn’t mean that alternative sources of crude oil relieve us of the issues of a finite resource. It simply extends the time to Peak Oil. Just because one’s cancer goes into remission doesn’t mean that you can then expect to live forever! The good news is that the reprieve may allow us enough time to find an alternative source of energy that isn’t unreliable and intermittent.
Known reserves is not the same thing as economically available reserves. We are very likely at or slightly past the point at which oil extraction became less viable economically; production may have already peaked.
Wanna bet?
You got that right. Recall the military transport plane that crashed in Wyoming while transporting gear for the Clintons.
I learned about the Hubbert Curve in the 1970s as a student taking a petroleum geology class. It was always understood that the global production curve and the US curve were two different things with peaks 50 years apart. Also the curve applied to existing technology: extraction from sandstone and carbonate reservoirs. It was understood that new technology opening up new reserves (horizontal wells in oil shales) would be a game changer. Even so, the depletion curve for an oil shale is much steeper than for a conventional well (it must be replaced faster). But it is a game-changer opening up new reserves.
I listen to the public debate and always come back to uncovered details. Petroleum products are used not just for fuels but for materials. About 25% goes to gasoline, mineral spirits and aviation gas. 25% goes to intermediate distillates, mostly diesel fuel and jet fuel. Fuels are not that interesting. The other 50% goes to lubricating oils, asphalt, synthetic fibers, paint, artificial rubber, wood stains and finishes, plastics, etc. It is the 50% used for materials that will be missed most and is the most irreplaceable.
Hubbert’s curve has been extended in time due to technology reaching new reserves. It has not been invalidated. There remains another untapped reserve: clathrates (gas hydrates). Nevertheless, conservation is good policy. It would be prudent to replace existing coal and natural gas power plants with geothermal (in the west) and nuclear (in the east) as “base power”. This is my measure of whether environmentalists are serious. When they abandon the pipe dream of wind and solar, temporary solutions without a valid battery technology, and go to something that works, then and only then will I know they are serious.
Life throws you curve balls. I studied for a graduate degree in petroleum engineering in the 1980s after completing my scholarship obligation to the Army. Of course the great bust occurred in 1986. It was then I learned that it is possible to study a specialty engineering subject and never work in it. I was not recruited on campus along with all of my classmates. Oil companies will not hire somebody without experience. How do you get experience? You are hired by on-campus recruiting. But there was no on-campus recruiting in the late 1980s. So I clean up toxic messes on military installations instead. These messes were created not out of negligence but from bad environmental engineering practices from lack of understanding of fate, transport, and toxicity. 40 years after CERCLA was signed we are still paying for cleanup. Wind and solar are similar. Being thrown out there without an understanding of environmental problems they create (every solution creates a new problem), without the necessary battery storage technology, they are tomorrow’s cleanup.
if humans were a fair and decent minded lot, we would understand the importance of saving some for whatever life springs up after the next meteor strike.
Mr. too: Yes, it’s critical that we act now to save the planet from the future you imagine.
“the world’s economic and political stability, which relies on an abundant supply of cheap oil, is in serious jeopardy.”
At least Campbell got that right. Unfortunately, the enviro/progs are busy trying to crush our economic and political stability with their “keep it in the ground” hogwash.
Of course they were!
Only by pre-inspecting and arming Biden’s fleet, can the Secret Service fully vouch the vehicles are safe.
No, they’re not likely to announce where, how or when these vehicles are transported. That is a critical security issue.
It would take several C5 Super Galaxies to transport 85 hardened, armored and likely armed Biden escort ICE vehicles.
Capable of carrying 176,610 lbs, (80,110 kg) of cargo means that at least two Super Galaxies were used, likely three.
Then there are the support aircraft; escort fighter planes, F/A 18E/F super hornets, and F35 Lightning strike fighters; A couple of E3 AWACS sentry aircraft; USAF flying tankers to keep all of the planes fueled; and the support crews both Air Force and USN needs to keep all of these planes flying.
There are likely countries that emit less CO₂ than Biden’s flying circus of losers and morons.
I think more than weight is floor space.
Cargo can be put on tall pallets and stacked.
Do they do that with these vehicles?
I tend to doubt it…that would take an awful lot of time, and also a bunch of people, both of which present problems of security and practicality.
“The C-5 features a malfunction detection analysis and recording system to identify errors throughout the aircraft.[33] The cargo compartment is 121 ft (37 m) long, 13.5 ft (4.1 m) high, and 19 ft (5.8 m) wide, or just over 31,000 cu ft (880 m3). It can accommodate up to 36 463L master pallets or a mix of palletized cargo and vehicles. The nose and aft cargo-bay doors open the full width and height of the cargo bay to maximize efficient loading of oversized equipment. Full-width ramps enable loading double rows of vehicles from either end of the cargo hold.[50]
The C-5 Galaxy is capable of moving nearly every type of military combat equipment, including such bulky items as the Army armored vehicle launched bridge, at 74 short tons (67 t), from the United States to any location on the globe;[50] and of accommodating up to six Boeing AH-64 Apache helicopters or five Bradley Fighting Vehicles at one time.”
If those vehicles are about the footprint of a Bradley FV, it would seem that it took 17 of them to carry 85 vehicles.
One may wonder in awe at the Almighty Creator who filled our cosmic blue pearl with such vast quantities of oil, gas and coal. Does He intend to keep us warm and comfy as we learn to transition to nuclear energy? The pope is tragically uneducated.